Trying to get Fico scores up.

[Anonymous]

Currently I’m trying to get scores up to buy a home and later get a real credit card that is not secured or subprime. I have increased my Fico 8 from the low 500’s to low 600’s over the past 12 months I opened 3 credit cards with limits of $300 Capital one unsecured, $500 quick silver secured and $1000 US bank secured. The CCs helped my score the most. I have two auto loans , 1 is new, 6 months old and the other is 4.5 years old. All 5 accounts are paid on time since they were opened. I have used the AZEO method every month with the credit cards and my aggregate utilization is usually 1-3%. Now the bad part. I have 4 charge offs all closed but have balances between $500 to $800 dollars. Every time I get any type of monitoring done thru karma, Credit Sesame, Experian Fico 8, Fico auto 2 and 8 ,Fico credit card score 2, 3 and 8 it states recent charge offs, delinquency, etc is always mentioned first followed by too many inquiries and or newer accounts. My question is what approach would you take to get over the hump? I would like another 50 points to at least get me to the 670-680 Fico range. I seem to be stuck at a 612 TU, 624 Experian and 628 Equifax Fico 8 scores. Nothing has moved in 2 months.

[DapprD]

Looks like you have a good base going, it's those 4 CO accounts that are killing you.

Are you in a position to pay off those CO accounts?  If so I would suggest trying to PFD and get those negative nasty's removed from your report.

If I had to take a guess, each one of those is probably worth at least 20 points each CO.

[dynamicvb]

What is the last updated date on the chargeoffs? If they are updating each month then they will continue to look new in Fico's eyes. The best thing on those is to get the creditors to agree to a pay for delete. Where you pay them in agreement for them removing the tradeline. If that does not work( search around the rebuilding forum to figure out which ones may do it), then its better to just pay them. Start with the newest first as that one is probably hurting the most. You can try to settle for a lesser amount too, but the important thing is to get it to stop updating so it can age and your scores will improve over time.

If you list them out, then someone will be able to point you to ways that may result in deletions. I would take this over to the rebuilding forum as you will get the best information there as many are going through the same thing.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for responses so far. Two of the collections said they would delete portfolio recovery and convergence (not sure of spelling) but 30 days after payment clears. The other two offered settlements 25-40% lower but don’t delete account from credit report. 3 of the 4 report monthly. Will I get any boost if two get deleted of the 4 ? I thought if you have 1 collection the hit is as bad as having multiple collections?

[dynamicvb]

Getting the last baddie gone normally gives the best boost, but 1 paid collection on your reports is much better than 4 unpaid.

[moosemoney]

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@Anonymous wrote:
Thanks for responses so far. Two of the collections said they would delete portfolio recovery and convergence (not sure of spelling) but 30 days after payment clears. The other two offered settlements 25-40% lower but don’t delete account from credit report. 3 of the 4 report monthly. Will I get any boost if two get deleted of the 4 ? I thought if you have 1 collection the hit is as bad as having multiple collections?

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Can only speak of my own personal experience, but my scores have gone up a bit with each and every removal of C/O or Collection. I currently have two left on my report, one with a $0 balance (ages off in September 2019) and one that is reporting $590 balance but have since done a PFD and that one should be deleted within the next 30-45 days, and my scores are decent at this point. In fact, with the removal of one C/O alone, my scores shot up ~60 points... So, going by my own experience, I do not believe that having one collection has the same negative effect on your score as having multiple. Especially if you are also building good credit as you work on the removals (as I have done).

One person's experience is not enough to gather significant data points though, so take this with a grain of salt.

[Anonymous]

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@DapprD wrote:

If I had to take a guess, each one of those is probably worth at least 20 points each CO.

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Unfortunately negative items don't work that way and dramatically diminishing returns exist when you're talking multiples.  To answer the OPs question of whether getting 2 out of 4 removed would increase his scores, the answer is likely No.  The only way the removal of 2 out of 4 would possibly increase your scores in my opinion is if the 2 you got removed were the most recent and the others were a bit older, thus moving back the date of your most recent negative item.

A final major negative item being removed from your CR is usually good for around 80 points, but removing others prior to the final is often good for 0 points or very few depending on the age/severity of what's being removed.

[xaximus]

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@Anonymous wrote:

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@DapprD wrote:

If I had to take a guess, each one of those is probably worth at least 20 points each CO.

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Unfortunately negative items don't work that way and dramatically diminishing returns exist when you're talking multiples.  To answer the OPs question of whether getting 2 out of 4 removed would increase his scores, the answer is likely No.  The only way the removal of 2 out of 4 would possibly increase your scores in my opinion is if the 2 you got removed were the most recent and the others were a bit older, thus moving back the date of your most recent negative item.

A final major negative item being removed from your CR is usually good for around 80 points, but removing others prior to the final is often good for 0 points or very few depending on the age/severity of what's being removed.

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Agreed with @Anonymous on this. The impact of removing 1 negative when still having others will not have much of an impact, possibly a few points if that. It's when all negatives are cleared is when the best/most increase comes. That's why when anyone tackles baddies, it's best to remove all and not just some. @OP - I would reach out to the rebuilding forum and post all the companies that you have CO's with, amounts, etc. They are more informed on the rebuilding side and can give you the best guidance on how to remove the baddies.

[moosemoney]

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@moosemoney wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:
Thanks for responses so far. Two of the collections said they would delete portfolio recovery and convergence (not sure of spelling) but 30 days after payment clears. The other two offered settlements 25-40% lower but don’t delete account from credit report. 3 of the 4 report monthly. Will I get any boost if two get deleted of the 4 ? I thought if you have 1 collection the hit is as bad as having multiple collections?

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Can only speak of my own personal experience, but my scores have gone up a bit with each and every removal of C/O or Collection. I currently have two left on my report, one with a $0 balance (ages off in September 2019) and one that is reporting $590 balance but have since done a PFD and that one should be deleted within the next 30-45 days, and my scores are decent at this point. In fact, with the removal of one C/O alone, my scores shot up ~60 points... So, going by my own experience, I do not believe that having one collection has the same negative effect on your score as having multiple. Especially if you are also building good credit as you work on the removals (as I have done).

One person's experience is not enough to gather significant data points though, so take this with a grain of salt.

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To go into more detail of my score increases as baddies have come off:

1. Removal of Public Lein +75pts
   • Total remaining negatives:
     • 2 collections with balances
     • 1 collection with -0- balance
     • 1 charge-off with a balance
     • 1 charge-off with -0- balance
     • late mortgage payment (120days) 6 months old
2. Removal of 2 collections with balance (1 will re-emerge later) & 1 charge-off with -0- balance +14pts
   • Total remaining negatives:
     • 1 collection with -0- balance
     • 1 charge-off with a balance
     • late mortgage payment (120days) 18 months old
3. 1 collections with balance re-emerged -20pts
   • Total remaining negatives:
     • 1 collection with balance
     • 1 collection with -0- balance
     • 1 charge-off with a balance
     • late mortgage payment (120days) 20 months old
4. Removal of 1 charge-off with balance +30 to 60pts (depending on bureau)
   • Total remaining negatives:
     • 1 collection with balance
     • 1 collection with -0- balance
     • late mortgage payment (120days) 26 months old

If anything, it looks like charge-offs with a balance do more damage than collections with a balance, but again this is just one person's experience and does seem to go against the consensus.

[Anonymous]

Also, keep in mind that FICO 8 isn't used for mortgages, FICO 5,4, and 2 are used and they tend to have lower scores than FICO 8.