Where to start? Need the basics....

[brokeinmichigan]

OK...so it's official. As of today, our CH7 BK was closed! We are, of course, thrilled. But we really do not know where to start as far as rebuilding goes.

Hoping someone here who has successfully rebuilt their credit after a CH7 can give us step-by-step instructions to get started. I'm still perplexed by the "credit monitoring programs" I keep hearing about. And FICO vs. FAKO, or whatever it's called. So, if someone can at least give some "ok, here's what you do first" kind of info, we'd greatly appreciate it.

Here's a little background info:
We both work full time, and make about $85K/year before taxes. We have 2 cars (soon to be 3), and our home is appraised at about 190K. The housing market in our area is terrible right now, otherwise we would likely sell it, as it will be too big for us soon.

We have 4 children...1 in college, 1 high school senior, 1 high school freshman (lives with other parent for now) and a preschooler. The college kid is mostly independent, works full-time & pays his own bills (for the most part). We keep him on our insurance (no extra cost) and our cell phone plan (he pays us $25/mo). The high school senior is buying a car next week, and we will add that car to our insurance coverage for $50/mo. He is responsible for his own gas/maintenance. High school freshman may move her next year to finish high school, but for now lives with mom out of state...no child support paid or received. The "baby" is still in preschool for another year @ $600/mo.

We have no credit cards, and only regular monthly expenses. 2nd car will be paid off in 3 months, so we will have no car payments. Husband has student loans, but currently in deferment as he completes his master's degree.

So, how do I figure out our REAL credit scores, and how do I clean our credit reports up? Can you monitor them on a weekly or monthly basis? How do you start to improve them if the score is so terrible that nobody will extend you credit? I think I nee the "Idiot's Guide...."

Thanks in advance

[SinkingFast]

We signed on with True Credit to monitor our Credit Reports. TC shows all 3.

Basically all we did was Dispute to make sure all accts included in BK were shown that way on our Credit Reports.

It can take a while for Creditors and/or the CRA's to Update your Credit Reports to show IIB. Meanwhile, you've got Lates and Derrogatories with balances showing.

Start out by Disputing anything that was included in BK and showing a balance as Incorrect.

We started off with disputing the $$$ amounts shown on accts that were IIB. Some Creditors did not respond and those accts just dropped off our Credit Reports. It was like they never even existed. Other Creditors updated to $0, Closed.

We still have some showing Charged off, Bad Debt, and Derrogatory.

With True Credit, you can dispute online with TransUnion and Experian. You have to write Equifax. The process moves kinda slow too. You dispute. The CRA's have 30 days to investigate. Then changes are made. Then you go at it again.

FAKO scores are the ones we see reported by the monitoring companies. FICO is the scores pulled by Creditors when you apply for Credit. Supposedly, the FICO at "myFICO.com" is pretty accurate with what Creditors would see when doing a Pull on you.

Generally speaking, each industry has a "grade weighted" FICO score that's indexed per their own criteria. Mortgage FICO is different than Insurance FICO is different than Auto FICO.