Help me with Creditor Speak.

it does doesnt it.

I have gotten it before and was floored by it.

But Ian just sailed right over that.
He sounds like a salesman..

Did he get it in writing that the entire debt is settled and clear?

yes.

He went to the collectors office, got a direct reciept that states account paid in full .

Fabulous!

Superb!

Bravissima!

hooter!

i mean hooray

I told you they's take half... and give you something in writing.....you just can't fold on these ass wipes....good for you...

Does anyone know what kind of 'points' you get for paying off an account?

And I dont think I worded that question well..

What I mean is,

If i pay something off, and it was a 200.00 mark against my score,for example..
how well will that bring my score up?
is it 10 points? 20 points?

Does it not ADD points to my credit at all and just stop taking points away?

I am paying another one today , and then will call a 3rd this month and hopefully get that one settled as well.
Im just curious how much all of this work is actually helping.. ?

Shewolf--

I can't help you out with specific point values, but if I were a mortgage company, I'd rather lend to someone with no outstanding bad debts than someone with three bad debts.

If I were making the rules, by eliminating bad debts you'd not only increase your credit points, you'd create an intangible aura of financial responsibility.

I had seven all together.

This one I paid today made my 4th settled account.

The mister had only 3, so we paid off the biggest one 2 weeks ago.
his others are small co-pays to hospital visits that we can save for the last minute, so we can put our big chunk of change to the larger accounts.

I am happy that it makes a great image, to pay them off.
Since that is my ultimate goal, I wont slow down.

But, instead of pulling a credit report after every payment to see where our points lay, I was wondering if paying them boosted points at all?

I guess that was my main question.

If it does not, then we need to open a small credit account to pay every month to get those extra points.
If it does, then may be close to 620 by now..

thinking out loud......

at 620, we can get an FHA instead of working for a conventional loan like we have been..

I have no idea if this is true or not, but I once heard that the number of hits (requests) for your credit report affects the score. Not checking constantly is a good thing.

it does.
But it is a temporary thing.

It is 7 points per inq.

And inq. is open ( in the case of a home loan) for 20 days.
In that 20 days you can request as many copies as you would like with out it hitting your credit.

That is how lenders are able to 'find that good deal' for you.
They pass your info around and let interested companies 'fish' for your business.

Other then that it is the 7 points and I believe it stays on for ......... 30 days? Then they just drop off, and the points are returned.

If the account went to collections but is now closed, it will stay in his credit file until it falls off. 3-5 years? I think it is 5. The longer the time since you had a late pay the less it affects your score. Paying it off only means you start to move the late payment back in time. 90 days without a late payment or a payment in collections is better than 30 days.


No one knows the secret formula they use for scoring. There is much speculation about how it works. (And a couple of lawsuits.)

There is a big catch to that '5 year' rule,

one that is the biggest chunk of WHY our credit is so bad. ( besides the collection accounts.. )

Yes.
it SHOULD fall off in 5-7 years.
Absolutly.

BUT- when a credit collection agency buys your account from Visa , for example, that begins the 7 year process ALL OVER.

yup.

If they dont collect, and want to sell you account to rid themselves of it, the next buyer ( collection agency) starts that 7 year process ALL OVER.

You could carry an account for a LONG time, with every purchase showing negatively on you account.

I just learned that one account I had before my hip went out. was sold 3 times.
Those 3 sales droped my credit to below 600.

just from sales to one collection agency to another.

Also learned, that any time a collection agency contacts you , by phone or mail, they can technically start the collection process all over there as well.

it pays to NOT answer those calls. They can not consider a message'contact'. But they can , if they speak to you