Gov’t Student Loan and late payments

[sir0925]

My fiancé and are looking to buy a house next year and we were looking into her credit report to start working on that. 

Her credit score is around 640 due to a couple diff factors. She only has 1 credit card with CL $5000 with 50% utilization.  She had the ability to pay it off but was just making small payments - that amount has now been paid off. 

Ive added her to 3 higher CL, zero to very low Credit Utilization credit card accounts to positively impact her credit score. 

She has zero credit checks, so no issues there. 

The Main issue revolves around 4 separate federal educational loans (4K-5.5k each) where she did not pay for 4-5 months straight. Her dad was a big part of helping her navigate the financial situations but he passed away at that time and those accounts began to not be paid. When her mom found out, they fully paid off all 4 accounts. Unfortunately those are still on her credit report as paid, but with late payments. It's only been 2.5 years so it'll be a long time for them to just drop off.

Is there anyway we can dispute or get those off since the accounts are fully paid for?   

[Anonymous]

They will not remove or do anything about it they will cite the higher education act stating they have to report what was correct at the time and cannot do goodwill adjustments

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@sir0925 wrote:

My fiancé and are looking to buy a house next year and we were looking into her credit report to start working on that. 

Her credit score is around 640 due to a couple diff factors. She only has 1 credit card with CL $5000 with 50% utilization.  She had the ability to pay it off but was just making small payments - that amount has now been paid off. 

Ive added her to 3 higher CL, zero to very low Credit Utilization credit card accounts to positively impact her credit score. 

She has zero credit checks, so no issues there. 

The Main issue revolves around 4 separate federal educational loans (4K-5.5k each) where she did not pay for 4-5 months straight. Her dad was a big part of helping her navigate the financial situations but he passed away at that time and those accounts began to not be paid. When her mom found out, they fully paid off all 4 accounts. Unfortunately those are still on her credit report as paid, but with late payments. It's only been 2.5 years so it'll be a long time for them to just drop off.

Is there anyway we can dispute or get those off since the accounts are fully paid for?   

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[Anonymous]

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@sir0925 wrote:

My fiancé and are looking to buy a house next year and we were looking into her credit report to start working on that. 

Her credit score is around 640 due to a couple diff factors. She only has 1 credit card with CL $5000 with 50% utilization.  She had the ability to pay it off but was just making small payments - that amount has now been paid off. 

Ive added her to 3 higher CL, zero to very low Credit Utilization credit card accounts to positively impact her credit score. 

She has zero credit checks, so no issues there. 

The Main issue revolves around 4 separate federal educational loans (4K-5.5k each) where she did not pay for 4-5 months straight. Her dad was a big part of helping her navigate the financial situations but he passed away at that time and those accounts began to not be paid. When her mom found out, they fully paid off all 4 accounts. Unfortunately those are still on her credit report as paid, but with late payments. It's only been 2.5 years so it'll be a long time for them to just drop off.

Is there anyway we can dispute or get those off since the accounts are fully paid for?   

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if they are paid off, you can absolutely request gw removal of lates.

I cant quote the section, but it states lates will be listed until account is paid. Something to that extent.

I would not dispute them, that will get you maybe more lates added.

Write gw letters

[calyx]

If you try to dispute them, the servicers will just confirm, so don't do that.

Definitely go for goodwill deletions - check the rebuilding forum for the saturation technique - write honest, polite letters explaining the situation and keep sending them until you can get a sympathetic ear.   The fact that they're paid will be a huge positive and if you're lucky, they might delete the lates or the entire tradelines.

[Anonymous]

I'm really curious if paying the loans off really makes the higher education act rules about late removals void, I know paying off a Perkins loan after lates are 7 yrs old makes them go away, I don't know about regular student loans, I'm very curious about this?

[calyx]

They must report lines that are not paid.   No one said anything about paid lines

Technically, my servicer had no reason to delete my negative lines at all, but they did (I still owe on my student loans, but not the lines with them).   I would also add that NOT reporting the lines isn't technically against the rules.  Not accurately reporting is (like saying a late wasn't).   No reporting isn't technically inaccurate.

If they're paid,  it's easier for them to hit gray areas.  But unpaid, there's no reason to goodwill it.

[Anonymous]

Great advice already. I agree with trying for the goodwill. 

The other thing is it doesn't matter if she only has that one credit card. The latest are locked in but might not be doing that much damage. She could still be in the 700's. 

From what I understand she should not pay off the credit card entirely. She should have a small balance reporting to max out the points. And adding her to your cards is only helpful if they are older and your utilization is lower than 8.9%. Pref 0%. Increasing TCL alone won't help her score. 

You can get some really helpful advise about credit reports/ scores and mortgages in the mortgage thread too. 

Best of luck to you both. 

[Anonymous]

Meh at this point for me its not worth fussing with it i dont want them to delete the whole lines those are propping up my age of accounts, im less than a year from clean on TU 9 months on EQ and a month on EX not poiking the bear im not applying for anyrhing immediate anyway