Student Loan Lates and Credit Cards

Question

I tried goodwill letters and emails but really got nowhere. I would get answers back that the loans are reporting accurately (which they are). I read on the Student Loan forum that people were having some recent luck with Nelnet so I might try again. It's been about 12 months since my last go at getting lates removed. And I totally agree with you. I love that I'm at a place where I can just relax and let the lates age. If I hadn't read all the posts here I never would have been able to get this far. I found that student loan baddies are some of the hardest to get rid of. At times I wished my mistakes were collections that I could have PFD'd.  At one point I had 3 open Cap 1 cards but as I started to get more approvals I closed the lower limit tradelines and stuck with the QS1 and watched it grow. It started with a limit of $1000 and was all auto CLIs. I even got the annual fee removed permanently back in 2013. A Cap1 starter was so helpful in this process and also enabled me to avoid the super predatory lenders like First Premier.

Answer 1

I wanted to share a bit about my rebuild story that hopefully will shed some light on the effect of student loan baddies and obtaining credit cards and auto loans. In 2011, I had 4 student loan tradelines that all had multiple lates. Many even had a few 120+ late notations. In the summer of 2011, I took finally took control and responsibility for the mistakes and worked hard to get the loans current. Only one loan was eligible for the rehab program, so I did that. The others I made additional payments until they were brought current and then started making the regular monthly payment, on-time, every month.  Despite completing the rehab program and having the default removed, the lates remained and my credit score only increased by about 30 points. I was literally stuck in the low 600s and the countless goodwill letters to Nelnet got me nowhere.  Despite the low score and remining lates on my report, I was able to rebuild fairly successfully. I did it the fairly typical way, started with secured cards, as those aged I applied for unsecured cards from Cap 1 and then edged my way into better lenders like AMEX and Chase. Despite the growth of positive history and positive tradelines my score barely moved. I hovered around 660 for years. What I wanted to share was that EVERY card in my signature below was obtained while my score was between 650 and 680. I got prime cards with decent limits despite 20+ lates showing. I also financed a new car through Chase with a 2.39% APR for 60 months in December 2013. I know my scores will never be stellar until the lates finally start to fall off, but I'm thankful that lenders started to give me a chance despite my relatively low score.