Hello. I was directed here from a mommy site.
My husband and I are 33 & 31 respectively, and have a combined total of $6k in debt, about $5k of which is collections debt from medical bills and the rest is things like a power company account that was supposed to have been changed back into the landlords name after a move but wasn't and the landlord didn't pay the bill because it wasn't in his name, a cable bill from when we were co housing with friends and had to move due to violence, that sort of thing.
Anyways, we need/want to move into a larger rental in the fall when our lease is up. In order to do that we need to raise our credit scores. My husband is a full time student {post job displacement} and will be receiving a decent amount of refund from his Pell grants this semester. Combined with 1/2 of our tax refund, we could feasibly pay off 1/2 of our total debt load at once.
My question is, if/when {since I plan to do it anyways just to get out from under it} we pay off the accounts, how fast can/should our credit score come up if at all? Currently we have a 512 and a 615 respectively, so opening a new line of credit with our bank or obtaining an outside credit card isn't possible or I'd do that since I've read that those things can help raise a score rather quickly.
Thanks in advance for any and all advice and thoughts on this and how to raise our score aside from debt repayment given our inability to obtain new credit.
My husband and I are 33 & 31 respectively, and have a combined total of $6k in debt, about $5k of which is collections debt from medical bills and the rest is things like a power company account that was supposed to have been changed back into the landlords name after a move but wasn't and the landlord didn't pay the bill because it wasn't in his name, a cable bill from when we were co housing with friends and had to move due to violence, that sort of thing.
Anyways, we need/want to move into a larger rental in the fall when our lease is up. In order to do that we need to raise our credit scores. My husband is a full time student {post job displacement} and will be receiving a decent amount of refund from his Pell grants this semester. Combined with 1/2 of our tax refund, we could feasibly pay off 1/2 of our total debt load at once.
My question is, if/when {since I plan to do it anyways just to get out from under it} we pay off the accounts, how fast can/should our credit score come up if at all? Currently we have a 512 and a 615 respectively, so opening a new line of credit with our bank or obtaining an outside credit card isn't possible or I'd do that since I've read that those things can help raise a score rather quickly.
Thanks in advance for any and all advice and thoughts on this and how to raise our score aside from debt repayment given our inability to obtain new credit.
Comment