Hi All,
I graduated college 2 years ago- where I messed up my credit immensely (or so I keep hearing.) I was getting calls from collection agencies, stuffing bills in my drawers, and not wanting to deal with it - looking back at it, I know what a bad idea it was, but I had no way to pay with it and didn't want to deal with it.
I now have a job where I can absolutely begin to pay back these debts- but I have no idea where to start. I owe $1400 to what was originally a $500 credit to Bank of America. I finally started opening bills, and saw one of the collection agencies offering me to settle for almost $900 below what I owe. However, it was past the due date at that point and once I called the collection agency, it said my account had been passed off to another collection agency.
I also owe a little bit over $400 to my old apartment complex- which has also been passed off to a collection agency.
Finally, I recently learned that I owed a mere $26 to Victoria's Secret from nearly a year and a half ago, which I already went ahead and paid off last week.
Other than that, I have had student loans which I have been paying on time for well over a year now and are in good standing. But don't have any other lines of credit.
What I would like to know is if your debt is passed on to another collection agency, will they typically agree to the settled amount with the previous company? As well, what is the difference between paying the settled amount and paying in full? Will doing one vs. the other improve my credit score or does it not matter?
Another question, which debt should I pay off first? The old bank of america debt or the one to my old apartment?
Finally, where can I start to improve my credit? Would a secured card be a good idea, if so from which companies? Is there a way to remove any of these charges from the report?
Any help is greatly appreciated !
That for most people is when bad credit begins,You usually get numerous amounts of credit card offers when you first step out of highschool. To most kids, it like free money but I think that if they were better informed on what they were getting themselves into, most people would be in better shape. Even though I think that we would still opt to take the "free money."
