My husband and I pulled our CR from myfico.com and his had a statement under "Understanding Your FICO Score" that I had not known about. It states that if you have consumer finance accounts on your CR that it will lower the score, EVEN if they are paid off and closed but that the impact will lessen as time passes. Well, I can see that it makes sense due to finance companies lending to those with poor credit, but that doesn't necesssarily mean that someone is a "risk" because they have an acct (closed or not) with a finance company. My question is would you try to have those TL removed from the report so that it increases the score? There are a couple that are 7-8 yrs old that I assume really don't have much impact on his score but there is one paid and closed with zero lates that is from 2010. Would you suggest trying to get it deleted? If so, how? Since it's all good I am at a loss. I have always left those alone because they are good TL's but this makes me wonder if they are the reason his score is slow to come up.
I wouldn't bother at all with the old ones. The recent one might be somewhat of a concern, but it seems ridiculous to me to focus on removing any account that was paid and closed with zero lates. What else is a concern in his credit history? There has to be some other things that are probably having a greater effect on his overall FICO Scores.
He has 3 accts that have 30 day lates. One of those 3 has 2 lates and the other 2 have only 1 each. The total of 4 lates are all 12 months or older. And then one other acct has 2 lates from 2008 so they are prolly not having much impact if any on it (this acct is paid and closed, others are open). He has 2 new accts in the last year, one installment and one CC. both in good standing and the CC is at about 25-30% utilization and paying down every month. It will be at $0 in 2 payments. Has 0% interest. And other than that...all he has is the finance companies on there. His FICO was 671 and I know the lates are what hit the hardest and then buying the computer on the 12 mos 0% int made it worse because the utilization on the card was almost maxed for a few months until the payments we made got it to a reasonable utilization. Since all I can really do is pay down the CC to help that's what I've worked on the most. The lates on the 3 are to recent to dispute. I'm going to dispute the two old ones on the paid acct but not sure that it would do much for the score....but would look better to be gone. That's why I started contemplating the finance companies. Thoughts?
Yea, the late pays are real killers. The high utilization is a huge problem too, but it sounds like you're working on taking care of that as soon as possible. What's his overall credit utilization ratio across all cards combined?
He has the one mentioned above, which after I looked today it is at $500 (limit of $2300) so higher than I thought (~22% utilization) but we will still pay it off in a couple payments. And then he has one with balance of $340 (limit of $1,700) that we also pay a chunk on each month. So that one is ~20% also. He has two others which are at zero balance. He uses them and pays them off in full at next statement. So overall he has total utilization of all cards combined of 12% Those 4 accts mentioned in the beginning are the only negatives on the report. Just threw me off when I saw the part about the consumer finance companies hurting the score even if paid... So really I think the only thing I can do is get the cards paid off to impove the score. Not much I can do with the lates right now.
I have been trying to clean mine up again, which are all old for most part just not had any luck getting it cleared in past so at it again. I have a couple of accounts that were car loans with a local independent bank that was bought by RBC back in 2008, which has now been acquired by PNC... They have a couple of late pays that are from 2007...I know they don't really have much impact but they still could go away! Well I know for fact that RBC did not transfer any loan histories to their system that were already closed at the time of the merger. I was told that by a close friend who worked there then. They had absolutely no access to old banks loans after the merger. So I was able to dispute a couple of them a few months afterwards and they got deleted. But the others that remain are either the ones that say sold/transferred or ones that EQ somehow "verified." Since I can't exactly go to the OC and ask what they verified...how do I dispute those? And is there a trick to getting the transferred ones off?? My fico is 700 as of the other day and I would like to get it up a bit higher if possible. And getting rid of some of those old ones will make it look better even though not necessarily raising the score. And if I can find out about histories pre-merger with PNC then I may can get a couple more transferred accounts off that have lates that are from 2010-early 2011.
OK, so the overall credit utilization looks pretty good and it sounds like you'll have the 0% card paid off soon too. I still think it's primarily the late pays that are dragging his credit scores down. You could try to get the consumer finance accounts removed, but I frankly don't think it will be worth the effort.
What exactly is still remaining on your credit reports? I just want to make sure I'm clear on what it is you're trying to remove. And you've already disputed all of these through the CRAs right? It's just a few that were verified and remain on your reports? Also, what are you currently doing to build recent positive payment history on your credit reports? Don't forget that this is just as important as dealing with the old baddies.
I can leave them...I had never figured they would matter anyway, but after I read that on the myFICO report it made me wonder if I had been wrong.
Ok, I'll answer the latter question first...it's shorter. I have been making all payments on time and also utilizing and paying off/down credit cards. As for what is on my report...I have 7 accounts that show to be negative. Of those 7, two are credit cards. #1 cc - B of Amer card that is paid off and closed. It has two 30 day lates from Mar/Apr 2006. I have sent a PFB goodwill letter on that one. I don't really want to dispute it because it is my oldest account at 15yrs with that being the only two hiccups on it. No answer on PFB yet (was sent 8/28). #2 cc - CAP1 that is open with $0 balance. Has one 30 day late 1/2006. I did a PFB goodwill on that as well. Could dispute I guess but figured I'd try that first. The card is utilized and paid off frequently. The remainder of the negatives are bank loans. #3 - Renasant Bank - Unsecured balloon note - has one 30 day from 7/2011 #4 - First American Bank - Auto loan - one 30 day 3/2008. This bank was bought by RBC bank (Royal Bank of Canada). All dates I can find on the merger are showing it final as of 2/28/2008. I have disputed this before and it kept coming back verified. Have disputed it again so I'll see what I get this time. This bank does not exist so they can't "verify" and if they do again I have no clue what my next step is. Can't go to OC and get it cleared off. #5 - RBC Bank - Auto loan - This shows 4 30 day lates spread since 2007. This account originated with First American Bank and that one is reporting also, but as a good TL...no updates though due to being acquired by RBC. And in 3/2012 PNC Bank Acquired RBC so it is reporting this exact same loan now too but it is showing zero lates and is a good TL... So, I'm good with the two TL's that are showing good but wonder if it's correct for all to be reporting the exact same loan? I mean if they were all reporting bad then it looks triple worse than it actually would be... What are the rules on that? All show the same open date, largest past balance and all... #6 - RBC Bank - installment loan - paid and closed - reporting status as 30 days past due, shows 6 30 day lates. 5/2008, 5/2010, 3/2011, 4/2011, 8/2011, 9/2011. It was paid off in 10/2011 and I don't recall it being 30 days at the time it was paid off. Ideas? #7 - RBC Bank - unsecured installment - paid and closed - shows 1 30 day late 1/2008. Everything else is good on mine. My newest account was 4 months ago, a Citi card. It is used and paid regularly. Utilization on all revolving is only 9% ($285) so will be no problem to eliminate that down to zero. Getting the lates wiped out if at all possible would be my biggest concern just for the clean up of the report. Certainly want the score to go up but also want it to look clean as possible. All ideas are much appreciated.
Consumer finance companies typically lend to people with subprime credit, which is why FICO considers you a higher risk if one of these accounts is on your credit reports. I can't say for sure, but I doubt it's affecting your overall credit scores too much.
It sounds like you're handling your existing credit cards well by keeping utilization low and making on-time payments. Nice work- keep it up! As you mention, all the late pays are really hurting your scores. If I counted correctly, that's 16 late pays from 2007 all the way up through last year, which would hold anyone's scores back from reaching their full potential. I would be most concerned about the recent ones that occurred within the past 2 years though- Renasant Bank and the RBC Bank installment loan. Focus on those first, and then move onto the old ones. Late pays can sometimes be difficult to get removed. You basic options are writing GW letters to the OC and disputing inaccuracies through the CRAs. Apart from those methods, there really aren't any magical tricks out there. I know you've disputed some through the CRAs with no success, but I would try again after waiting for awhile. Since RBC doesn't even exist anymore, you might get lucky the second time around and the CRAs will delete them. Regarding the RBC auto loan, all 3 lenders can report it if it sat on their books at one point. They need to be reporting it correctly though, so you might want to dispute something that's inaccurate in hopes that they won't be able to verify any information now that the account is managed by an entirely different lender.
