Time Limit on Credit Information

Although it is an unwise tactic for credit repair, you can wait out almost anything on a credit report. Federal law governs how long the major credit reporting bureaus can report negative data, but the credit bureaus sometimes give customers a reprieve sooner. At the other end of the spectrum, the credit bureaus can ignore all time limits in some situations.

The Seven-Year Limit

The majority of negative items have a seven-year reporting limit. This includes missed payments, collection accounts, charge-offs, debt settlement and foreclosure. Inquiries only stay for two years and affect credit scores in the FICO formula for one year. A few items last longer than seven years. Bankruptcy can stay for 10 years and unpaid tax liens forever, because the government does not want to let people off the hook for cheating the government out of money. The agencies can freely lower the time limit. Experian, for example, reports unpaid tax liens for 15 years, while Equifax and TransUnion report it indefinitely.

Positive Information

Technically, the credit bureaus can report positive items, such as a punctual payment, indefinitely, according to "Credit Repair Kit For Dummies" by Steve Bucci. The credit agencies generally report positive data as long as you keep an account active, so positive data might stay on your report the rest of your life. Once you close an account, however, the credit bureaus usually take it off your report within 10 years.

The Exception

The Fair Credit Reporting Act allows one exception to the federal credit reporting rules: the agencies can report anything if the borrower applies for credit or a life insurance policy in excess of $150,000 or for a job that pays more than $75,000 annually. However, as of 2011, the national credit agencies do not enforce this provision of FCRA. Also, judgments can stay longer than seven years if state law allows it, and state laws amend the report limits for some items. In California, for example, the bureaus can only report unpaid tax liens for 10 years.

Misconception

Once a collection account or judgment appears on your report and the reporting time limit passes, it cannot reappear on your file, according to Carreon and Associates. Also, the clock on defaulted accounts starts with the date of the original delinquency, not when the creditors writes off the debt or the last missed payment.