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Credit Repair Advice: Credit Repair Services
When your credit is bad, it can feel hopeless. But, you can improve
your credit score if you take the right steps -- although be sure to
research any credit repair services before you hire them....
Credit Repair Advice: Some Credit Repair Services Can Harm Your
Credibility
Credit repair advice is a highly sought after service these days. Good
credit repair advice, however, is getting harder to come by. With all
the programs claiming the ability to ‘fix’ your credit, finding advice
is easy; but beware the many credit repair scams. Not all credit repair
services are disreputable, and there are many professionals who honestly
help repair your credit. When selecting a company to help you in bad
credit repair, first do some research and avoid any credit repair
service that claims to ‘fix’ your credit.
The best way to repair your credit is by doing it yourself. But if you
need help, be careful where you place your trust for credit repair
advice. Some services aren’t helpful but instead produce negative
results by promising to get you out of debt when in reality they can’t
improve or repair your credit. They may require you send them a check
every month from which they are to pay your creditors. They, in fact,
make late payments and your account is rated R2 - which mean that
payments were made after 30 days lowering your credit score even
further.
Certain service providers, posing as ‘debt negotiators’ further ruin
your credit rating by suggesting not paying your credit card bills.
They, of course, charge you upfront fees, maintenance fees, and monthly
fees, etc. After months of non-payment, they negotiate with the
creditors to settle for a lesser amount. This ruins your credibility, by
your account being tagged R4 or R5 - payments delayed beyond 90 days,
and beyond 120 days. Further, the money you considered as having saved,
by paying a lesser amount, is actually considered ‘income’ by the IRS
and you pay income tax on that.
Watch out for credit repair services that, promising to remove listed
information in your credit reports, will write on your behalf to the
credit bureaus, stating the information as false. The credit bureaus
will remove the said information while conducting investigations. In the
meanwhile you receive a clean credit report, which gives you a false
sense of having improved credit. After investigations, the negative
information reappears in your report.
Some agencies do perform a reputable job and help you remove incorrect
items, such as children’s items on parents’ reports, double items,
paid-off items that still show on your report, and items that should
rightly have been removed after a bankruptcy. Such reputable credit
repair services can be helpful for people who are uncomfortable or
unable to handle the issue on their own.
Credit repair is an issue that has reached enormous heights in this
country and should be taken seriously quickly to make corrective actions
if possible. However, keep in mind that only the incorrect items, if
proven to be false, can be removed from your credit reports. If the
negative items are correct, they JUST cannot be removed, regardless of
what anyone tells you. Do your research before allowing any credit
repair service to take actions on your behalf. What you don’t know can
do additional harm to your credit.
Sherry Frewerd publishes 'How to Consolidate Credit Debt'
http://howtoconsolidatecreditdebt.com where you can find free
information to help you repair and improve your credit history and
reduce credit debt.
Recommended Frugal Reading
Living On A Dime is known as one of the very best resources of its kind to help you get out of debt without depriving yourself.
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