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Mortgage lenders generally
check with three credit bureaus in order to evaluate your
past payment history. Your goal in cleaning up your credit
report should be to clean up each of the three bureaus. If
you only work on one, this does not effect the reporting
to the other bureaus.
The first step is to get a copy of your merged credit
report, which shows all three of the major bureaus, Experian
(formerly TRW), Equifax (formerly CBI), and Trans-Union. Most
mortgage lenders will obtain data from all three of these
bureaus in analyzing your credit history. The exception
is that some portfolio lenders (usually adjustable rate lenders)
may only review one.
There are two efforts that must be made. First, call any
creditors reporting a negative and ask them to remove the
negative item. Ask in a nice calm voice and do not get upset
when they say no. Simply repeat your request over and over
in your nice pleasant voice. If you get nowhere, then ask
to speak to the supervisor. Make sure you keep a log of your
conversation, noting the date, time, who you spoke to and
what they said. Repeat this procedure over and over. In a
high percentage of cases, it works.
Be sure to ask for a letter by mail or fax that shows the
creditor is correcting the negative information. You may
need this letter for two reasons. First, they may not actually
make the changes. With the letter, you can appeal directly
to the credit bureau and they will make the correction. Second,
if you are applying for a mortgage before the changes actually
hit the credit bureau’s report, your lender will need
this documentation.
If you have a charge off
or collection account that shows as unpaid, don’t just
send them a check and pay it off. Call the creditor on the
phone, explain that you have the funds to pay the account
in full, and calmly explain why it should not have been reported
on your credit in the first place. Then ask if they will
provide you a letter deleting the account entirely from all
credit bureaus if you pay off the account. Try to get them
to fax it to you. As before, be sure to document all of your
telephone contact and always keep a nice pleasant tone in
your voice. In a large percentage of cases, this also works.
There will be cases when the creditor does not agree to remove
the negative credit item. If it is an item that is definitely
not yours, call the credit bureau immediately (except for
Equifax, who only responds by mail). When on the telephone,
do not discuss any negative items that are accurate. Do not
discuss any items that may be accurate in general but have
some small error in detail that you can dispute by mail.
Once you confirm any accuracy at all, you cannot dispute
it later by mail. For the remaining items,
you need to dispute them by mail, writing directly to the
credit bureaus. Write a letter to the appropriate bureau
including your name, social security number, address, disputed
accounts, and account numbers. You must sign the letter.
Inform the bureau that you are disputing the data as it appears
on your credit report.
copyright 1999 RealEstate ABC
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