Tuesday, December 04, 2007

Kiplinger Answers My Reader's Query: Bad Credit RX?

The folks at Kiplinger’s Personal Finance have provided an answer to a reader's recent question about credit-card repair, which followed a recent post on this site.

Here's the question:

In response to Kiplinger's formula for a healthy credit score, Anon wrote:

That's very nice, but sometimes people get sick and can't work and lose their income and their credit goes in the tank. How do you get your credit out of the tank?



Kim Lankford, Contributing Editor, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance magazine provided this response:

"You can't erase a bad credit history, but you can take steps to improve your credit record from this point on. Negative items generally affect your score for up to seven years, but as time goes by their impact lessens.

Continue using your cards, but clean up your act. Pay your bills on time, keep your account balances low, and be sparing in opening new accounts. As long you use credit conservatively, your score can rebound surprisingly quickly, says Craig Watts of Fair Isaac. We've seen cases of bankruptcy in which borrowers have qualified for a premium mortgage in three years.'"

Here's a link to an article Kim wrote for the November issue profiling individuals who took control of their credit problems:

Special Thanks to Kim Lankford for the prompt response.


Special Thanks to Laura Stevens from the The Rosen Group for making it happen so quickly and efficiently.


And, of course, kudos to Anonymous for asking the question.
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