I need to fix my credit! Articles | Personal Finance

By: Guy Starbuck

Once you have found yourself in debt it can be very difficult to figure any way out.  The frustration and confusion over what to do can become too much and cause tons of stress and heartache.  However, there are a few different ways to get out of debt and start to repair your credit.  Some methods may not sound like something that you will want to do, however checking them out completely before making a decision is best.

One method is using a debt consolidation agency to help you negotiate lower interest rates, lower monthly payments, and work out a repayment method that works best for you.  The counselors will help you to come up with a plan after they have assessed your situation.  Again, they will cover these areas with you and your creditors, they are:

• Help to decrease fees and interest, lowering your monthly payment.
• They will go over your current commitments and help you to simplify them.
• Some agencies will give you reminders of when payments and help keep you on track.
• They will go over how long you have had bad credit and help you to figure out ways to improve it.

Staying on top of your credit report will help you in repairing your credit.  So, if you do not want to go through a credit counseling agency and would rather do it yourself, remember to check your report frequently and make sure that any inaccuracies or discrepancies are corrected and resolved.  It will take a lot of phone calls and negotiating on your part, however you will be part of the whole process and who better to work in your best interest than yourself.

Improving your score can be difficult and may take awhile.  The best way is to keep working at it and disputing anything and all misinformation that appears on your report.  Even incorrect address and phone numbers do not look good and should be changed to match correctly.  If the accounts on your report are incorrect in any way, even if you do own money but the amount is wrong, get it changed.  These changes can mean many points between the score you want and the score you have.

Furthermore, if for some reason you cannot get your credit report online, you can always call their toll free numbers or use their mailing address to receive your free credit report.  All three agencies prefer that you if you have a dispute, it is handled through their online system, however they do have forms that can be filled out and sent in the mail to their office for them to review and correct. 

There is no quick way to credit repair, it takes a lot of work and time for your score to increase and for negative items to fall off your report.  Remembering that agencies that claim that they can erase all bad credit from your report or increase your score overnight to a more desirable number are fraudulent companies.  There is no way unfortunately to do this legally.  Only using licensed professionals to help you consolidate your debt is recommended.  The fix quick schemes are just that schemes and will get you nowhere and will be a complete waste of time.  Realizing that it will take time to get out of debt and repair your credit will make the whole process simpler and less painful.