A small venting and... I need help :(

[Shadax]

Well, I'm 24 years old and finally facing reality: credit is pretty damned important.

It's taken me 6 years to grow up and realize this, and I want to take the initiative and fix my awful 500 credit score.

"How did this happen?" I ask myself, then I reflect on my years before becoming a man. I couldn't WAIT to turn 18 and get a job. When that day came, all I could do is revel in the hundreds of dollars a month I was making

Yep, it was minimum wage and I thought I could do anything with it, but all I did was blow it. Then I bought a brand new car which my father cosigned for me, and I got a First Premier Credit card. Within a year I was offered $5,000 from B of A. Then they just started rolling in... Then I got rid of my perfectly-fine first-owner car and got something used that was faster (and had mechanical problems).

Then I traded THAT for another used car that I assumed would be better even though the payments were much higher.

It would only be so long until all this racked up credit and upside down auto loans would cave in on me. I then found myself jobless and neglecting ALL my bills.

My car was repossessed, I had collection agencies calling me 'round the clock.

After a couple of years of pointless retail jobs and living with the 'rents, I FINALLY landed myself a career in technology. I finally see myself making more and more (and saving more and more) each month. I have a promotion around the corner and I actually see success in my future FINALLY!!

My aforementioned problem was really brought to light when I went to go see about getting a better vehicle. It was a bad decision to begin with considering my situation... and when they showed me the numbers for this auto loan I would end up paying TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS over the purchase price of the inexpensive car, and I finally made my first good credit decision and backed away instead of impulse buying (even though I could afford it).

Long story short, my financial insecurity swelled from uncomfortable to just downright embarrassing: two of my friends just bought houses... and I can't even get a CHEAP auto loan.

So here I am, about $10,000 in debt and a terrible, horrible, no good very bad credit score. But I have a good job now and more motivation to turn my situation around.

My goal is to have all of this paid off in six months. My question is just about the best method.

Many moons ago (before my auto repo), and for the sake of not advertising, I was with a certain non-profit, credit help foundation who actually helped me pay off a few cards and get them marked as paid in full on my report. I was looking into doing this again with another company (or the same if I could find them again, I'm sure they're a Google inquiry away), but is there any negative repercussion for doing this?

I suppose I could settle this myself, but I have to face that I have a wee bit of a problem with maintaining commitment. I'm ready to tackle that problem but I think that I'd really like to have assistance in absolutely ensuring that all these negative inquiries are removed, or even better, get really good settlements so I can do this without paying way more than I have to (even though it's all my fault anyway, I don't think I speak for just myself here that the less out of my wallet, the merrier).

So any advice on my situation would be WONDERFULLY appreciated.

And thank you for baring through my introduction!