The best way to fix bad credit is to be pro-active by removing negative accounts report and adding positive accounts to your credit report. Both of these processes can take some time. The time to start fixing your bad credit is now, not on the day you are ready to apply for a loan. Depending on how bad your credit is, it can take as little as 1 or 2 months to fix and as much as 12 months to fix.
First, you want to know exactly where you stand. You will need to pull your credit reports and know your credit scores. You can get a copy of your credit reports for free once every year, but it will cost you a little bit to know your scores (unless a banker or mortgage broker is willing to give you a copy for your credit report for free after applying for a loan.) I suggest getting your scores directly from MyFICO.com.
Once you know where you stand, you will need to analyze your credit reports and find out what’s helping and what’s hurting your scores. It may take awhile, but it’s worth learning how to read a credit report. Once you figure out what’s hurting your credit, you will need to make a plan of attack to get those accounts removed from your credit report as fast as possible. You can do that by disputing accounts with the credit bureaus, sending debt validation letters, negotiating with creditors and many other ways.
When you make a dispute with the credit bureaus, the burden of proof is on them. All you need to say is something along the lines of “Please provide documentation that the following accounts belong on my credit report; otherwise please delete this damaging data immediately." It is then up to the credit bureaus to contact the creditors to verify that all of the information they are reporting about you is correct. Fortunately for you, most creditors keep horrible records and can not verify that the accounts even belong to you. In this case, by law, the accounts must be deleted immediately.
Disputing is one of the best ways to get accounts removed from your credit report but, there are so many other ways to fix your credit. You should also be trying to add positive accounts. I would suggest applying for a few secured credit cards or visiting your local credit union or bank and asking them if they have a credit card with a low limit that can help you rebuild your credit. There are also many other ways to build credit. Make sure to always ask if what you apply for will appear on your credit reports. You want to get credit for paying your bills on time.
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