I recently spoke to a young lady who learned a very expensive lesson which could have easily been avoided. Be careful you never fall victim by learning from her mistake.
Just over a year ago a young lady signed up with curemyscore.com in an effort to increase her credit score so she could one day qualify for a mortgage. After several months of getting errors fixed on her credit report and following all the credit education provided, her score was much higher and she was ready to qualify for a mortgage. She knew her dream home was soon to go up for sale. She sat back with her improved credit score and waited for her soon to be home to become available. After waiting about 90 days, her dream home did get listed for sale and she quickly took steps to buy it. Her excitement quickly turned to anger.
In order to make an offer on the home, she had to reapply for a mortgage since her past pre-approval expired. The lender told her it was no big deal and all they needed to do was obtain an updated credit report. The lender obtained a new credit report and discovered the woman’s credit score dropped an average of 63 points in the past 90 days. After reviewing her credit with the lender, she discovered her Navient student loan accounts were reporting her as being currently 60 days past due. She felt this could not be correct since her loan was in deferment; so she calledNavient. Within minutes she discovered her deferment ended a few months back and her payment was now due to be paid each month. The servicer explained they mailed 5 different notices to her explaining the deferment period expired and the exact date and amount of her first payment. She acknowledged receiving the letters fromNavientbut admitted she did not open any of it due to thinking it was junk mail. As it turned out, it was not junk mail.
Her lower credit score prevented her from qualifying for a mortgage and she was not able to buy her dream home. She learned a very important lesson, open your mail and review it before throwing it away.
Credit Reporting / Scoring Expert, Chris McConville is the President of Credit Education at CureMyScore.com and founder of myexpertcreditwitness.com where he works as an Expert Credit Witness in both Federal and State Court. With working in the credit and mortgage fields since 1991, he’s dedicated to sharing his knowledge to educate consumers.
