Monday, February 15, 2010

Fixing Our Credit Score

This is about my families journey to paying off old bills.
Right now on mine and Tony's credit report the only thing that shows on the positive, paid on time side is my car. Because we don't have any established credit and so many things on the delinquent side it caused our credit score to be in the poor category. With poor credit we can't get a loan for anything and we can not get a credit card to help establish credit! Just to get my car we put 5,000.00 down and have a interest rate of 21%, but every month it brings the credit score up. We got my car last March and Tony's credit score was 549 and a few months ago when he checked it it was 600. Since then we have paid off or started paying on some of the things on the delinquent side of our credit report, no it will not help our credit immediately when it's paid off but it will show as paid in full or paid on time instead of delinquent, and that is something that people look at when giving you a loan or credit card.


June 2009 Tony paid off a 2,200.00 credit card bill from back when he was 18 for 1,100.00 that now shows as paid in full.


July 2009 there was a knock on the door and I was served papers for an outstanding doctor bill. I was so nervous about my upcoming court date that I called the creditor and asked if I could settle my debt outside of court, they agreed. September 11th I made my first payment that was my "good faith payment" and agreed that every month on the 16th 263.90 would come directly out of my checking account until March 2010 when my debt would be payed off. I wanted it to come directly out of my checking account so that no matter what, the 16th of every month I had to make sure I had 263.90 in my checking account or my account would end up in the negative and I would be left with a ton of fees. After the 263.90 comes out tomorrow I will only have one
more payment left on that bill and then it will show as paid in full!


Today February 15th is the day of my first payment of 222.00 to a creditor for a crap hole apartment that we lived in when we first moved to Colorado. The total of that bill is 2,220.00 and that will take 10 months to pay off. With the near ending of my doctor bill comes the beginning of another bill. I am very excited it is working this way and that we didn't end up having to pay them at the same time.


February 8th 2010 I received a call from a creditor letting me know she just received my bill from my last apartment complex in the amount of 316.00 and that she was giving me the opportunity to pay it immediately before it showed on my credit report. Of course I jumped all over that offer and this Friday February 19th that bill will be payed off.


All that we have left to pay is a few small bills that have gone to a creditor and one big bill for a surgery Prestyn had when he was 10 months old and that bill is 2,500.00


In November 2009 we tried to buy a house. This is when we learned Tony's credit score was 600. This is also when we learned that the only positive thing on our credit report was my car. We were told our imcome was above where it needed to be for a loan we were just being held back because of our credit score and the things on our negative side of our credit report in how they all said delinquet. We were told that if we can get the things on the negative side of our credit report to show as paid in full or on time that it will help us get loans or a credit card so that we can have something else on the positive side of our credit report so that we can build up our credit score some more. With the car alone bringing up our credit score it is taking longer than it would with multiple things. At the rate our credit score is going up with the car alone it will be about 6 more months for us to have a good enough credit score to buy a house and we really want a house by April so we can get that 8 grand and use it as part of the down payment. This is why having the things in the negative side say paid in full or paid on time is important to us and the person getting us the loan for our house. Tony got another raise in January that has made us very comfortable financially so paying off all those old bills has become very easy and we can do it in a quick amount of time. We just can not believe that we didn't do this sooner. Right now we don't miss the money that comes out of my account every month for these debts which is why it is so important for us to keep paying while we don't miss it. Hopefully we can get a loan or credit card in a few months so we can have something else to show in the positive side as "paid on time" to help bring our credit score up some more.

4 comments:

  1. eeekkkk why didn't it put any spaces in my paragraphs? It's all a big mess lol, sorry..

    ReplyDelete
  2. Well pat yourself on the back for taking care of all your bills - many people would just let it slide & let the creditors come after them in court. Have you ever looked into those prepaid credit cards - they kind of work like a debit card. You put money on them and use them like a credit card and it goes toward your credit score - you can never charge more than you have on the card which is nice. We did that a year before we bought our house to help bring our score up. Just google pre-paid credit cards & make sure they report to the credit bureaus. Good Luck!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Jenny- Our bank told us about this a couple weeks ago, we just weren't sure how it worked but I am going to look into it and get one asap. Do you remember which prepaid credit card you used?

    ReplyDelete
  4. There are lots of things to be thankful for but i guess none of them is my debts. I don't want to sound bitter but it is something i can hardly be proud of. My family knows about all my debts, they really wanted me to help on this but then, all of them have their own life too, until they discuss me about the free credit repair and the credit report score, I really work on hard just do get over it. Hope you can also fix your credit score and be free from debts like me =)

    Thanks

    ReplyDelete