Credit Repair Made Simple

Rating:
Summary: Just Awful - Negative Stars
Review: Except for one excellent section on settling old debts and negotiating to get them taken off your credit report, this "book" is a piece of crap, to not put too fine a point on it.

There are a number of points I want to make about this "book."

The author says "if you have credit lines open that you have not used in a while and have no intention of using then it may be wise to close those accounts." No, no, no, no, no, a thousand times NO! The longer your credit history, the higher your score. Don't close old accounts! He is completely wrong here.

He spends almost no time on rebuilding your credit, an essential part of credit repair! He writes maybe 1½ pages on the subject, and here is what he recommends: get a secured credit card, use credit cards only in an emergency, get department store credit cards then max them out and return the items later so it shows you used a lot of credit and paid the account satisfactorily (sleazy!), and save $1,000 then deposit it in a bank and apply for a passbook loan. Is any of that advice even slightly original? Ummmm, no. Not a bit.

I am amazed at the nerve of some authors - like this guy Brian Eichorn - and publishers who charge ten or twenty bucks for a 50-page booklet (they call it a "book," but it doesn't really qualify to be called that) which contains only the most cursory of information, or twenty-five bucks for a hundreds-page long behemoth stuffed with things you will never read or don't need. For instance, this Credit Repair Made Simple book is 126 pages long, although pages 124, 125, and 126 are blank - as are a number of other numbered pages throughout the book. It has only 56 pages of what can charitably be called content, although nine of those 56 pages are either completely blank or are half-pages, pages 58-68 are simple credit repair letters anyone can write, and pages 69-123 are copies of the Fair Credit Reporting Act and Credit Repair Organizations Act that the author obviously downloaded from the web and shamelessly stuffed into the back of the book to up the page count. Its riddled with grammatical errors, misplaced punctuation, and run-on sentences; its like the first draft of a report from a high school student.

There is some justice in the world, though - there are no blurbs on the book.
Still its amazing to me that almost all of these crappy credit repair books have blurbs - those quotes on the front and back cover and on the first few inside pages from supposedly knowledgeable (or famous) people that attempt to convince you to buy the book and which lead you to believe that these often dull (or just plain bad) books are great. I am left to wonder if the blurber (not a real word, but it works here, doncha think?) actually read the book and, if so, just what the heck they were thinking. Did the author have pictures of them having sex with a goat? The blurbs make the book sound great, but you read the thing and you're left wondering what they had been smoking when they wrote the blurb (although, I am told, some blurbers don't even write their own blurb, allowing the publisher to do that for them), not to mention what possessed the author to think she or he had written a publishable book and the publisher to agree (although in this case, we have a self-published book - not surprising, considering the "content").

The major complaint I have with these credit repair books - aside from the fact that they are mostly full of stuff anyone can get for free on the web or they are poorly-written and -edited, and, hence, full of typos - is that they are too thick. You may be asking "What the heck does that mean?" Well, let me tell you...

As I noted, the big-book game is played by stuffing the book with:

- sample dispute letters; while useful, these things are available just about anywhere, including online, and usually for free. Including these letters just puffs up the page count.

- copies of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), the Fair Debt Collections Practices Act (FDCPA), the Equal Credit Opportunities Act (ECOA), and the Credit Repair Organizations Act (CROA), among others, simply downloaded then pasted into the book to try to impress you. If you want copies of those acts, write to your representative in the US House, or type the name of the act into a search engine. Better yet, go to www.ftc.gov where you will find links to those acts and a whole lot more. That website is a goldmine.

By including sample dispute letters and copies of pertinent acts, an "author" can make his "book" about three times thicker than it really is.

Anyway, back to the specific sins of Eichorn. He gives readers some really wrong information about how a credit score is computed. He says the FICO score takes into account things like time at present job, time at present address, occupation, homeownership, and age. He claims the Federal Trade Commission "gave Fair Isaac permission to use these factors when determining credit scores. Is it right? I don't think so."

No, Brian, its not right. And when I say that I mean what you wrote isn't correct. You've written a book and gotten the central point wrong.

The FICO score is computed using information in the credit report. Lenders can and do then layer their own underwriting criteria and scoring model on top of the FICO repository-based score. But the FICO score does NOT take into account the things this guys says it does.

Eichorn correctly points out that the use of other factors "present(s) a clearer picture of the probability of repayment," but those other factors are emphatically NOT part of the FICO score. As the company itself clearly points out, "your FICO score only looks at information in your credit report. Lenders often look at other things when making a credit decision, however, including your income, how long you have worked at your present job, and the kind of credit you are requesting."

Go to www.MyFico.com for a free, downloadable booklet on credit scoring that will tell you a lot more than Eichorn will, with the added benefit of accuracy.

Oddly, this book doesn't seem to take into account the existence - nay prevalence - of automated underwriting systems that make decisions in seconds. The book seems to be referring to a time when we met the decision-maker (usually the loan officer) face-to-face. That time has long since passed!

Some sections of the book - one chapter in particular - appear to have been downloaded directly from the FTC.gov website and passed off as the author's own writing. This isn't illegal (government information is in the public domain and may be freely copied and even sold), but it is unethical.

For some reason, throughout the book Eichorn uses the term "paid out" when he means "paid." Strange.

He says too many inquiries lower your credit score "because the computer model that calculates your score can't determine if you are shopping for a mortgage or (an) automobile..." Ummm, wrong! Every creditor or potential creditor who pulls your credit report is coded. A mortgage company would be coded as, guess what - a mortgage company! The model knows the kind of company obtaining your credit report. The model deals with inquiries by putting them into "like groupings." It can do this because it knows what kinds of creditors are pulling your report.

He then claims "your occupation, being a homeowner, and your age are other factors that go into determining your credit score. However, this goes directly against the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA). The ECOA clearly states that you cannot be discriminated against when applying for a loan." Actually, the ECOA lists categories of people and situations and prohibits discrimination in very specific ways. And, as I noted above, the credit score does NOT take into account your job, whether your own or rent, or your age.

The author digs himself deeper into a hole when he opines that "you should not be judged for credit on the basis of being a doctor or a janitor." Well, some folks would argue that, indeed, you should be judged for credit on that basis. Regardless of where you come down on the issue, the ECOA doesn't cover professions.

He says "FICO reasons the better the profession the more likely the repayment of a loan. Also, a homeowner is more stable than a renter, and a retired person is more responsible than a twenty year old." gain, FICO scores do NOT take into account your profession. Where this guy got that impression, and how he felt it was proper to put into his "book" such bogus and unsupported "facts" is beyond me. But its damned irresponsible, I tell you. I would suggest a complete rewrite, but this book is too far gone for that.








Rating:
Summary: Outdated and Inaccurate
Review: Eichorn offers some good general advice, but much of the information is outdated and inaccurate. He covers some of the credit basics.

Rating:
Summary: Great Investment with Excellent Benefits
Review: I bought this book in the Spring or Summer of 2003. I began cleaning up my husband and my credit. The sample letters were easy to follow and I was able to raise our credit considerably. I now have began my own business from home cleaning up people's credit. This book was a great resource for me and now my business.

Rating:
Summary: Great Investment with Excellent Benefits
Review: I bought this book in the Spring or Summer of 2003. I began cleaning up my husband and my credit. The sample letters were easy to follow and I was able to raise our credit considerably. I now have began my own business from home cleaning up people's credit. This book was a great resource for me and now my business.

Rating:
Summary: Very Informative
Review: I found this book to be very helpful in explaining how to improve my credit. I have read many articles in magazines and newspapers on the subject of improving my credit but I like the way this book broke down each component of one's credit and how each plays a role in the overall credit score. I found it easy to understand.

Rating:
Summary: Simple...Effective...and Straight Forward
Review: I've bought a couple of books to help me improve my credit score after I was turned down for a credit card.

This book showed me how I was actually hurting my credit by every time I applied for a card, and was denied. I used the included sample letters to get those denials removed from my credit report. I took me about 2 months to clear most of my "inquiries" (as I learned in the book) off my credit report. A month later, I had a credit card.

The nice thing about this book is that everything it suggests is legal. A lot of these credit repair books and services have you breaking the law or being dishonest to improve your credit.

This book is a great gift for people who are just starting out. I've given this it to friends and family to help them too.

I would definitely recommend this book, no matter how your credit is.

Rating:
Summary: Outdated and Inaccurate
Review: Mr. Eichhorn's books is simply the best credit repair book I have seen. 5 Stars all around. I found his information easy to apply, it has helped improve my credit rating enough to finally get the car I wanted at a good rate. An invaluable resource for those of us who have not had a perfect credit history.