Monday, November 12, 2007

Starting Fresh After Bankruptcy

I ordered a full credit report in September from all tree of the credit bureaus to see what my credit looked like and to my surprise, most of the accounts were already marked Bankruptcy Discharge. I was told it could take up to 6 months to a year. Only a couple still had overdue balances.

Tried to apply for a credit card to see if I could get one at that point but no, got refused. Well, was worth a try.

Three months went by, now we're in November. I've been receiving lots of those credit card offers in the mail that say, "You're pre-approved!" so I went ahead and let them try and approve me this time. Wow, they approved!

I got my first credit card with $300 credit. It has a $59 annual fee and is 9.9% interest. Awesome! I finally get to start building my credit back up.

From all the research I've been doing about building up credit I learned that to grow or improve credit, well one of the things is to keep the debt to available credit ratio low. So my plan is to first pay off the annual fee and any other fees they may charge to the $300 credit. Then I will make small purchases, probably around $30 to $50 per month and pay them off each month when I get the bill. This should push my credit history towards the top. It will probably take me a while at that rate to get my credit increased but I am excited about getting this chance. My second chance!

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