Tracy Winters
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It’s TransUnion’s version of Fico
TransRisk is a credit risk score that was developed by TransUnion, one of the three major credit bureaus. To be exact, it is Trans Union’s version of the Fico score, which is used by more than 90% of all financial institutions, lenders & creditors to make lending decisions.
Although it is not an official Fico score, it is almost identical and should be considered as Fico for all purposes. Like Fico it has a range from 300 to 850, so a score of 672 is considered good. Certainly good enough to qualify for a home rental contract.
See credit-score-range.html for more information about the different credit scores and their scales.
BTW, you can get a free TransRisk credit score at Credit Karma.
Are these tax liens or judgments?
It is true that most derogatory items age of your report after 7-1/2 years. Even chapter 7 bankruptcies stop appearing on your report 10 years from date of first delinquency (see this for more information).
Satisfied (paid) tax lies remain on your report for seven tears from the date released (paid), while unsatisfied tax liens can remain on your credit report indefinitely.
Judgments age of your report after 7-1/2 years or until the SOL, which ever is longer. However, most states allow un-settled/unpaid judgments to be renewed. Do not count on that judgment just going away at the 7 year point
If these items aren’t tax liens or judgments then a simple dispute process with the credit bureaus will take them off. See credit-report-disputes.html for a good guide.
As for your score – I’m not sure that it’s low because of these items. Credit scores are 90% based on the last two years activity, and by the time old derogatory items age off your report, they have very little affect on your score.
Your score may be low because of more recent negative information, high credit utilization or simply because of lack of positive information.
Hope this helps.
You should go back to the lawyers and the court
Simply disputing the items won’t help because your lawyers didn’t complete the paperwork!
The lawyers have to file paperwork with the court to show the judgment is satisfied. Until that happens, the records won’t show that the judgments are satisfied.
When you dispute the item with the credit bureaus, they simply check with the court records that show the judgments aren’t satisfied, so they keep it like that on your report.
Simply go back to your lawyers and the court, and the issue would resolve without you having to dispute it again.
Good luck
It’s called Identity Theft, and it’s a crime!
What your brother did is a very serious crime, called identity theft. It’s not surprising – According to the Federal Trade Commission, 22% of all identity thefts are committed by family members or relatives.
Unless you deal with it promptly, it WILL ruin your credit, plus you will need to pay your brother’s debt in the end.
There is only one way to deal with this situation – you need to report the identity theft to the police. You have no other choice. You probably feel uncomfortable to report your brother, but he’s the one who put you in this position in the first place, and it doesn’t sounds like he cares too much about the damage he inflicted on you!
What you need to do is to confront your brother. Tell him that either he pays immediately the debt collector or you will report the identity theft to the police.
Unless your brother pays immediately, here is what you need to do:
- File an identity theft report with the police
- Send a copy of the report to the debt collector and tell him the cosigning was criminal fraud and you do not owe anything.
State that reporting the debt to the credit bureaus is violation of federal laws. Also tell him to stop calling you - Send a copy of the report to each of the credit bureaus, stating that your signature as cosigner was criminally forged and you do not owe anything
- Report it to the FTC
Send each letter via Certified Mail, Return Receipt Requested and note the time that you sent the letters.
See ../how-to-report-identity-theft for more information.
You may be able to qualify, but…
Here are a few thoughts:
First – why is your score too low? Is it because you still have no credit, or do you simply have bad credit. There a big difference! Lenders are much more forgiving towards no credit than to bad credit.
Second – If you qualify, expect to get the worst terms. Because you pose a risk to your creditor, you will get a very high interest rate, and you’ll probably have to put a considerable down payment.
Third – you may have more success with dealerships than with your bank. Try to get pre approved with the bank you work with. After you have a picture on the terms they’re willing to give you try to negotiate a better deal with the car dealer. Car dealers tend to be more forgiving to not-so-good credit/
Lastly – if you can come up with a co-signer, your chances of getting approved will improve dramatically, and so will your loan terms.
Low fico score car lawn is hard to get, but not unheard of.
Secured credit cards, Store credit cards, Gas cards…
Without a credit history you stand no chance of getting a standard credit card. Especially if you’re under 21.
The following credit cards are much easier to get, and even people with no credit history usually get approved:
- Secured Credit Cards – These are offered by many banks. Capital one has a good card, as well as US Bank and Ammax. Secured cards are easy to get because the bank has your deposit, and so it incurs no risk in case you default on the card.
After a year or so you can change the card to a regular card. - Store Credit Cards – These are also relatively easy to get even without credit history. They usually come with low limit, and because they can be used for purchases made only in the store, the issuers tend to be less picky.
Almost every major retailer has its own credit card: Mays’s, Best Buy, Target, Wall-Mart, Sears, Khols… - Gas Credit Cards – These are also relatively easy to get approved for.
Besides this, there are two more options very popular option with young people:
- Co-Signing – You can ask anyone (parents, brothers, spouse etc) that doesn’t have a credit history to co-sign for you. If they have good enough credit, you will get approved
- Authorized User – You can be added as an authorized user on your parents, brothers or spouse as an authorized user. You will get your own card, but the statement will still be on the main account user’s name
Either way the card will be reported on your credit report and will build credit for you. After a year or two you will have sufficient credit to apply for a new account of your own.
See ../best-no-credit-history-credit-cards/ for more information on no credit history credit cards.
RE: Mortgage requirement
Here are some of the minimum requirements to get approved on a home loan:
- Minimum Fico score of 620 for an FHA loan
- Minimum Fico score of 720 for conventional loan.
- A clean credit report. No unresolved derogatory items (unpaid collections, liens, or judgments). No late payments.
- Minimum 2 years of stable employment.
- Low debt to income ratio. You’ll probably need to provide the previous 2 years bank statements.
- Sufficient income to support the size of loan you’re looking for. You’ll probably need to bring the previous 2 years pay slips plus tax returns.
- Sufficient self funding for a down payment (10%-20%)
- Sufficient funding for closing costs.
If you’re buying the home with your spouse then both of your credit files will be checked. Expect that the lower credit score will determine the lending decision. In some cases they will be willing to use the average score of you & your spouse.
Good luck!
Sure they can
Government subsidized student loans are forever. They cannot be discharged even in bankruptcy, and so will generally follow you to your grave.
Any assets that you have can be attached to enforce payment of the debt, including liens, wages garnished, tax refunds offset etc.
It’s for YOUR benefit, not his
You seem to lack basic understanding about credit report and scores. You father can’t benefit from your credit. No one can benefit from another person’s credit.
Your credit score has absolutely no effect on your dad’s score, and vise versa.
The ONLY thing you can benefit from is the history of payments that your father will make on this credit card. Payment history builds credit, and adding you as an authorized user will cause this credit card to appear on YOUR credit report, as well as on that of your father’s.
With time, this history of (presumably) timely payments will build good credit for you and raise your score.
Your father had only good intention doing this. He himself has nothing to gain from it.
As to the differences in your credit score, I assume that your father had past problems that lower his score, while you don’t. This is why your score is higher than his.
There is only one downside to authorized user. If your father keeps the card in good standing – great. On the other hand, if he runs into problems and start making late payments (or worse than this – completely default), this will ruin your credit.
If you don’t trust you father, ask him to be removed from authorized user. In any case, after two or three years you should have good enough credit to apply for your own credit card, and then you should remove yourself from authorized user.
Remember to do this in writing, return receipt, and keep the records forever.
It doesn’t matter how many days before the due you pay
As long as you pay before the due date – it’s good enough. It makes no difference if it’s 1 or 20 days before.
Just make sure you pay after you get the statement. If you pay your balance before the closing date, your statements will show $0 balance. Since the credit card companies send their data to the credit bureaus at the closing date each month, if your balance is $0, then it will have the same effect as not using the card at all, and that WON’T build credit for you.
So wait for the statement, and pay in full any time before the due date.
As to the number of credit cards, having another credit card may help a bit. Having a different type of credit (e.g. car loan, personal loan or mortgage) would help your credit much more.
The BEST way to jump start your wife’s credit is to put her as an authorized user on your credit card. It’s called Credit Piggybacking, it’s perfectly legal and Fico acknowledges it. Your credit card will be reported to both of your credit reports, and will build credit for both of you.
Using ITIN to get credit is against the law, and can get you into trouble. If she has no SSN, she needs to use her state’s ID instead.
Hopes this helps
Yes. They all build credit
All store credit cards are reported to the credit bureaus and help you build credit history. However, not all store credit cards report to ALL 3 major credit bureaus (Equifax, Experian & TransUnion).
When you’ll want to apply for a major loan or a credit card, the lenders will pull your credit report from these 3 credit bureaus, so having a credit card that report to just one or two of the tree major credit bureaus is not going to do any good.
If you’re applying for the purpose of building credit, you have to check first with them to which credit bureaus they report. If it’s not all three – choose another store.
One more thing that you need to consider is that a store credit card is not enough to build a good score. For a decent score you will need more than just a store card – at least one more “regular” credit card (a secure card will do) and an installment loan (a secured loan, a car loan or a student loan).
Having three accounts for a period of at least 2 years will build you good credit.
Good luck
Various reasons… Here’s why:
It is true that paying collection will NOT erase the item from your report, and will NOT improve your score. The only thing that will happen is that the status will be updated to PAID or SETTELD and the balance will be show to $0.
Still, there are many benefits to paying you debts:
To start with, collection agencies tend to sue right before the statue of limitation. In many cases (especially if the debt is yours) they will get a judgment against you.
The judgment will appear on your credit report as a new item, and will once again impact your score severely.If you have imagined the collection fall of your report after 7.5 years – think again. That new judgment will stay another 7.5 years, which may even be extended if not satisfied.
Not to mention that the debt will grow exponentially, incurring interest, fines & legal fees.
So in the end you WILL pay, only in the way you’ve paid much more and ruined your credit.Another thing to consider is that most creditors look at much more than just your score. They actually go over your credit report and look for things like unpaid collections, judgments, liens etc. You need to resolve all your derogatory items, so they show on your report as paid/settled with zero balance
In many cases, your actual credit report is more significant than your score. For example, you can have a Fico of 680 and not qualify for a mortgage or a car loan because your credit report contains unresolved derogatory items, while someone else with a 640 Fico but a clean credit report does qualify.
Hope this clears the subject
Try the non-profit bad credit repair counseling
Non profit credit counseling can certainly help with overwhelming credit card bills that have not yet defaulted. From what I hear they do a pretty good job. They cannot help, however, with any credit cards debts that have already defaulted.
While you’re in this program, your credit reports will get updated to “in debt management program” which might disqualify you for a mortgage. However, your Fico score will not be effected by this (See Factors Excluded from the Fico Score). When you complete the program, you would be eligible.
The best advice I can give you is to find someone affiliated with the National Foundation for Credit Counseling at http://nfcc.org.
Getting a home is worth getting educated on, if you don’t want to find yourself facing foreclosure like so many others. There are many books on the subject. Try your public library for a free one.
As a rule of thumb – you can afford a home that is about 3 times your pre-tax annual income.
Good luck.
Only after 7-1/2 years
Disputing the items won’t make them go away. In fact, you can expect them to reappear on your TransUnion’s report.
Your credit report contains your credit history. Paying of a debt doesn’t change your history. It only changes your current debt status. So paying a debt changes its status to “Paid” or “Settled” and updates the balance to zero, but it doesn’t erase the fact that you had a debt!
As long as the information is correct it cannot be legally removed from your report, and it continues to impact your score. With time its impact diminishes, and by the time derogatory age off your report they hardly have any effect at all.
Most items age off your report after 7-1/2 years. See this for a detailed list of derogatory items life cycle.
Paying off derogatory items does not improve your score
Derogatory items do not disappear after you’ve paid them. The damage is done, and paying off the items doesn’t clear the damage or raise your score.
The items will appear on your credit report for 7.5 years from first delinquency, whether paid, settled or unpaid.
After two years the effect of these accounts on your credit score starts to diminish, and by the time they age of your credit report they have almost no effect on your score.
If you want to increase your score you need to re-establish good credit. You need at least 24 months of consistent timely payment history do that. Either credit card payments or an installment loan, or (preferably) both.
Although paying off derogatory items does nothing to raise your score – it’s the right thing to do, and it DOES improve your credit. Your credit is much more than just your score, and when future lenders review your credit report, paid debts look much better than unpaid ones. See why-pay-off-debts.html for more information.
