Your credit report makes or breaks your ability to get loans, and sometimes even jobs. The information that TransUnion, Equifax, and Experian add to your records carries a lot of weight. Wrong items with negative information can get you reject for everything from a small loan or new credit card to a car loan or mortgage. Surely there's some oversight for something so important, right? Surely the credit bureaus have a program in place to catch and remove errors, right?
No, they don't.
As scary as it sounds, the credit bureaus add information to your credit reports continually without ever verifying it. No law requires to them check out information before they add it to your credit records. Your only protection comes from your right to free annual credit reports and your ability to dispute things on those credit reports. That's why it's so important to check your records regularly and fix bad credit caused by mistakes. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), the credit bureaus have to take action once you notify them of errors with a credit report dispute. My credit repair ebook for Kindle explains much more about this process for only $2.99 (free to Amazon Prime members).
Showing posts with label credit reports. Show all posts
Showing posts with label credit reports. Show all posts
Friday, January 6, 2012
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Your Credit Repairs Itself in Seven Years
Bad credit hurts you in many ways, lowering your credit score and causing credit application rejections. Often you can remove a lot of bad credit from your credit reports by finding items with mistakes and disputing them. Sometimes you can't fix bad credit completely, and you're stuck with negative items.
Fortunately, most bad credit entries on your credit reports can only appear for a limited time. The vast majority of negatives, like late payments, defaults, charge-offs, judgments, collection agency accounts, repossessions, and foreclosures get removed automatically after seven years. Bankruptcy stays on your credit reports between seven and ten years.
When checking your free annual credit reports, don't just look for mistakes in the individual items. Look for anything over seven years old and dispute the old negative items. Getting rid of them gives you an immediate benefit. Learn more about credit repair for only $2.99 with my comprehensive eBook (free to Amazon Prime members).
Fortunately, most bad credit entries on your credit reports can only appear for a limited time. The vast majority of negatives, like late payments, defaults, charge-offs, judgments, collection agency accounts, repossessions, and foreclosures get removed automatically after seven years. Bankruptcy stays on your credit reports between seven and ten years.
When checking your free annual credit reports, don't just look for mistakes in the individual items. Look for anything over seven years old and dispute the old negative items. Getting rid of them gives you an immediate benefit. Learn more about credit repair for only $2.99 with my comprehensive eBook (free to Amazon Prime members).
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
Charge-Offs and Collections
Charge-offs and collections are two very different things. The same account can give you two bad credit entries on each of your three credit reports if the lender charges it off, then tells it to a collection agency. The original account shows that it's charged off, which is very bad for your credit score. The debt collector adds a collection account that harms you even more.
You can sometimes fix bad credit that involves charge-offs and collection accounts by finding disputable mistakes. Debt collectors sometimes buy large portfolios of bad debt accounts for pennies on the dollar. They don't have proper documentation, so the credit report entry has some sort of mistake. You can challenge it, and the collection agency won't have the proper information to validate it. Now your credit is repaired, at least partially, because the collection account is erased for lack of validation. This process is covered in depth, with easy to follow steps, in my $2.99 Kindle book on free credit repair (the book is free to Amazon Prime members).
The original account is trickier, but it's not impossible that you'll someday find a wrong date, amount, spelling, or something else in the charge-off entry that gives you the right to legally file a dispute. Remember, disputes are free, and you're entitled to free annual credit reports, so it never hurts to check. Read my book if you're not sure how to fix your credit for free yourself.
You can sometimes fix bad credit that involves charge-offs and collection accounts by finding disputable mistakes. Debt collectors sometimes buy large portfolios of bad debt accounts for pennies on the dollar. They don't have proper documentation, so the credit report entry has some sort of mistake. You can challenge it, and the collection agency won't have the proper information to validate it. Now your credit is repaired, at least partially, because the collection account is erased for lack of validation. This process is covered in depth, with easy to follow steps, in my $2.99 Kindle book on free credit repair (the book is free to Amazon Prime members).
The original account is trickier, but it's not impossible that you'll someday find a wrong date, amount, spelling, or something else in the charge-off entry that gives you the right to legally file a dispute. Remember, disputes are free, and you're entitled to free annual credit reports, so it never hurts to check. Read my book if you're not sure how to fix your credit for free yourself.
Sunday, January 1, 2012
The Credit Repair Resolution
One of your New Years Resolutions should be to repair your credit. Don't pay anyone to fix your credit. Fixing bad credit yourself is within your reach. If you don't know how, my $2.99 Kindle eBook gives you all the steps you'll need to fix bad credit. It's free if you're an Amazon Prime member. Click here to go to Amazon and read an excerpt from the book.
Once you know the process, it's good to start in January by ordered a copy of all three of your credit reports. Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion all have to give you a free copy every 12 months by law. Once you finish fixing your credit, restart the process in January, 2013, but only order one credit report. If everything looks good, order the next one in May and the last one in September. That spreads your credit report monitoring throughout the year. You don't need to pay for credit monitoring service because your right to free annual credit reports lets you do it so easily yourself.
Once you know the process, it's good to start in January by ordered a copy of all three of your credit reports. Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion all have to give you a free copy every 12 months by law. Once you finish fixing your credit, restart the process in January, 2013, but only order one credit report. If everything looks good, order the next one in May and the last one in September. That spreads your credit report monitoring throughout the year. You don't need to pay for credit monitoring service because your right to free annual credit reports lets you do it so easily yourself.
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