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There's
a brisk business among so-called "credit repair"
companies that charge from $50 to more than $1,000 to
"fix" your credit report.
In many cases, these outfits take your money and do
little or nothing to improve your credit report.
Often, they just vanish.
There are no quick or easy cures for a poor credit
history. If a
credit repair company promises you it can clean up your
credit report, remember the following:
- your
credit history is maintained by private companies called
credit bureaus that collect information reported to them
by banks, mortgage companies, department stores, and other
creditors;
- these
credit bureaus can legally report accurate negative credit
information for seven years and bankruptcy information for
ten years;
- accurate
items that are within the seven (or ten) year reporting
period cannot be erased from your credit record by
companies advertising "credit repair" services;
- if
you have a poor credit history - even if your past
problems were due to illness or unemployment - time is the
only thing that will heal your credit report;
- the
only information in your credit report that can be changed
are items that are actually wrong or beyond the seven (or
ten) year reporting period;
- if
there are genuine mistakes or outdated items in your
report, you can fix them yourself.
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