Bountiful Short Sales: Fixing Credit After A Short Sale Step 3: Rank Items In Order Of Importance

Bountiful UTAH – The next step in going over your credit reports is to really rank the items being reported about you to find ones that are the most negative.


Rank the negative items with the MOST negative ones given the lowest ranking. Get my Free, Step By Step Loan Modification Guide by clicking here. You want to rank the ones that will cause the most damage to your credit score.

Here are the most damaging items (in order of damage amount): bankruptcy; foreclosure; repossession; loan default; court judgment; accounts in collections; payments that are past due; payments that are late; being denied credit; inquiries to open new credit.

One thing to note about disputing things on your credit report – items like court judgments and foreclosures and child support arrears are verified by a different system, and are rarely if ever disputable. Here is one of the best suggestions that I have seen work well. Take a Sharpie pen, and mark on the unused copy of your report. 

Circle the items you are disputing and write a SHORT note about why you are disputing that item – for example “Not my account” or “Not Late.”

I am not advising you to lie or make misleading statements when you write to the credit reporting company. However, I will tell you that if someone is reporting something about you, they should be able to prove that what they are saying is the truth. The credit bureaus are required to check out and investigate all the disputes they get that are deemed to not be “frivolous or irrelevant.”

What that means is that you need to not dispute every single item on your report right now, and you need to be taken seriously. This means DO NOT use the dispute form that they sent with your credit report. They see those forms as “frivolous” 9 out of 10 times.

DO NOT use their online dispute center – the credit bureaus don’t take those seriously because they think you can’t be too serious if you just click-click-clicked away to dispute it.

Thinking about a loan modification?Our Layton loan modification guide will show you how to reduce your mortgage payment, keep your home, and get back on your feet. Send me an e-mail at utahhomesaver@gmail.com to request a Free Copy. Or, click here to request a copy.

Thinking about a short sale? I can help you short sale your property so you can move on with your life. Send me an e-mail at utahhomesaver@gmail.com. I will contact you for a free consultation. When we talk, I will explain how the process works in detail and answer any questions you may have. Or, if you prefer, you can call me at (801) 651-0707

Discover how other sellers successfully completed a short sale and request a free consultation by clicking here.

Thanks for reading this, Dave Forsberg.

Dave is a Real Estate Agent at Prudential Utah Real Estate - Bountiful. Utah Short Sales Realtor:

Phone: (801) 651-0707. utahhomesaver@gmail.com.

Greater Salt Lake Short Sales. Real Help for those that need it most.

View My homes for sale at BuyUtahNow.com.

Bountiful Short Sales: Fixing Credit After A Short Sale Step 2: Analyzing Your Credit Report

Bountiful UTAH – Once you have gotten your credit report, the next step in the process of restoring your credit score is to go over it with a critical eye.


Analyze what the report says.

Get my Free, Step By Step Loan Modification Guide by clicking here.

Put aside any emotion that looking at the report might stir up – you need to look at it objectively.

First, make two copies of your credit report. Save the original without any marks on it. You can make any notes you need on one of the copies, and put the other copy aside for a later step. Your credit report will show all sorts of history on your credit accounts. Look for all the negative items on your credit report and highlight each one.

The credit reporting firms might not make it easy for you to know what they are considering negative with all the codes they use. As a very general rule, Experian notes negative items with an asterisk or an inquiry; Equifax and TransUnion put “>>>” as a way to signal negative items or items that have a rating higher than l1, M1, or R1. You can also look for these words: repossession, foreclosure, profit and loss write-off, charge-off, paid profit and loss write-off, paid charge off, settled, settled for less than full balance, included in bankruptcy, collection amounts. Paid, unpaid (or anything indicating payment history); court accounts, liens, judgments, bankruptcy (chapters 11,7, or 13) divorce, satisfied liens, or satisfied judgments; or items that show more than 30, 60, or 90 day payments.


All of these should get highlighted by you. Once you’ve highlighted anything that is listed as negative, take out a pencil and put a note next to the items that are either inaccurate or inconsistent. Inaccurate items are the ones that aren’t yours, or show the wrong balance, etc. An inconsistent reporting is where the same information on the report contradicts itself somewhere else. For example, showing one place that there are twelve 31-day-lates on an account, while also saying that the account was only reviewed for 4 months. It is always surprising how often there are errors like that found on credit reports. Remember – there’s a whole lot of information being submitted each day to these companies, and mistakes can happen. The next step will be important to take as soon as you finish highlighting your report. You will need to move quickly through these first few steps – your timing is all tracked and it’s important for you to be diligent so that your credit can be restored.

Thinking about a loan modification?Our Utah loan modification guide will show you how to reduce your mortgage payment, keep your home, and get back on your feet. Send me an e-mail at utahhomesaver@gmail.com to request a Free Copy. Or, click here to request a copy.

Thinking about a short sale? I can help you short sale your property so you can move on with your life. Send me an e-mail at utahhomesaver@gmail.com. I will contact you for a free consultation. When we talk, I will explain how the process works in detail and answer any questions you may have. Or, if you prefer, you can call me at (801) 651-0707

Discover how other sellers successfully completed a short sale and request a free consultation by clicking here.

Thanks for reading this, Dave Forsberg.

Dave is a Real Estate Agent at Prudential Utah Real Estate - Bountiful. Bountiful Short Sales Realtor: Phone: (801) 651-0707. utahhomesaver@gmail.com.

Greater Salt Lake Short Sales. Real Help for those that need it most.

View My homes for sale at BuyUtahNow.com.

David Forsberg specializes in loan modification assistance and short sales in Bountiful Utah.

Bountiful Loan Modification Help, Bountiful Short Sales. Bountiful Short Sale Realtor Bountiful UT Short Sales. Bountiful Realtor.

Bountiful Short Sale: The First Step To Fixing Your Credit After A Short Sale

Bountiful UTAH – One of the common reasons that people are concerned about a foreclosure or short sale in their history is because they are concerned about their credit score.

Get my Free, Step By Step Loan Modification Guide by clicking here.

While it’s true that your credit score will be adversely affected by these items, it is also true that you can move past blemishes on a credit report.

You may want to consider doing some credit repair or credit restoration. It isn’t hard to do, and when taken step by step, it can be handled in an organized, manageable way. The first step that you need to do is to get and review your credit report.

I’m always amazed by the psychology of just this step. Most people don’t want to pull their credit report because they “just feel” like it will be bad, and they don’t want to see it. However, you won’t know where you are at or how to get onto the next phase of recovery until you figure out where you are at.

You have seen all the commercials, and can sing the jingles, for some of the places to get your credit report. There are pros and cons for any of the places you can get your credit report.

The two words of caution I offer here are: 1. You can get an annual free credit report (the one that the government requires the 3 credit reporting bureaus to provide) from annualcreditreport dot com. However – if you choose this route – it is free, but it then bumps up the time that a creditor has to investigate any of your disputes from 30 to 45 days. This isn’t a great option, in my opinion. You’ll understand why after you learn about the dispute process. Also, be aware that this service doesn’t have to give you your 3 digit credit score – which you might want to know.

2. Most of the other services offer you a free 30 day trial period, and then you get “enrolled” in their credit monitoring program. If you aren’t one to keep track of the 30 day trial timeframe, you could end up sucked into paying for something that you wouldn’t normally want to spend monthly money on. In the next article about your credit report restoration, I’ll talk about how to review your report, what to look for, and how to analyze it.

Thinking about a loan modification?
Our Utah loan modification guide will show you how to reduce your mortgage payment, keep your home, and get back on your feet.

Send me an e-mail at utahhomesaver@gmail.com to request a Free Copy. Or, click here to request a copy.


Thinking about a short sale?
I can help you short sale your property so you can move on with your life. Send me an e-mail at utahhomesaver@gmail.com. I will contact you for a free consultation. When we talk, I will explain how the process works in detail and answer any questions you may have. Or, if you prefer, you can call me at (801) 651-0707

Discover how other sellers successfully completed a short sale and request a free consultation by clicking here.

Thanks for reading this,

Dave Forsberg.

Dave is a Real Estate Agent at Prudential Utah Real Estate - Bountiful. Utah Short Sales Realtor:

Phone: (801) 651-0707.

utahhomesaver@gmail.com.

Greater Salt Lake Short Sales. Real Help for those that need it most.

View My homes for sale at BuyUtahNow.com.