Repair Your Credit

Lexington Law Firm is one of the most popular credit repair companies on the Internet. They have been in business for over 15 years and have helped over 300,000 clients repair their credit reports. Lexington Law works with clients to improve their credit reports legally and affordably.

Lexington Law is the trusted leader in credit report repair for a reason: they make the process easy and effective for their clients. Their services have proven so effective that their participating Concord level clients have seen an average of 8.7 deletions from their combined credit reports by month 3, and 28.6 deletions by month 12. (Your results may vary.)

The Lexington Law Credit Repair company leverages your consumer rights to engage the credit bureaus and assist with your credit rating. They work on your behalf to remove questionable negative items from your credit reports.

Lexington begins the dispute process by drawing upon its vast arsenal of credit report repair strategies and experience to challenge questionable negative items directly with the credit bureaus. The credit bureaus have 30 days to investigate your dispute. After that, they must inform you of their results, and send you a free copy of your updated report. It usually takes 60 days from the day they send a dispute to the day you receive an updated report. When you receive a response from a credit bureau you simple make a copy of the updated report for your records then send the original to Lexington Law. Lexington Law then repeats the cycle, this time hopefully with fewer questionable items on your credit report.

The nice thing about Lexington Law is that their service is backed by a refund policy which entitles you to some or all of your money back if enough disputed items are not removed. If you read the testimonials on their website you will certainly see how happy and impressed their customers are with their service.

Collection accounts are typically seriously past due accounts that have been assigned to an attorney or collection agency. A collection agency is usually hired after a company has made multiple attempts to collect money that they believe is owed to them. Collection accounts can remain on your credit report for 7 years from the date of the initial missed payment that led to the collection (the original delinquency date). The following techniques will teach you how to remove collections from your credit reports.

What the Credit Bureaus Don't Want You to Know:

1. A study released by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group in June 2004 found that 79% of the consumer credit reports surveyed contained some kind of error or mistake.

2. Once you dispute an account, it must be proven or it cannot remain on your report. If the credit bureau cannot verify the item when investigated, it must be removed from your file whether or not it's true.

3. Every negative item on your report can be denied or challenged at any time. The credit bureau must re-investigate every time it is challenged and if the item cannot be verified within a "reasonable amount of time", it must be removed from the file.

4. Many times the creditor does not re-verify in time or the credit bureau is busy and does not handle your dispute properly. It must then be deleted.

5. The older an item, the more difficult it is to verify. Creditors seldom keep records for longer than a couple years.

Steps to Repair Your Credit:

1. Obtain your three credit reports.

2. Review the reports and locate the collection accounts.

3. Dispute the collection accounts with the credit bureaus.

For more information on how to remove collections and other negative items from your credit reports, visit the free credit repair site!

First of all, take a few deep breathes. Ok, now let’s get started. Forget about everything you’ve heard about credit repair; the scam stories, the “it doesn’t work” stories…get all of that out of your mind, because it absolutely works and it’s not that difficult at all. Have you ever noticed that the people telling you that credit repair doesn’t work usually have pretty bad credit themselves and haven’t had good credit in a long time? Just something to think about.

Credit Reports

You know you have bad credit, because you can’t get approved for any loans that you apply for, but that’s not good enough. We need to know exactly how bad it is, so let’s get a copy of our credit reports. As you probably already know, there are 3 major consumer reporting agencies (credit bureaus), Equifax, Trans Union and Experian. You will need to get a report from all 3 of them. The best way to do that is to get them separately from each credit bureau. You can do that over the phone or by mail. You can also get your reports through a credit monitoring service.

You can also go to AnnualCreditReport.com and order your reports for free from there, but if you do that you give the credit bureaus an extra 15 days on your investigations. You don’t want to do that. Pay for your reports.

Dispute Negative Items

Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, you have the right to dispute any information contained on your credit report. This is simply done by writing the credit bureaus a dispute letter. Once they receive your letter, they are required to verify the information with the furnisher. They have 30 days by law to do so. If the information cannot be verified, it must be deleted.

Many people will tell you that if the account is “really” yours, you can’t dispute it. However, if you read the FCRA, it doesn’t say anything about that. Whether or not the account is "really" yours has no bearing on the credit bureaus responsibility to verify it. If it can’t be verified, it must be removed from your report. If the creditor can’t provide verification of your account, they can’t legally report it on your credit reports. It’s that simple.

Build Positive Credit

After you've cleaned up your credit report, the key to rebuilding credit is to get positive information reporting. Acquiring new positive accounts is just as important as deleting negative information. One of the best ways to do that is by getting a secured credit card. The interest rates are usually pretty high and the credit limits pretty low, but that’s ok because you are strictly using these cards to build credit. Keep your balances at about 30% of your credit limits.

The most important part of the credit repair process is learning from your mistakes and realizing where you went wrong. Learn to live below your means and budget your money so that you don’t have to go through it again.

Chane Steiner is the president and founder of AAACreditGuide.com, the credit repair authority site. He has helped many people repair their credit and get back on their feet. Chane has reviewed and recommends the following credit repair companies.

Most people don’t even realize that it’s possible to remove bad credit from your credit report. Most people believe that once they are plagued with bad credit, they simply must go through life paying high interest rates or not being approved for loans at all. They’ve been told that it takes anywhere from 7 to 10 years for the negative items on their credit report to come off. They rarely even try to get new positive items reporting.

Hopefully one day “most people” will realize that it is possible to do something about their bad credit. Here’s how you can get started today:

1. Obtain your credit reports. You can do it for free at AnnualCreditReport.com.

2. Analyze your reports and locate the negative items.

3. Dispute the negative items with the credit bureaus. Anything that can not be verified by the creditor within 30 days must be removed from your credit report.

4. Disputed items will either be removed, corrected or remain.

5. Request validation with creditors and collection companies on the accounts that remain.

6. If the creditors validate the accounts, you can choose to negotiate with creditors and collection companies.

7. After negotiating and making payment, creditors delete the negative accounts or change them to a positive rating.

8. Apply for new credit. Rebuild your credit by adding new positive accounts to your report.

9. Make your payments on time and keep your balances below 40% of your limits.

10. Enjoy good credit and remember to be responsible.

If you would like more in depth information on how to remove bad credit from your credit reports, visit the free credit repair forums and learn from people who have already been in your situation!

Credit report repair is commonly referred to as the process of disputing negative items in a credit report. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, consumers have the right to request an investigation with the credit bureaus for any item on their credit report. The credit bureaus and the original furnisher of the information must investigate the claim within 30 days and report their results back to consumers.

It’s important to point out that the credit bureaus are for-profit organizations and possess no government affiliation. They profit off the sale of your private information and from selling your information to you. Only after the Federal Trade Commission came up with a set of regulations passed in 2003 were consumers able to receive one free credit report a year.

The FCRA also had to regulate how long negative information, such as late payments, bankruptcies, tax liens or judgments may stay on a consumer's credit report. It’s typically seven years from the date of the delinquency. The exceptions: bankruptcies (10 years) and tax liens (seven years from the time they are paid). Unpaid tax liens can remain for up to 15 years. Although, 7 to 10 years is a long time to stay on a report, the credit bureaus would report it for much longer, if not forever, if it weren’t for the FTC stepping in.

When a consumer makes a dispute with the credit bureaus, the credit bureaus do not interact with information providers (typically creditors) directly. They use a system called E-Oscar. E-Oscar is an automated consumer dispute verification process. The credit bureaus demand that everyone who provides information to them be on this system. If you don't get on the system, you CAN NOT provide information to a credit bureau.

The E-Oscar system allows credit grantors to resolve disputes in a timely manner; however the results are commonly inaccurate. In fact, a study by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group found that 79% of all credit reports contained errors. With E-Oscar the credit bureaus NEVER send the original creditor the information you provide them. Instead, an employee scans your letter along with hundreds of others.

The employee is given a very short amount of time to figure out what you are trying to dispute and then gives your dispute a code. It is then verified with E-Oscar. Any documentation that you sent which proves the information is erroneous or any information that you provided simply gets filed away, incase you should sue them. It’s rarely ever even looked at.

Under § 602 of the Act, (15 U.S.C. § 1681), a consumer may seek a maximum of $1000 in statutory damages, plus actual damages, punitive damages and reasonable attorney's fees and costs for willful noncompliance with the FCRA. Any consumer may file suit in state or federal court to enforce the FCRA. Consumer lawsuits against credit bureaus are becoming more and more common and most of the time the consumer wins. Unfortunately, a lawsuit is what it takes to get issues solved with the credit bureaus.

For more information on credit report repair, visit the credit repair forum.

Most people know that if they pay their bills late, their credit scores will suffer. However, most people don’t know this: According to Credit.com, a single 90-day late payment is as damaging as a bankruptcy filing, a tax lien, a collection, a judgment, or a repossession. It doesn't matter if you're late paying a $50 credit card bill or a $2,000 mortgage payment. All that matters is that you were 90 days behind in paying your due balance.

Payment punctuality counts for about 35% of your overall credit score. Paying bills on time is generally the single most important contributor to a good credit score. Being late on any bill, for any length of time, is a possible sign of future non-payment of debt and is always viewed negatively by lenders. Late payments stay on your credit report for 7 years from the date of the initial missed payment.

A 30 or 60 day late payment will damage your credit score only while it is being reported as currently past due. They usually don’t cause lasting damage to your credit score after this period passes unless you make 30 or 60 day late payments on a regular basis.

If you only have a few 30-60 day late payments listed on your credit report, the best thing to do is contact your creditors by phone and ask them to remove it. Tell them a nice little story and ask them nicely to remove it. Follow the conversation with a written request to have the isolated late payments removed from your reports. However, if you consistently make late payments, it will probably take a little more effort.

As mentioned, a 90-120 day late payment is extremely damaging. At around 90-120 days, the creditor will usually write off the account and it will stay on your credit report as a charge off for 7 years.

If you are unable to get the creditor to remove the late payment history from your reports, there are a few other ways to do it. One of the best ways is to dispute them with the credit bureaus.

To learn more about how to remove late payments, visit AAACreditGuide.com – the bad credit repair site.

A foreclosure can be reported on your credit report for 7 years and should be avoided at all costs. A foreclosure can be devastating to your credit scores. If you have a foreclosure on your record, credit repair should be one of the very first things you look into. A foreclosure can be deleted from your credit report just like any other negative account, but you must know what you are dealing with or you could actually make matters worse.

If you would like to remove a foreclosure from your credit report, you will first want to learn about your rights in the Fair Credit Reporting Act and all other laws having to do with foreclosures and credit reporting. The better you understand your rights, the easier it will be to have your foreclosure removed from your credit report.

Most people would claim that they don’t have the time or resources to commit to learning about the laws and their rights, but it’s very important to know your civil and consumer rights. If you don’t have the time you may want to seek legal help and/or consult with a credit repair company.

Credit repair professionals specialize in removing foreclosures and other negative items from your credit reports. They focus on correcting inaccurate and erroneous information on your credit report. If a negative item on your credit report is disputed and can not be verified by the creditor or contains any kind of inaccurate information it must be legally be corrected and/or removed from your report immediately.

Learn more about removing foreclosures and other negative listings from your credit reports at the credit repair forum!

Bad Credit Repair is one of the top searched keywords online when it comes to consumers searching for solutions to bad credit. Unfortunately, many consumers with bad credit are also searching for "bad credit loans", "bad credit lenders" and similar terms. The reason I say its unfortunate is that most of these people don’t realize that the worst thing they can do for their financial situation is a get a loan with bad credit.

If they succeed in finding what they’re looking for, they are going to pay extremely high interest rates and that is not the intelligent way to go about repairing your financial situation. It’s certainly a good idea to want to get new positive accounts reporting on your credit reports, but it’s definitely not a good idea to pay such high interest rates. It can make it even harder for a person to meet their financial obligations and lead to even worse credit.

If you have bad credit, you should first see what you can do to get negative items removed from your reports. After you have done everything to get the negatives removed, then it is wise to start rebuilding your credit. You want to start off small when rebuilding your credit, especially if you are strapped for cash. Start with a couple secured credit cards or contact your local credit union and see if they will give you a low limit unsecured credit card. After about 3-6 months of paying, your credit scores will slowly start to climb up and your payments should only be $10-$20 per month.

It’s possible to repair your credit a little quicker if you have more money available, but this is the best way to repair bad credit when you’re on a budget. Remember, the first thing you should do is try to remove the negatives from your credit report.

Learn more about bad credit repair and how to remove late payments and charge-offs at AAACreditGuide.com.

You can raise your credit scores by taking a close look at your credit reports and creating a plan of action to improve them. It takes time and a continual effort from you to raise your credit scores. There are really now quick-fixes of besides paying down debt and to successfully disputing negative information on your credit report.

One of the most important things you can do is simply pay your bills on time – that should be fairly obvious. Late payments play a major role in driving down your credit scores. You will also want to keep your debt-to-credit-limit (or available credit) ratio as low as possible. Never let it get above 40%. If you don’t have many positive accounts reporting, you may want to open some new accounts to raise your debt-to-available-credit ratio. Try to get an unsecured credit card from your local credit union or a secured card from a legitimate site online. Remember, don’t apply for too many because the inquiries count against your credit score.

Don't close unused accounts, especially if they are old and reporting positive, because zero balances can help your score. Also, don't open several new accounts in a short period, especially if your credit history is less than three years old. Too many inquiries in a short period of time can really be hurtful to your credit scores. Apply for credit wisely.

It should be mentioned though, that pulling your own credit does not harm your scores. In fact, many people think it’s wise to use a monthly credit monitoring service online to monitor your progress and make sure there are no unauthorized inquiries or new accounts showing up on your reports.

As mentioned, disputing negative accounts on your credit reports is an excellent way to raise your credit scores. All negative accounts on your credit report should be disputed to make sure they are accurate. If they are not, they must be removed. You don’t have to be dishonest when disputing accounts; the burden of proof is on the credit bureaus and the lenders. If you know that an account is yours, do not dispute it as “not mine”.

It’s the credit bureau’s obligation by law to verify the account and show proof that every little thing they are reporting is 100% accurate. If it’s an old account and the lender no longer has the records to verify an account, guess what? It must be removed. Just remember to always be careful and honest when disputing. Unintended consequences happen quite frequently with credit bureaus. They know how to play the game and they are NOT happy about having to verify your accounts, so be smart about it or you will find yourself with even worse credit.

What is free credit repair, anyway?

Well, first let’s start with what credit repair is. "Credit repair" is a term most commonly used to describe a systematic process of improving ones credit scores by obtaining copies of the individual's credit report, reviewing the credit report for errors and misleading information; then disputing the information with the credit bureaus. This is just a basic explanation of the process. While it can be very simple for some, it is much more complex and time consuming for others.

Most consumers with bad credit are searching for free credit repair. Regrettably, there are no services that I know of that will repair your credit for free so, if you are looking for “free credit repair” you will have to do it by yourself. There are also some reputable, inexpensive credit repair services available for consumers who just don’t have time to learn the credit repair process. But, doing it yourself has many advantages and I think that most people who learn about the credit game have better chances of not getting into credit trouble again.

When you are ready to start your free credit repair journey, I suggest starting at a credit repair forum or by reading a credit repair book. A credit repair forum is a discussion group of people teaching and learning credit repair. There’s tons of information online – just be careful – there is lots of misinformation online as well. Remember to always research your questions with different sources.

After spending hours and hours researching credit repair online, I’ve realized that credit repair has got to be one of the most misconstrued topics online. There are way too many people being mislead online. They don’t research the information they find and end up repeating it to others. And yes, some of them are even repeating the information on their websites. They are only trying to help, but instead usually end up really hurting other people financially. Please, please do not be one of those people.

This is why I suggest credit repair forums; usually when someone is wrong, there are plenty of professionals at the forums that will correct that person immediately.

Get more Free Credit Repair Insider Tips at AAACreditGuide.com.