Transcription
So here's the exciting part. The CFPB is now helping people just like you delete collections permanently off your credit once and for all. And the cool thing is, once a credit collection agency is able to be removed off of your Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion credit reports, it can never by law be returned back on your credit report, even under the guise of a different credit collection agency.
So, you're probably wondering, well, who's the CFPB and how does it work? Well, the CFPB is a government agency. It's one right now that the current administration is trying to forcefully strip all the funding out, but this is actually a consumer, you know, protection agency that was built to help become the barrier and the legal protection between you and some of these very unscrupulous creditors out there.
Now, everybody remembers the collapse of 2008 and all those very unscrupulous mortgage companies that took advantage of people, especially with the adjustable arm mortgages that they had back in the day. And so these these agencies, especially this consumer credit agency that is there to help afford protection for you, that's there to help you to create this legal barrier so that you don't get screwed over.
But what a lot of people don't understand is that this particular agency, while it's still functioning, which by the way, it's still functioning, it can actually help you permanently delete these collections off your credit reports. And again, like I mentioned before, once they're removed off your credit report, they can never legally be put back on again.
Now, I have a lot of people argue with me, they're like, Monica, I had this credit collection agency removed and now another company went back on under the same, you know, original creditor under ABC collection agency and the other one was called XYZ collection agency. So they can put it back on. Well, legally they can't. And once you show proof that it's fallen off to Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion, this is why you save all your paperwork from them, once you show proof that it's already fallen off, Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion will remove it just like that. So don't ever worry about these collection agencies coming back on your credit report under a different collection agency, for example, because legally they can't do that. You just have to stay on top of your credit reports.
This is also why I strongly urge all my students to freeze your credit reports so then that way people are just not willy-nilly throwing stuff on your credit report or even able to view your credit reports unless they have your expressed permission.
So, how does this work? How can you get the CFPB to help you successfully remove collection agency, you know, marks that are on your permanent credit report? Well, here is how you do it. So, first and foremost, what [clears throat] you have to do is you have to start the process of first disputing all your credit collection entries into your credit report directly with Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion.
Now, I have my free letters that you can get at getdisputeletters.com or secretcreditletters.com, which is down below. You can also get my free credit repair flowchart as well as a download. And you can check out exactly what the stages are or the steps are to be able to fix your credit as fast as possible. I've had students use that chart successfully over the last several months and they've been able to boost their FICO score by hundreds of points over the course of say around 120 days maximum if they follow the chart, and that's all you need to do is follow the chart. So you can also get that at getdisputeletters.com or secretcreditletters.com.
Along with what you're looking for is my 609-611 letter, which is the dispute letter. This is the key dispute letter. Now, you want to dispute first with Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion just to open the door for the investigation and for the legal paper trail. So if you've not filed your disputes yet, and by the way, you always want to send everything to Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion with number one, the letter, the 609-611 letter. Make sure you also include your state consumer credit statutes in addition to the federal consumer statutes that are included in the letter. So you can have ChatGPT or something similar to that create the state statute for the letter that you could just simply insert into the letter somewhere.
So include the letter, include a copy of your current driver's license showing your current address or a passport. If you have a current passport, you can include that, a copy of that as well. And two utility bills or equivalent showing your current address. Every single time you correspond with Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion, you always need to have a copy of your ID in there and a copy of two utility bills or equivalent.
Now, if you live with somebody who pays your bills, all you need to do is simply include a credit card statement, cell phone bill statement, insurance statement, some other statement that shows your name and address. You only need page one. You can scribble out your account information in the corner. You don't need 15 pages of your cell phone bill, just page one that shows your name and address. You always need to show proof of your address along with a copy of your current ID. Again, current, not expired ID and your current address on that ID. If you do not have your current address on your ID, go to the DMV and update it. By law, you have to do that anyway. So go ahead and make the trip down there and do it. And so once you get your actual legit ID, not a paper temporary copy, but a legit ID, you can then send a copy of that in with your 609-611 letter.
You do need to open up the investigation before you start the process of using the CFPB to help you remove these collections. Now, you have to allow them to do their investigation by law for 30 calendar days. So once 30 calendar days passes, if they do not remove these collection accounts, and by the way, we're only focusing in with this first line of disputes, this first round, we're focusing in on closed collection agency accounts. That's what we want to focus on cuz that's what I call the low-hanging fruit. These are the easiest accounts to have removed.
If Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion do not remove these accounts, then you can start the process of using the CFPB at consumerfinance.gov. You go to that website and you basically tell this government agency, this consumer credit, you know, protection agency, that you need their help in sending a letter to Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion because they failed to do their investigation as per federal law.
So what's what what Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion are supposed to do is open up an investigation for 30 days to determine if this account is truly yours and to collect proof that this is your account. Most of the time they're not even doing their job anymore. They're completely 100% negligent in doing this investigation as per federal law that's required once you initiate this investigation inquiry with this dispute letter, which is the 609-611 letter. So most of the time they'll just ignore the letter or just put some BS in there like, oh, we don't believe this is you, we believe you're working with a credit repair company or, you know, we're not going to do the investigation or that you just don't hear from them at all. So you do give them the 30-day calendar day time frame.
Once the 30 days passes, you immediately go to consumerfinance.gov. You file a complaint. Now, they have to be separate complaints, one against Experian, one against Equifax, and one against TransUnion, and it has to be a separate complaint for all three, but also has to be a separate complaint for all of the creditors that you are disputing. And again, we're only focusing in on those credit collection agencies, not original creditors, just collection agencies of closed accounts. Again, these are This is your low-hanging fruit. These are the easiest things to have removed. And you only focus on those accounts that did not fall off because some of them actually will fall off, especially older accounts.
So for example, if you have a credit collection agency that's like 5 years old, the likelihood of you having that immediately removed within say a couple of weeks after sending that 609-611 letter to the credit reporting bureaus is really high because many times some of these credit collection agencies aren't even in business anymore. So when the you know, Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion send in letters to them or send in correspondence to these creditors asking for proof of the debt, many times these creditors don't respond because they're not even in business anymore, or it's changed hands, or the address is incorrect, or whatever, and they're not able to get a hold of the credit collection agency, which is good is good for you cuz then that has to by law, by federal law, fall off your credit.
So you'll only file the complaint against Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion with consumerfinance.gov on those accounts that are left standing, that were not removed. So you're not going to obviously just blast out a bunch of complaints on every single thing that you disputed because maybe half of them fell off. Like if you had say, for example, six collection accounts and three of them fell off, well, you're only going to focus on the other three that are still there, and that's how you're going to address the complaint.
And [snorts] so you can also file a complaint against each creditor that's left standing. So again, it's going to be a separate complaint. So not only do you have to separate complaint against Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion, you're not going to lump them all in one complaint on consumerfinance.gov, you're going to have a separate complaint for each one in relation to the credit accounts that they did not remove and they did not investigate as per federal law upon your request in the 30-day calendar time frame, but you'll also file a separate complaint against those three creditors that are left standing. Whatever their names are, ABC collection agency, XYZ collection agency, you know, Midland Credit, whatever the names of the companies are, you'll have a separate complaint series against those three as well, and those will also be three separate complaints on consumerfinance.gov.
And so you don't communicate directly with the creditor. You don't send them a letter or anything. The only time I ever suggest sending a creditor a letter is if they sent you a letter because you're in dangerous, perilous waters if they send you a letter saying, you have 30 days to to basically tell us if this is not your debt and if we don't hear from you then we're going to assume that this is your debt, which is kind of an unfair way of going at it because what if you never even got the letter, what if it got lost in the mail, whatever, and that that happens a lot. So, the only time I ever suggest that you kind of go up against the creditors directly is with an 809 letter and that is only if they sent you a letter like the one I just described where they're threatening you and they have to hear from you within 30 days or else kind of thing. So, that's when you send them the 809 letter, which you can also get for free at getdisputeletters.com or secretcreditletters.com down below. But, otherwise, you don't communicate with them directly at all. That's my my advice. I don't like dealing with them at all. And anytime you are going to send them a letter, always scribble your initials at the bottom of the letter. Don't actually physically sign your letter the way you would legally sign a letter just because I've heard of situations where a lot of these unscrupulous creditors can sometimes lift your legal signature off of your letter and apply it to a contract that you technically never signed, which is dead illegal, but some of them do some most illegal, unscrupulous nonsense that I've that you've ever heard of. I've heard of a lot of these horror stories.
So, [snorts] when you send a letter again to a creditor directly, it's only in response to them sending you a legal threat letter in the mail directly to you. Otherwise, you don't have anything to do with them and you just have the CFPB send a letter on your behalf complaining about the debt stating that you have that they're essentially going to say, "You have failed to provide proof to Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion that this debt belongs to John Doe. So, therefore, you need to either take it off or cough up the proof that you need to provide as per federal law."
Now, what a lot of people don't understand is that a lot of these credit collection agencies don't have something called a chain of title. A chain of title is basically how they legally acquired the debt from the original creditor. And so, a chain of title is a legal contract that shows how they came into possession of your debt. Otherwise, it looks like they just stole the debt from somebody. They just raided somebody's file cabinet at Capital One or Bank of America or some large bank and they just took the file folders out and now they're saying that you owe them the money. Well, who the hell are they? You don't have an actual legal agreement or contract with them unless they could show some kind of chain of title, which is also required in a court of law if if the creditor ever sues you or the credit collection agency ever sues you. A lot of people don't know this cuz they don't know their consumer rights.
And so, what a lot of these credit collection agencies might do is show proof that you owe the debt by simply giving a stack of statements, you know, from the bank. Well, a stack of statements is not proof that you owe them the debt. So, say for example, you didn't pay Bank of America $5,000 on a credit card and eventually ABC Collection Agency ended up with that debt. They said that you owe $5,000. So, what they might do is they might respond to the Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion inquiry through an investigation saying, "Well, here's all of all of her, you know, Bank of America statements for the year that she didn't pay." That's great, but your name is ABC Collection Agency, not Bank of America. So, how do you fit into this picture because I don't have an agreement with ABC Collection Agency. I have an agreement with Bank of America and you are not Bank of America. So, that's where they come into a lot of problems when it comes to a credit collection agency cuz just because they show statements or an invoice, that does not show proof by federal law as per federal law that you owe the debt. They have to show proof that you owe them the debt, whether it's an actual agreement with them, which sometimes people do make agreements with collection agencies if they want to make good on on their debt and they want to create a payment plan with the collection agency. Yes, people do make agreements with them. I don't agree with that, but some people do that out of fear or whatever the case may be. But, otherwise, you don't owe them anything. You don't owe ABC Collection Agency anything unless they could show chain of title, which is not a stack of statements, this is not an invoice or some kind of piece of paper that says, "Oh, you owe me." or an IOU or whatever the case may be. That's not a legitimate, you know, claim to you owing the money.
So, you need to understand what your consumer rights are. So, basically, when you go to the CFPB, you're going to say, "Listen, I asked for Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion to do an investigation. They claim that they came back with proof that I owe the debt. I have not seen the proof of this debt. I do not owe this company any money because I never had a contract or agreement with ABC Collection Agency. So, therefore, I'm filing a complaint against this collection agency for failure to remove this debt off my credit report because they have failed to show proof that I owe this debt through a chain of title or any other legal means identified in a court of law." So, that's basically what you say to the CFPB.
So, again, whenever you want to file a complaint with the CFPB, that can help you essentially gain a lot of traction when it comes to removing a lot of this debt off, you can go to consumerfinance.gov, but only after you filed your first round of disputes with Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion directly to at least get some of the low-hanging fruit collection agency debt off of your credit reports first. You'll be shocked to see how many will fall off. But, whatever ones remain standing, that's when you're going to be filing complaints against Experian, Equifax, TransUnion, and against those creditors that are still left with consumerfinance.gov with all separate complaints. You have to open up a separate complaint for every single one. One for Experian, one for Equifax, one for TransUnion, one for each one of the remaining collection agencies that are left that did not fall off after your first round of disputes.
So, what ends up happening is that these creditors and Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion start getting these government letters in the mail and even better if you can up the ante and have an attorney general letter sent in from the state of Texas against Experian, from the state of Georgia against Equifax, from the states of both Illinois and Pennsylvania against TransUnion. So, now they're getting all these letters and then say ABC Collection Agency is in California. So, then you have an attorney general complaint filed against ABC Collection Agency in California against them. So, every single state that every single one of the remaining creditors are in, you basically file complaints against, you know, them with their appropriate attorney general. So, now they're getting attorney general complaints against you and then you can even up it again and I know a lot of people hate when I say this, but the BBB in those regions, again, BBB is mostly useless. I'm going I'm not going to lie. They they're mostly useless, but this just adds another layer of letters coming from the now another entity that now all the creditors are getting, now all of the credit collection, you know, credit bureaus, I should say, are getting. So, Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion are now getting an attorney general letter, CFPB letter, BBB letter. All these legal letters are coming in about this one particular debt or this series of debts. They don't want to deal with that, you guys. They have dealt with so many different government lawsuits that have cost them billions of dollars over the years. And if you become their squeaky wheel, that's the last thing they want to deal with and and you'll find that these things will just start deleting off your credit reports like that just because they simply don't want to deal with you and the possible legal aftermath of all of their, I guess, unscrupulous behavior in wanting to keep this stuck on your credit report like really glue. They don't want to deal with that. They'd rather just simply delete it, have you hopefully go away, and then move on to the next sucker that does not know his or her consumer rights, which is most of the people out there.
So, hopefully that helps a lot where you can use the leverage of the government, the CFPB, ideally before it's gone or stripped of funding altogether. So, you want to use this now while you still can because we don't know how much longer the judges are going to be able to continue blocking the, you know, the stripping out of the CFPB. So, you want to be able to use this government organization as long as you possibly can before it's gone one day. Because you're going to be regretful if you didn't use it to its fullest extent and then all of a sudden it's gone and you can't use it anymore. So, use the power of the government while you still can, while it's still there.
And again, if you want my free letters, go to getdisputeletters.com or secretcreditletters.com down below. You can also get my free credit flowchart, which shares with you the exact steps in how to go step-by-step in the process of fixing your credit. And finally, if you do want a free credit audit from me, simply go to school.com/monicamein. Once you're admitted into my community, you will simply head on up to the classroom tab at the top of the page and simply look for credit audit and I can do a credit audit here on YouTube just for you. I only use your first name and your location, that's it. And I will be more than happy to walk you through the exact steps that you need to take to be able to fix your credit and boost your FICO score in the fastest amount of time possible. If you found that this content was helpful, give me a nice thumbs up, subscribe to my channel, drop some comments down below. This is Monica Main signing off and I will see you in the next video.