Building New Credit

In addition to getting rid of the negative tradelines to increase your credit score, you must also establish new positive tradelines to start building some more positive credit history. Early on in my credit repair progress I applied for and received a couple of sub prime cards or credit rebuilder cards, the first of which was Orchard Bank MC. Initially they gave me a $500 credit limit, it is now $700. I also applied for First Premiere, and they gave a $300 credit limit. I do not recommend the latter of the 2, unless you just can't get a card through Orchard. Both cards have annual fees. Also another card that is fairly easy to get is the Hooter's MC, your credit scores should be upper 500's for this card. They gave me a $1000 credit limit and it does have fees, but also has a rewards program.

Recently I applied to my credit union for their Visa card. Figured I have a long history with them, what the heck and give it a shot. They gave me a $6000 credit limit, no annual fees. They also offer a MC, so I applied for that as well, another $6000 credit limit. This allowed me to close the First Premiere card with high fees and high interest with a low credit limit. Served its purpose by giving me 6 months good history.

I discovered that if you have scores in the upper 500's to low 600's that Kay's and Jared, basically any Sterling Bank creditors, are fairly easy to get. I got a Kay's at $5000 credit limit. One thing to note is that all these cards share the same credit limit, but it will show as separate tradelines on your credit report at whatever credit limit they give you.

The immediate result will be a slight decrease in credit scores, new accounts and the inquiries will hurt you short term. The long term effect is that you are now building a good utilization ratio. You want to be using less than 25% of your available credit at all times. Plus now I have some positives to build up a good history to offset the derogatory accounts that I may not be able to get rid of.

Last Collection Account - Lawsuit Update

One more collection account to go until they are all completely gone from my credit reports. This one will be litigated in the courts (Paragon Way / Collins). After speaking to my lawyer, he feels as though they have a very weak case because the only evidence they have produced in the discovery process is a statement from 2003 with my name and an old address on it. Nothing to prove the account is mine. I have come a long way in a relatively short time...100 point increase in my FICO scores and down to 3 charge-off accounts and 1 collection account. Folks this can be done and is relatively simple to do once you become an informed consumer.

I am writing a letter now to WFFNB / Victoria Secret to ask for them to produce some documentation proving this account is mine. I am sure my Ex-wife opened this account in my name (she was good at this I'm coming to find out). There is no way in hell they will find my signature on anything concerning this account.

Credit Secrets Bible

Another Collection Agency Bites The Dust

Finally, CACV removed the tradeline from all 3 credit reporting agencies. This is big, these guys are tough to get rid of. I am still showing a Paragon Way account on my TransUnion credit report that was supposed to be removed two months ago. I have continued my dispute with TransUnion on this but they keep rejecting it. I am going to have to get tough with TransUnion to get rid of it I guess. I am writing up a dispute letter to them now and going to send it off it should be gone because I know they sent the transmittal because I have a copy of it. I am now down to really only having one collection account left and that is the other Paragon Way account that I am being sued for.

Update on the lawsuit, well really nothing to report there. They filed on me, I answered and filed a counter suit, they asked for a 2 week extension to answer. This is probably good news meaning they don't have squat.

Some other things I need to work on are a Victoria Secret account, which I can pursue directly with them now that I got their flunky collection agency off my back (Plaza). My plan is to contact them and try to file an identity theft report on this account. I am pretty sure I never opened this account, I'm also sure that it was probably my ex-wife. I also have a Chase charge-off, the one Paragon is suing me for, listed. Not sure how I am going to deal with it yet. I have an Amex charge-off also, this will probably have to be paid to get it into a "better standing", they don't fudge and they don't make deals. I will tackle this later, may end up just waiting this one out if they are not real cooperative in working out a deal.

The Victoria Secret and the AMEX are killing me because they report the charge-off every single month and it shows as a recent derogatory account that just kills my score. Got to do something with these.

Updated Credit scores (FAKO)
TU - 638
EX - 621
EQ - 598

Credit Repair - Erase Bad credit!