i had already decided to not take out any credit for anything other than a house. i pay cash for my vehicles, etc. Beau, i will have to talk with you about this whole buying a house without credit - that is unfathomable to me, but i am wrong a lot of the time, hah!

so yes, my focus right now is clearing out the old debts. and getting a couple of things corrected on my report, like that credit card that i paid off ten years ago, STILL reporting derogatory on my report.

and just save money in the meantime. gotta get a car with air conditioning. i love my volvo, but it is a gas guzzler, and hot!

In short, bad debt is bad because it creates jobs and new industries. Credit Bureau's enable banks and finance companies to charge higher fees and interest rates. Think of what would happen if all the bad debt went away?

Profits go down at banks and collection agencies are gone. Unthinkable really.

The key is to out smart them. I've worked hard to build my bad credit and I'm proud of it. I delight in getting things done with what is perhaps the lowest credit score on the planet. If someone is lower, please stand up!

Seriously, the key is don't buy anything on credit. Not even a house. Or at least not through traditional means. There are ways. Pay cash for everything and refuse to play the game.

“Be of good cheer: we’ll yet live to piss on the graves of our enemies.” -Edward Abbey

The credit bureaus are VERY innacurate. Astonishing, considering the power they have over your life options. You can do a lot to clean things up, and although it's tedious, you should try.

When I bought a house last July, my credit score was near perfect (which is because I worked really hard to clean up after a bankruptcy in '94.) However, at the 11th hour, I learned one of the 3 bureaus had incorrect info for me (making my loan payments increase by $400/month.) I did a mad-scramble of trying to fix it, which was frustrating. I made *some* progress, but had to accept some errors were unfixable.

==> You're doing this NOW before you're in negotiations for a house--how WONDERFUL!

Medical bills are hard to remove than credit card companies (I was getting dinged for something that was my husband's.) So work at getting that cleaned up.

Oh, and not all credit card companies report to the agencies. My BEST one that I use all the time for business, didn't show up. But I learned that if I called and asked, they could send a report to the agencies. So ask if they can and will.

Someone said to me once:
"God will only give you as much abundance as you can be responsible for." Meaning, learn to be responsible with what you have, if you want more. I took that to heart, and got out of debt. Ironically, buying a house is even bigger debt. But it sure is a rocketship to financial empowerment and learning how to handle money. You can do it!