Credit Score Post Short Sale

My husband and I are having to do a short sale on our home after he was laid off from his job last December, couldn’t keep with the payments, and owe more than it’s worth. We have a buyer, the bank has approved the sale, and we are supposed to be closing on June 16th.

My question is, we both had 750 credit before this all happened. We’ve managed to pay off all of our consumer debt except our car, so that’s the only thing left with a balance. What can we do now to boost our credit score after the short sale is complete?

Rachel

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Hi Rachel,

The shorting lender provides a payoff letter which should speak to the credit reporting implications of the completed short sale.  This is all negotiable.  The lender could offer a partial release, a full release, or simply charge-off the remaining balance.  All three would yield different results for your credit report and score.

Aside from the credit repair seminar and thousand-plus articles in our Help Center Library, my advice would be to monitor the tradeline’s reporting post-closing.  If the tradeline is not ‘complete and accurate’ then you can file a dispute with the CRA.  To add a heavy hand to your dispute, send an additional letter labeled a qualified written request to the customer service address of your former mortgage servicer.  The furnisher can either correct the problem or the tradeline will be deleted.

Thanks for the questions and hope this helps.

Paul