Young Jimmy was a strapping lad of about 24 years old or so. He was a very entrepreneurial minded young man.
He did what many people seeking to start a business do. He used ‘other people’s money’.
Since he didn’t have access to a big bank loan, that meant using his personal credit via the many credit cards he had been given by various credit companies.
Johnny had all of these things in his favor:
–> He was a crazy hard worker
–> He had a great, ‘winning’ personality
–> He had a deep seated determination to win
Jimmy was no slouch! He worked hard to make his young business grow. He was working every single day, including weekends.
Jimmy went out of business after nine months of hard work.
Maybe he just didn’t have the right opportunity, the right knowledge or maybe some key unknown peice of the puzzle was missing.
He was so disappointed. He worked so hard. Now he felt like a failure.
Since he used his personal credit cards and there was no money coming in from his now defunct business, Jimmy had no choice but to not pay off those credit card loans. He defaulted on all of them.
He didn’t pay them. He didn’t have the money.
The bill collection agencies were calling him left and right.
After a while, when they figured out that they were not going to get anywhere, most of them stopped calling.
But Jimmy told his story to one of them. This bill collector hated her job and told Jimmy she was going to quit and go back to school. Good for her!
She also told him something else that was important. She said that after 7 years of bad credit, those debts would roll off his credit reports and he wouldn’t have to worry about it anymore.
It had already been 4 years, so Jimmy just had 3 more to go.
But Jimmy wanted to clear up his credit sooner, just in case a prospective employer might do a credit check! So Jimmy went to a ‘credit repair company’.
They offered to charge Jimmy a hefty sum to clear up his credit report. However, Jimmy liked to find things out. So he asked them how they planned to do that.
Jimmy found out that anyone can get their credit reports fixed. It just takes time and persistence!
He learned that what he needed to do was to dispute each item on the credit report. This initiates a procedure with the credit reporting agency. They must go to the alleged creditor and ask for verification / explanation.
Sometimes they respond. But if they do not respond within a certain amount of time, the reporting agency would have no choice but to remove the disputed item from his credit report.
If they do respond, he would simply dispute the item again. Sooner or later the creditor was going to drop the ball. When they don’t respond, presto! The item is removed from the report.
– Dispute in writing
– Wait for a response or not. If not, he wins.
– If there is a response, dispute it again.
Jimmy learned that this is how he could fix his credit report without spending a lot of money on a credit report repair service.
This is a fictional story. Seek appropriate legal | professional advice if you have credit issues.
You may also enjoy: Responsible Credit Card Use
and / or
Building | Rebuilding Credit with a Secured Credit Card
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