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Three tips to begin your road to credit repair

Oh hello there 👀 

I get a lot of questions regarding credit repair.  Growing up black and in the 1980's during the world famous crack epidemic, my grandparents taught me absolutely nothing about credit. So naturally, I ruined mine with department store credit cards, Visa's, MasterCard, new car',s etc. all by the age of 20.  

At the age of 31 and having gone through the entire process, I am happy to report my score is approaching a smooth 800. With out filing bankruptcy!  So it's only right that I share what I've learned with the world.  I'll start with a few simple tips:

KNOW YOUR CREDIT:

Knowing what you have to repair is the very first step in the process. There are three agencies (Equifax, Transunion, and Experian) that factor into your credit score and reporting history.  You can pull ALL three of your reports for free once per year at annualcreditreport.com. These are reports are 100% free, but you only get one pull per year. Pulling your credit affects your score negatively, so be careful with that. Also allowing others to pull your score (applying for financing of any sort) pulls down your score. An awesome monitoring tool I use is creditkarma.com. You can not tell me anything about my credit karma. It isn't perfect, but it is damn close!  

DISPUTE, DISPUTE, DISPUTE

Once you complete a detailed review of your credit report, dispute your little heart out. You can dispute inaccurate personal information, credit inquiries, incorrect balances or accounts, inaccurate late payments anything wrong! You can dispute with all three agencies online at their corresponding websites.

BE PATIENT

Credit repair requires patience.  If there is a debt you can settle with a collection agency, ask them to remove it from your report and make sure YOU GET THE AGREEMENT in writing as terms of the settlement. This will support your dispute should they not remove it.  If you have time, (and I'm talkin years) wait it out. As long as there are no judgement's against you, negative credit remarks will fall off the face of the Earth within 7 years. Just like that! It is important in this case not to talk to any agencies. Once you make communication with them, the debt re-sets itself. 

Now, go out there and get control of your financial life!!!!!  This is only the beginning. When we work hard to repair our own credit, we have a greater sense of appreciation for it. Which allows us to take such better care of it now and forever. 

Until next time, with LOVE ❤.

Beautiful Tori

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