Please help, I need to get a house, I have 2 kids, single mom, question about getting a home?
The thing is I have bad credit. I need to know what I can do to repair my credit. I am not looking for anything fancy. I’m in my late twenties and just need to get a starter home. I am looking for something for my kids. I printed my credit report and I have two open accounts and 4 negative closed accounts. What do I need to do to bring up my score? I’ve spoke to a few people before and all have said that in order for me to get a loan, I need to raise my credit score. Okay… so…how? I need this for my kids. Again, basically all I want to do is get approved for a starter home. My monthly income is around 4K per month and I am single mother with 2 children. I have pretty bad credit. And my second question is, how long would it take for me to repair my credit?
You pay your bills on time, pay off everything in default. It takes 2 yrs to see improvement.
So use those years to save cash for down payment and closing costs
You will have to rent for now.
It takes time to ruin your credit and it takes time to fix it. There is no quick fix.
You fix it by paying all your bills on time. Don’t miss a one. You pay off all your debts. It will take a couple of years for your credit score to improve. However, if you stop making the bad choices that ruined your credit in the first place and start being more responsible with your money, your credit score will come up.
So, take the next couple of years to pay off your debts and save up a down payment.
You did not indicate if your open accounts were current, delinquent or in collections. This is important as there are different ways of handling them depending on what state they are in.
1. Current accounts
You would want to maintain them in that condition and perhaps paying a little more than required per your monthly statement. You might would want to pay them down if there is a high balance on the cards.
2. Delinquent accounts you would want to bring them current as soon as possible or pay them off. You might even call the card holder and make arrangements to return these cards (torn or ripped up) or not use them an longer. Tell the card holder you are no longer gonna use this card again and you want to pay them off without additional interest.
3. Negative accounts, depending how old they are would depend on if you would take any action on them at all. If they are more than 4 years of age, leave them along. It would be nice and honorable to pay them, however the laws in most states indicate if they are more than 4 years of age they have been deemed noncollectable and would come off your credit report after the four year period has elapsed. You should google noncollectable accounts followed by the state in which you reside to see what the time limit is in you state to have these noncollectable accounts removed from your credit report. Your credit report you obtained should indicate when they would be removed from your credit report.
You will be called by the collection agencies that have purchased these noncollectable debts. Make no deal with them about the collection, nor agree to pay anything toward the accounts. Doing so would put you in a position of starting over from square one and the four years would start all over again.
These methods would improve your credit scores over time. Your credit should improve every 90 days.
While you are getting your credit straightened out, you should open a savings account, preferably in a credit union, as the credit union is more flexible than your local bank would be. If you are serious about the purchase of a home for you and your children, this savings account would be constant with the amount being the same or more each time you make a deposit.
You might consider applying for a mortgage loan immediately. Applying for a mortgage loan would tell you what you would need to do to be approved for a mortgage loan.They might be able to determine that you might not need as much to do as you would think. It cost nothing to apply for a mortgage loan.
I hope this has been of some benefit to you, good luck.
“FIGHT ON”
To bring up your score, you need to do several things:
Pay your open accounts on time and don’t carry a huge balance.
Pay off your closed accounts. you can try to get a pay for delete (meaning you pay in full and they take the bad stuff off), but that’s tough.
It takes time. not knowing what the negative items are, it could take a few years.
I am landlord. As long as no eviction, I think it should be ok to find place rent