By John Cooper

You do not have to just wait for negative marks on your credit report to fall off. You can remove them and improve your credit score.

The Fair Credit Reporting Act that was passed by Congress gives you the right to dispute any item on your report. This act also makes it law that if the item is not verified by the creditor then the bureau must delete it from your credit report.

To dispute an item you must create a dispute letter and send it to each credit bureau. You can hire a service to create this letter or do it yourself.

Upon receipt of a valid dispute letter the bureau will investigate the item. They will ask the creditor to verify the account, the balance and the dates of delinquency.

However if the creditor does not verify the account then the item must be removed from your report. It has been learned that once a charge off, repossession, and late payment have aged 2 years there is a high success rate that they will not be verified by the creditor.

After two years the lender has received some form of payment. For example with a charged off credit card account the debt has been sold to a collection agency, and the lender has no need to save any record of your account.

Recent delinquent accounts, tax liens, judgments, and bankruptcies are more difficult to remove. If you have one of these marks then hiring a service is a good idea, because they have advanced dispute tactics.

A service can use more advanced methods to remove an item if it is verified by the lender. A service can use; creditor direct intervention, escalated dispute information requests, and debt validation.

You can also help your credit score by opening a revolving unsecured credit line. This will help your score because you can create a positive payment history and improve your ratio of debt to available credit.

In sum you do not have to wait seven years to repair your credit. You can have a good credit score by removing derogatory items and building a positive payment history.

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