A little bit of good news and an update I wanted to share. I have good credit in sight!
Summary/TL;DR: I made a post a while back in regards to settling a charged-off account with Chase. I paid it off early (agreed on $1,000 / orignally owed $5,200), and a few weeks later when my credit updated, all three bureaus showed a 62 point increase. Stoked because this puts me in a much better range for a mortgage application and with a few more payments on my remaining cards to lower my utilization, 720+ is in sight.
Longer Story: I had gone through a nasty divorce over 3 years ago. I had 4 credit cards. The Chase Card had the highest minimum ($200 +/- a month), and my other three cards all added up to around $200 +/- month.
Didn't notice my ex had charged a lot on the card right after she moved out (it was saved online on her computer). We "shared" it but it was only in my name. Spoke with my lawyer about it, but aside from paying her more money to pursue legal action, which I didn't have, I ultimately let it get charged off while keeping the remaining cards in good status (it made more sense to pay 3 at $200/mo rather and let 1 get charged off than vice versa).
Anyone who has gone through a divorce know how it drains your financials. I had to max out the remaining cards to pay my lawyer, borrow from 401k, and literally slash expenses, and live off bare minimum.
Fortunately, everything slowly got better. Remarried, paid off my lawyer, my child support got cut in half (originally, my ex [who worked under the table] reported no income for the first year, so I had to pay the max rate which was insane).
When life was back to normal, I made goal earlier this year to attack my credit. I was at 100% utilization, and that charge off was lingering, and I was dwelling in the mid-500's. Called Chase, explained what happened, they offered me a settlement of $1,000 (it was at $5,200).
After getting my utilization down, and settling, I am now cruising at high-600s. Also have a bonus coming in this week, and can pay a huge chunk towards my remaining cards to get my utilization down even further.
It sucks going through bad credit. I finally feel I can breathe a little bit. It's taken a lot of work, cutting expenses, and just busting my tail, but this increase, as well as the steady increases from the utilization down, has been worth it. I hope others who have gone or going through similar experiences know there is a light at the end of the tunnel if you stay the course.
Thanks for this board for the advice, and just wanted to share a bit of good news.
Starting Score: 652/644/654 (March 2019) 
