How Long Can Credit Repair Take? The Real Scoop On Fixing Your Credit Fast!
Does credit repair take a while? Days? Weeks? Months or years? If I start today...how long should I expect it will take? And is there a way to get it done FASTER if I need help quick? In this article we are going to take a quick and insightful look at how long credit repair takes...and see if there is anything you can do to speed it up if you need help in a jiff!
The truth about time and fixing your credit
Most conventional credit repair works in cycles. And those cycles are usually done in 30 day increments. For example, if you file your FIRST dispute on the 1st of the month, you really shouldn't expect to get a response until the 5th of the following month or thereabouts. Why? Because the FCRA (Fair Credit Reporting Act) and it's amendments generally allocate a "reasonable time" for the Credit Bureaus to investigate your dispute....which has been interpreted as 30 days. You have to allow for a little bit of mailing time as well, which in my experience is generally 5 days...which means I typically "budget" my disputes, from a time standpoint at 35 days for each.
Can some disputes be done FASTER?
Absolutely, yes. You can actually CALL the bureaus, and fax in documents in some situations, and if you have unequivocal PROOF that something should come off your report, or be changed to a new classification entirely, you can follow a very specific protocol, and they have 72 hours to fix your report. But it's important to use this sparingly....and ONLY when something is truly completely wrong, and not just wrong in detail. (like the amount you owed that was delinquent - in which case you'd want to use a more traditional dispute for a whole bunch of more strategic reasons..:-)
You CAN also expedite everything on your side...
With certified mailings and overnight mail when and where appropriate, and that will cut down on the time things take. But as always, you ARE subject to the schedule of the bureau's themselves, and often they CAN (and will be) the slow cog in the wheel...no matter how much we wish they moved faster! The good news is that each "round" of disputes tends to be about 30 days, and I've never seen anyone NOT be able to dramatically improve their credit in 6 months...and get an almost entirely NEW report in 12!
The truth about time and fixing your credit
Most conventional credit repair works in cycles. And those cycles are usually done in 30 day increments. For example, if you file your FIRST dispute on the 1st of the month, you really shouldn't expect to get a response until the 5th of the following month or thereabouts. Why? Because the FCRA (Fair Credit Reporting Act) and it's amendments generally allocate a "reasonable time" for the Credit Bureaus to investigate your dispute....which has been interpreted as 30 days. You have to allow for a little bit of mailing time as well, which in my experience is generally 5 days...which means I typically "budget" my disputes, from a time standpoint at 35 days for each.
Can some disputes be done FASTER?
Absolutely, yes. You can actually CALL the bureaus, and fax in documents in some situations, and if you have unequivocal PROOF that something should come off your report, or be changed to a new classification entirely, you can follow a very specific protocol, and they have 72 hours to fix your report. But it's important to use this sparingly....and ONLY when something is truly completely wrong, and not just wrong in detail. (like the amount you owed that was delinquent - in which case you'd want to use a more traditional dispute for a whole bunch of more strategic reasons..:-)
You CAN also expedite everything on your side...
With certified mailings and overnight mail when and where appropriate, and that will cut down on the time things take. But as always, you ARE subject to the schedule of the bureau's themselves, and often they CAN (and will be) the slow cog in the wheel...no matter how much we wish they moved faster! The good news is that each "round" of disputes tends to be about 30 days, and I've never seen anyone NOT be able to dramatically improve their credit in 6 months...and get an almost entirely NEW report in 12!
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