Collections on my Report

[John Spellman]

Good morning I have a question I'm in the process of getting preapproved for a mortgage and I have an item in collections that is lowering my score I tried disputing it months ago but it wasn't removed so I called to just pay it off and the collections agency stated that they dont do pay to delete I called 4 separate occassions and was met with the same response I have the money to pay off the account so should I just pay off the account and hope they remove the item off my report or just leave it as is?