can some one please explain..........

misty · 02-06-2008, 02:44 AM

How to really Read and understand your credit report?

I pulled 2/3 of my free ones.. the other one I have to call tomorrow for some reason...

So I wrote down all the creditors from my one report... (experian) and it totaled up to 4415.00 which is AWESOME! totally reachable!!

BUT

Then I read the other E one and theirs is so much diffearnt... one creditor I saw was the same creditor but had a differant address & total...

So now I am confused... SO here are my questions.. if you can answer any PLEASE lmk!! tyia!!

1. Should I write a letter to each creditor that does not have a phone number and ASK what I owe & if they will take a lower amount?

2. If their "On record date" is almost here Should I just Ignore that one or should I start paying on it... My example is one of my creditors dates is May 2008... Should I pay them or wait it out??

3. What if they dont accept a parcial (sp) payment? Is it true that I dont have to pay them then??

I know I had more but I guess these are the important ones... Our car just got repo'd the other day so we are going to be paying that off with income tax this weekend.. I THINK. we are not 100% sure if it is worth it (we totally got screwed on the finance charges) BUT if we do pay it off will they put it on our credit as a repo/charge off? It is a Buy/here pay/here place... And is NOT on our credit as of now...

Ty guys again!!

getnrichslowly · 02-06-2008, 06:40 AM

I'm sorry I can't explain any of it to you but I am proud of you for taking the big step to finding out everything you owe.
Don't stop now, get that debt gone!
You can do it!
(hopefully someone else can explain it all)

FrugalMomof3 · 02-06-2008, 07:54 AM

Ok, sometimes the 3 credit bureaus have different info but if they are showing different amounts owed either you recently made a payment and the higher one is not reflecting this or you could call the company you owe the money to and explain to them what you saw and how much is owed as of this date.

As for one almost hitting the 7 year mark, my suggestion is to let it go, if it will come off your credit report in May 2008 that's only 3 months from now, if you make one payment even if for a penny it will stay on your credit report for another 7 years so your best bet (I know not very nice) is to not make a payment and in 3 months it will be off your credit report (If it is not you can always dispute and ask them to take it off, after 7 years they have to).

As for other ones with ending dates in the future (years in the future) you might want to make some payments on it. If they are in collections already, try calling them to see if they will take a settlement offer and tell them how much you can pay on a monthly or even weekly/bi-weekly basis, most often times than not, they will accept the offer since they want to get paid.

I wish you the best of luck, this happened to me years ago before I wantedto buy a home, I paid off everything that was in collections and even negotiated with the companies to list with the credit bureaus "Paid in full" instead of the normal "Paid off for less than the balance - charge off"

Best of luck and let us know how things turn out

mmy2grls · 02-06-2008, 10:11 AM

When I got my free copies I disputed everything that did not seem familar to me. 8 out of 11 things on my report came right off because the debt couldn't be verified.

lve2save · 02-06-2008, 10:03 PM

You should definatley check out creditboards.com They are a big help with dealing with credit reports. Also, most of the time buy here pay here places do not report to the credit bureau.

kmsinsa · 02-06-2008, 11:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by lve2save

You should definatley check out creditboards.com They are a big help with dealing with credit reports. Also, most of the time buy here pay here places do not report to the credit bureau.

I was going to mention creditboards.com as well. They provide sample letters and will answer any question that you have.

Momto2Boyz · 02-07-2008, 07:50 AM

Woo Hoo...this is my area of expertise! I was a loan officer at a credit union, for 7 years and I specialized in people with poor credit. My job (instead of credit agencies that push you into a higher rate) was to help you clean up your credit in order to qualify for a good loan.

So, I spend 7 years decipher credit reports and dealing with collection agencies. Now, I am guessing that most of these things are already in collections from the way you are talking. Which is actually a good thing. If they are in collections, then you can call each one and offer to pay a settlement. If they agree, then you also make sure they will agree to remove the charge off from your credit report completely, and make sure you get it in writing.

The statute of limitations now on credit reports is 10 years, not 7. This is a fairly recent change, and it is up to the collector to decide how long they want to keep it on there (keep in mind that creditors have to pay each month to report each account)...so they may take it off after 7, but they don't have to.

If you have one that is about to come off, it may actually be able to stay there for another 3 years. Plus, just becuase it comes off your credit report that doesn't mean that you don't owe that money anymore. They can try to collect for 7 years, when that time is up (like yours is in May), they can change the status of the collection to a charge off, which renews it's date, and it can stay on for another 7 years.

On average, you can usually get them to lower your payments by 50%, but they are going to want one lump sum payment. So, if you can do that it will help you alot.

Depending on how bad your credit score already is, a repo may not hurt you that much. Most people, by the time they are at a reposession, their credit score is so low, from not being able to meet their minimums, that the repo doesn't lower their credit score a significant amount. So, just another thought there.

I hope you get it all figured out! I know how hard credit reports are to read...I remember when I first started working with them I was sooooo confused!

Momto2Boyz · 02-07-2008, 07:53 AM

I forgot to add what I posted to say! Duh!

If there is no phone number for a collection agency, you can call the credit bureau and request the phone number for them. By law, they have to give you the phone number on record for that company (and each company is required to have a number on record), so you will be able to get them that way.

If those numbers are no good and don't help you...do a simple information call. Call the 800 directory assistance number which I believe is 1-800-555-1212 (I think that is it), and they might be able to help you to.

Don't bother writing them, becuase you will never hear back from them. Just find the numbers and call them!

Paquita · 02-08-2008, 11:26 AM

I too recommend Creditboards. They have a lot of good information. Just to let everyone know, for any Dave Ramsey fans, they are NOT DR friendly.

misty · 02-09-2008, 01:58 AM

Wow thank you guys for all that info! !I am going to check that site right now...

We are going to go and pay off the van and get it back. We need it and know what is already wrong with it AND no payments So that is great :-D

I am hoping they will put Paid in full on our report instead of repo. But the lady that is in charge of billing is a real... well I am sure you know lol. The owner is supposedly "christian" And I say that because his ways arent very christian... needless to say the van was 5000 to start.. we had a 4000 downpayment and still financed 5000... go figure. We were desperate so we NEEDED the van kwim?

Anyways. I am going threw old bills now that I am assuming are not in collections yet. I am writing them all down and figured I would snow ball those first.

Ty guys for the info!! Oh and a quick question to anyone who has recorded all the bill information down...

Do you guys KEEP the bill or just mail a check w/ your account number on it? I am SO tired of paper trails in the house kwim?? lol.

Ty again!!

FrugalMomof3 · 02-09-2008, 09:44 AM

From experience this is what I did.

1. Called companies to make either A) settlement amount if I had the cash on hand or B) Payment plans with automatic deduction each and every month.

2. Once the payments were paid in full, I asked them to mail or fax me a letter stating my account balance has been satisfied/paid in full as of DATE.

3. Keep those papers for your records just in case they try to give you heck.

My best suggestion would be for you to do auto draft each and every month, that means you and your bank have proof or your payments and no paper trails. If you dont get your cancelled checks back you might want to set that up so you received them because most companies with auto-debit will write out a check payable to them from your account, so getting these back is alos proof of payment.

Good luck and glad your going to get the car back BUT I am confused, you paid $5000 for the car and put a $4000 down payment and still paid another $5000 on top of that? Was the car $5000 or $9000?

If that's the case, you dont owe anything, seems they owe you.

misty · 02-15-2008, 01:08 PM

Ty again for the info!!

oh and yeah our car was 5000 (well 5 and some odd numbers) But the way they worked it is Finance fees... We were in a bind and NEEDED the vehicle and looked every where else So we were suckered into it...

But we paid it off and Now have our van with NO payments!!! YEAH us! lol.