credit help?

You can contact any (or all) of the credit reporting agencies, i.e. equifax, Trans Union, and the other one which I can't think of off the top of my head and they should all be able to provide you with contact #'s for your creditors, I've done it before and they were able to help me. Good luck, I'm trying to do the same thing myself :-(

I had to learn the hard way with credit myself during college. The other poster is correct, you can contact the reporting agency for any info you might needf. The way I cleaned mine up in a hurry was to make all of my installment payments on time or early each month(obviously), but then if you have credit card debt, you need to make more than the monthly payment on time each month. I would set up online bill pay if you don't have it. I would pay each credit card each month and then pick one of the bunch as the card I was going to attack. Then if I found that I had extra money at the end of the week, month or whatever, I would pay more toward that card until it was paid off. It pays them off more quickly and the credit card companies report even good pay history every 30-60 days. You will be surprised what you can do in 12 months! Good luck!

I wish you all the luck I was going through a credit cleanup for 6 years and it can be very stressfull. The only thing is it wasn't my credit it was my husbands that needed cleaning up. We pulled periodic credit reports and would pick and choose what we could pay off fast once we took care of those we moved onto the next. Some of the companies worked with us and if we payed a certain amount on time for a year they would take it off his credit as bad and we would be put on a normal payment plan. If the contact info is not listed for you I would check with the credit agency and some of them I had to research and call. I am happy to say that we just pulled another report about a month ago and his credit is now excellent. I never thought it would happen but it finally did!!!

This doesn't really apply to getting info from the credit agencies, but is something to consider. Many financial advisors tell you to pay off the highest interest item first (credit cards, etc.) but another school of thought is to see where you have the least number of payments (such as 12 car payments left, 17 student loan payments, etc). Then, you work agressively to pay off the loan with the smallest number of payments. When that first item is paid off, you apply ALL the money you were paying toward that bill, and put it toward the next loan with the lowest number of payments. The thought is, you'll see progress more quickly and won't get stuck just trying to pay off that credit card for years without getting anywhere. Eventually, you'll be paying all your money toward your mortgage if you get the other bills paid. Good luck and congratulations on getting started!

Hobbymommy, 38, is a discussion leader from Mesa. She is a happy stay-at-home mommy to a 3-year-old daughter and a 2-year-old son.

You truly can't hide ANYTHING from those credit reporting agencies--dang it! Good for you for taking responsibility for your good credit--it took me several years to do the same thing. One bit of advice--when you do get your cards paid off and decide which accounts to close, follow up with a written letter and keep a copy for yourself. Otherwise, those accounts will continue to follow you around for years, even though you paid them off.

Thanks all for the insight on this. Im just stuck and this gives me a good idea where to start :)