Let me just start by saying this board is awesome! I've been lurking for a few weeks now and have learned quite a lot. Now I have an issue of my own. Three years ago, I had three credit cards charge off. My first question is - do these stay on my report from the date of the last activity? Or from the date reported? Now, my other dilemma is much larger. I'm trying to buy a house. When the mortgage broker pulled my credit, the charge offs were there - but another credit agency had purchased the charge offs and reported them again as new debt JUST LAST MONTH! This does not seem legal to me....I've been building up positive credit, and this has ruined me! It's also ruining my plans to buy a house. =( Any ideas? What can I do?
bump let me see if I can answer...I may not be right but at least this post will get a bump In your case the DOLA of the chargeoffs shoud be the last day you made a payment to the OC--three years ago. This means it should fall off of the report in 4 more years. What seems to have happened is that a CA has bought the debt and "re-aged" the DOLA to last month--meaning that now it would be an additional 7 years until it falls off. What state do you live in? You need to see about the SOL for collections where you live. I'm pretty sure that you are within the SOL because it has only been 3 years. Re-aging the accounts is illegal. Just this on its face isn't going to get you the results you want. A mortgage company is going to insist that you take care of the charge-offs before they give you a mortgage (even though the credit score has been wrecked by the re-aging). What you need to do is to start building FCRA and FDCPA violations against the CA. Start with a validation letter. Play hard ball with them. see what violations will shake loose. Ask the mortgage guy to talked to to write you a letter stating that the charge-offs dated last month (furnished by the CA) will make you inelibible for prime credit terms. This constitutes pretty severe damages. That and the violations you document will allow you to sue the CA for much more than you owe them, in effect putting them on the defense and giving you a commanding hand in negotiations you may need to make to patch up your report. Who knows, if they are really stupid they may pay points for you on your mortgage Hope this helps. I'm sure that there are others out there who know more about this than I. Good luck!
while all of rondas advice is good, realize that doing it that way will take time. months. which is fine, if you don't mind taking your time, and buying a house after you repair your credit. however, if you're in a huge hurry for some reason, you may want to try and settle for deletion. another thing...if you let them know you're wanting to buy a house (by sending a letter from the lender) your chances for settling for less are pretty much out the window. they know how things work, and they know that you HAVE to pay the collections before you get a loan. they'll make you pay in full. if this was me, I'd send a [sickeningly polite] letter stating that you just pulled your reports and noticed their entries, and you dispute the validity of the debts. the listing of this TL was their first communication with you (I'm assuming they never called or sent letters before putting it on your credit?) and the law states http://www.ftc.gov/os/statutes/fdcpa/fdcpact.htm#809 that within 5 days of initial communication they must send you, in writing, the details of the debt, your right to dispute, etc. did they ever send you anything? you've probably got them on a couple violations already, but a few more wouldnt hurt. also, you could get lucky, and if the debt is not validated, dispute with CRAs and it could come off. Then you could even try to settle with the OC for deletion of their TLs. (unless its out of SOL at that point.) there's really not ONE way to go about it. mostly, you want to be nice and dumb at first, and see what violations you can get.
are you sure they are charged off? i would dispute them as either not mine or never late. if they validate i usually tell people to demand everything from statements to copies of tax returns in which they got to write off the debt, etc.
