Kindred

Yep, I'd have another 5k+ just in interest to pay for after 30 years just for the silent second if I stay put. Another reason why this refi is tempting. Good question on the cost of loan. Closing costs is 2,100 which I already included in the 173,000 figure. Would take 21 months basically to see ROI on that. Definitely a coin toss indeed.

Good insights. Thank you!

Since mortgage insurance isn't tax deductible starting this year it looks like I'm looking to ditch my FHA loan from 2011 and refi in to conventional. Originator is pretty confident that current home value is more than enough to refi in to Conventional to get rid of MI. I'd also be able to pay off the silent 2nd mortgage from the State I have that must be paid off upon selling, refi, or loan maturation using this refi. The only caveat here is that the interest rate is slightly higher and I'd restart loan with 30 years. I'm wondering if this refi makes sense. Here are some numbers: Current FHA loan: Remaining balance 1st Mortgage: $163,000 Interest Rate: 4.25% Remaining balance 2nd Mortgage: $5,500 @ 3.5% MI is currently at $155 per month. Estimate numbers from Conventional Refi: New loan balance: $173,000 (includes payoff for both loans above and closing fees). Interest Rate: 4.50% They're calculating about $50 more per month for principal/interest but $100 net savings per month since MI is no longer paid. So the way I understand it the pros for either situation is -- If I stay with current FHA loan: Keep lower rate of 4.25%, remove MI after 2.5 years (maybe). If I refi: Remove MI, silent 2nd mortgage is paid off thus no more interest accural, FHA is available for me again eventually in case I want to buy a new house and turn this in to a rental I don't know if I calculated correctly but it looks like the numbers look to be about the same after 30 years on either loan. Maybe the refi is slightly higher? Am I actually staying in this house for 30 years? No, likely another 5-10 max. With all this being said, does this refi make sense? Thanks!

This is sound advice. It looks like you're not too aware of what your credit report situation is. You'll need to do a lot of reading and a lot of research first to see what's the best way to go about your credit repairs. This starts with knowing your credit reports like the back of your hand Good luck, it'll be well worth it in the end.

Normally I trash mail credit card offers but I've been itching for some nice BT deals and BOA has been working non stop to get me to do some BTs with them. All of them have been crap so far. So in the mail today I get an offer for a "BankAmericard Cash Rewards MasterCard". It's not great, but not too bad either. 1-2-3 cashback and $100 cashback on first $500 in 90 days. What gets me is the 0% BT for 12 months (3% fee); so I'm interested. I already have a BOA Platinum Plus Visa (WorldPoints) which has been auto-upgraded from a 99/500 Secured from years back. I already have way too many open lines than I'd want right now and I'd rather not open a brand new line either. Does BOA do any kind of upgrade of my existing card to the offer they're sending me in the mail? And if they do, does the old card history stay in tact?

Something's seriously screwed up and I'm pissed. I noticed my Cap1 was denied at the grocer's last night. Thought maybe it was a glitch or something so I used another card. Had to book a flight tonight so I tried using that card and the website said the card was denied. I call up Capital One and the automated system tells me that the account is closed. Okay, that's really odd I thought. I eventually spoke with a CSR and they said they received a payment few weeks back along with a correspondence saying to close the account. Well, I can see where the payment came from (I did a balance transfer with Patelco) but nowhere should there have been a correspondence saying to CLOSE the account. Patelco was asking me to close one of my cards when I applied and I happily told them I'd close my Hooters card (which wasn't being BT'ed over) since I was going to do just that if I got Patelco approved. So I'm more than sure this is the "correspondence" they got. I told Cap1 that I'm the sole account holder and I had never sent a request to close the account. I also questioned on why the account would be closed via a third-party request and not the account holder himself. The CSR agreed that it was odd but the best he could do was send in a review request and notate our conversation. Takes 14 business days and extra 10 days or so through mail for me to get an answer. I knew that's the best the CSR could do so I asked them to do just that. Question is, has this ever happened to anyone? I know Cap1 isn't the most popular lender around here but I'm mostly pissed because it's my oldest tradeline (10+ years) by FAR. If this account stays closed, my average history drops down quite a bit. Not to mention I'd be losing the 2nd highest CL card I have. Anyone know what I can do to make sure this opens back up?

yes but it's free to become a member and not required to have a checking or savings account For anyone else who stumbles across this thread looking for the best service, I was able to sign up for USAA-CMP even though I have no family military history and it would appear I would otherwise be ineligible for their services. And it is pretty awesome. So how did you exactly sign up? I tried purchasing CCM thru USAA but they need an online ID obviously. So I filled out their form to join and basically was denied an Online ID since I'm not eligible for any of the criteria they specified in the questionnaire (no military spouse/service/relative/anything). I need to dump TrueCredit and move to one of these guys.

Congrats. I've had this card for a while as well at 16% APR (my lowest APR). If they don't bump up your CL, it will grow over time. I started out at 1100 about 3 years ago and it now grew to $5500. Long as you make payments on time and keep a good history with them, they'll consistently bump your limit up without you asking. Oh, and the matte black card they send you looks pretty darn sexy!

This is what I did to get rid of Asshat Acceptance. It may take you a while longer but it's worked for me and number of other people. 1. DV, etc etc. You've already done this. Keep paper trails of EVERYTHING you get from them including your own letter. 2. Dispute with the CRAs. If they fall off here, then great. You're done. If not, retain that paperwork too, especially the piece of documentation that says AA verified. 3. Start a complaint/dispute with Michigan Attorney General. You can do this online. Scan in all your paperwork from above two steps, describe, in detail all the steps you took and what they failed to provide you with or violated with. Submit that along with scanned copies of all the paperwork. 4. You'll eventually receive a card of sort in the mail from MI AG saying they've received your complaint and will investigate. 5. Hopefully, if everything goes through, you'll get a letter from them along with a copy of AA's letter to MI AG saying they will delete and remove the account from their records. This took about 5-6 months after I submitted my complain to MI AG. Good luck.

It's been a long road for me. But it was a great feeling today after talking to Discover. Started my journey here about 3-4 years ago with one $500 card, 6 counts of (30/60/90), 3 CAs and relatively thin file. I was able to rid of ALL the baddies towards the 2nd half of last year (basically just waiting for the lates to fall off) and also bought a house. Hooters card was one of my first builder cards and I lived through 3 years of them charging me high interest rate and the stinkin $3 fee a month(annual fee). Now that I'm able to almost pick-and-choose what card I want, this silly card will probably be closed off. Got my first Discover card today approved for $5500 after apping on Friday. They had to make me call in and talk to their specialist who had TONS of questions about my credit (mostly about how I plan to use my card and questions about bit high utilization and how I plan to pay off. Felt like a job interview almost). Eventually, they approved for that amount also with a BT with my whole balance from Hooters. Just wanted to post this as a thank-you note for this great community for getting me this far and hopefully some encouragement for those still fighting that you will get there soon enough.

Thanks. Got a preapproval last week and I'm having helluva time searching my area right now. It's ridiculous here. Almost every damn property out here is a short sale! My RE agent and I've been trying to avoid it but all the ones I've been seeing and liking are all short sales so we may have to go to this route.

This is good information folks. Thanks. I was a bit concerned about how much debt I have on my CC's (not much, only $2k and I've been planning to pay it all off before I think of buying a house but I might need to buy one before that). But since they only look at payments, that's a good thing. Guess I'll have to start looking in to FHAs. I've only glimpsed at it here and there but I think it's time I read and research a bit more about it. Any other quick pointers before I go full on with this? Try to go to my CU and get preapproved first or just get some agents through trustworthy referals and have them help me out from there?

Due to some circumstances, I'm in a situation where I'll need to move out of my rental apartment soon and will need to either go get another rental apartment or finally dive in and buy a house. Here's my info: Income: $50,000/yearly Job: Kept same job for past 4 years at local government FICO: EQ as of last month was 702. Other two reports are alike so I'm assuming FICO is similar on other two reports. I have a downpayment available between $5-$7k. Current rent is $700 Current CC payments is $300 I have a $18k balance left on an auto loan that I pay $550 monthly. Credit Baddies: I have 60 and 90 for one closed card from 6.5 years ago. Another 60/90 from the same time for another card that's currently open and good standing. No other baddies. CC debt is around 15% of available credit at the moment. I'm looking for a starter house that's in about $150k range MAX. Ideally, it'll be between $100-$130k. Thanks for any help in advance.