My experience with Lex Law--I will update

[nelly16]

After searching this forum (ok, lurking) for some time, I noticed that a lot of people started threads about their experiences with Lexington Law, but nobody finished them. So I decided I would go ahead and try them and then also start a thread with my experiences, hopefully helping others on here looking for the same information I was. I will update this regularly and you can feel free to ask me any questions you want. So here's my situation.

I got into debt while in college and irresponsible with credit cards. My total debt ended up around $6K and I paid it off in full about 3 years ago with a loan from family. As a result I have the following-

120 day late
30 day late
60 day late
charge off
settlement

I also closed every single one of those accounts after paying them off (I know, I know---hindsight, right). But the above aren't why I joined Lex Law. I also have 4 collections accounts for medical bills from 2005. I was a student athlete in college and had some medical issues while in school. These bills were supposed to be covered by the athletic department but somehow slipped through. They were unknown to me until 2009 when I checked my credit report and found $5K in 4 collections accounts. The Univ acknowledges it's their fault and they did pay them off finally but the damage has been done.

So that's where I'm at. For many years I thought there was nothing I could do and I would just have to wait many years for these to fall off. It's only been in recent weeks that Ive learned you can have these removed. I have the time to do this myself, but I think I'm just so confused by the process that I felt Lex Law was the smarter route.

[nelly16]

Continued---So here is how it went with Lex Law so far---

I called, joined and was directed to a rep who would handle my case from here on out. The pulled up my credit reports from all 3 agencies so that they could look at everything. Everything was ranked from 1-9 and we talked over what I wanted to tackle first. We also found a collection account from 2005 I had never heard of on the transunion report.

It was $10 right away to pull the reports, which at the least, is worth it since you see all 3 reports. They also go over your report with you and talk about which items are the worst and how long until each falls off etc. For someone like me who didn't know much about my report, this was very helpful. I'm on the $59.95 plan. So it will be $99 up front (I pick what day I want that to come out--anytime in the next 15 days) and then a month later the $59 will start coming out every month.

Based on my report we are going to target 4 items first. They expect some response/results in about 45-60 days. I've already emailed with questions and each time I received a response back within 24 hours. So far I'm pleased and happy with the service. I think the ultimate test will be how many items can come off. I went into this only expecting the collections to come off. If they can get anything else off it would just be icing on the cake.

Once again, hope this helps and if anyone has any specific questions about lex law please ask!

[nelly16]

Quick update---

Letters have already been sent to all 3 agencies. They sent 3 to equifax, 3 to experian and 4 to transunion (I had 1 more negative on trans than the other 2). I am supposed to expect responses within 30-60 days. But I am pleased that it's been a week and I already have credit reports, an idea of what is most important to deal with and letters sent out.

[nelly16]

Ok, not sure if anyone is following this or even interested but here's an update--

It's been about 2 weeks and I've already received a response from Equifax. They deleted one and verified 2. So some progress I guess. As for LexLaw...not sure how I feel about them. I've sent some supporting documents and they "don't know where they are" so I have to send them again. Also I've had a hard time getting ahold of my specific paralegal so I'm constantly having to speak to different people and tell them my story of the medical bills and student athlete crap over and over. Needless to say it's kind of annoying. Part of me wonders if paying for the convenience is really worth it afterall. I'm going to wait and see what the results are from Trans and Exp but not sure how much longer I'll be with LexLaw. I kind of expected more from them (not in the results but in the help/service).

[mertzj]

I used LexLaw for 10 months. They got 6 of 12 deleted off EQ and nothing off of EX or TU. Which may be a good thing because my EQ is 641 EX 643 and TU 656. Even though they got items deleted it also deleted a large amount of my credit history. I have read on here that judgments are the easiest to delete because court houses wont verify but the couldnt even get them off of my EX or TU. They really dont care as long as they getting your 60 bucks a month. I might try sending out a few letters on my own.

[nelly16]

Thanks for your input! I'm actually wondering how getting these deleted will affect me. A couple of them are very minor (only a 30 day and 60 day) compared to the more severe collections accounts (those are the ones that were the athletic dept's responsibility). Ironically since the one account was deleted on my EQ my score dropped from a 625 to 610. Granted that's a FAKO not FICO but I told myself I would wait to check my FICO until a few months out. I am worried that deleting all of these could hurt me since it will virtually eliminate the majority of my credit history. But I also don't think they will be able to get them all deleted---we will see.

As for my thoughts on LexLaw so far. You definitely have to be very firm with them. Turns out this whole time I should have been on a different level (no added cost) which would have included letters from the athletic department proving those collections were not my debt. Lex Law knew this all along but were not including this information in their disputes. It's frustrating to me because this first round of letters sent out essentially was a waste (there goes a couple months and thus, the fees they charged). Also, trying to get ahold of my specific paralegal is a NIGHTMARE! She is impossible to get in touch with. So every time I call I have to explain my athletic department & medical bills story all over again to someone new.

All in all I'm growing very frustrated. I'm going to try and stay patient since I've only heard back from EQ. But if I get the results back from TU and EX and nothing is deleted I think I will be canceling. I guess I thought LexLaw would be sending letters that were more advanced or better than what I could do---I think I was wrong in my assumption.

[mertzj]

When I called to cancel the guy said well several of these you chose to ignore. Well yea I dont need a 30day late on an 8 year old mortgage completely deleted. They were trying to tell me when I signed up that no credit is better then bad credit. They are full of poop on that. Ive probably gave them 1k bucks and I would say have done me more harm then good really.

[nelly16]

Mertz thanks so much again for your reply! I just went back and looked at my account on LexLaw. I have a 30 day late with capitalone and a 60 day late with chase. Both of those are only a 2 severity and were next to be disputed. Luckily I changed things around and put that I don't want them disputed at all. Honestly I would rather have those negatives than no negatives. Since I'm young (25) and have little credit history I'd rather have those accounts. I had paid them off for almost 3 years but ran into one late payment on each. If they dispute them I don't want to take the chance that the whole account is removed.

Everything else on my reports are 9's and one 5 severity so those are worth trying to remove. But I do agree with you on some of the negatives with lexlaw. Luckily I've only paid them the 99.95 and $10 and I'm about to pay them my first month fee in a few days. So overall not as bad as your $1K.

And they told me the same thing---that any negative is worse than no credit--I disagree! I'd rather have those late payments than lose those accounts. If anyone else wants to chime in with their opinions I'd love to hear it!

[chane]

Originally Posted by mertzj

They were trying to tell me when I signed up that no credit is better then bad credit. They are full of poop on that.

Actually they are right on about that. No credit is slightly better than bad credit.

[chane]

Originally Posted by nelly16

Mertz thanks so much again for your reply! I just went back and looked at my account on LexLaw. I have a 30 day late with capitalone and a 60 day late with chase. Both of those are only a 2 severity and were next to be disputed. Luckily I changed things around and put that I don't want them disputed at all. Honestly I would rather have those negatives than no negatives. Since I'm young (25) and have little credit history I'd rather have those accounts. I had paid them off for almost 3 years but ran into one late payment on each. If they dispute them I don't want to take the chance that the whole account is removed

They would dispute them as "never late" or something similar and ask the CRA to update them, not remove them. There is very little chance that the accounts would get deleted if they disputed them right. If they did get deleted it would be the CRAs fault, not Lexington's.

Everything else on my reports are 9's and one 5 severity so those are worth trying to remove. But I do agree with you on some of the negatives with lexlaw. Luckily I've only paid them the 99.95 and $10 and I'm about to pay them my first month fee in a few days. So overall not as bad as your $1K.

And they told me the same thing---that any negative is worse than no credit--I disagree! I'd rather have those late payments than lose those accounts. If anyone else wants to chime in with their opinions I'd love to hear it!

I don't know who is telling you guys that having some bad credit is better than not having any credit, but they are dead wrong.

There is a way to dispute late payments. Lexington Law has been in business for 20 years and I'm pretty sure they know how to do it the right way. Having late payments on your credit history is DEVASTATING to your credit scores. Thinking that they are just minor blemishes and that you can just "let 'em go" is a huge mistake.