Using A Debt Settlement Firm Can Cause You To Be Blindsided By Debt Collectors.
Debt settlement firms want you to have at least $10,000 in credit card debt. They want $1500-2000 of that $10,000 in fees paid first before they begin working on settling your debt. They tell you to stop paying your credit card and to send those payments to them for their fees and to save for a lump-sum settlement. So then what happens if they cannot settle your credit card debt? What happens to what you have paid them? What happens to the credit card account that is not being paid and to your credit rating? If they tell you they can get a 50 percent settlement on $10,000, how long will it take you to save $5000 plus $2000 for their fees? $500 a month will total $7000 after 14 months of payments to the debt settlement firm. At that pace it will be over one year before $5000 can be paid (after $2000 in fees is taken) in a lump sum to end the debt. But, that debt may no longer exist because the banks charge off unpaid credit card debts after six months. Then within the year, they sell those bad debts for about 10 cents on the dollar. If that happens to you, that means some junk debt buyer has bought your debt for 10 cents on the dollar before it has been negotiated. At that point there is no reason for the bank to remove the charged-off debt’s bad mark from your credit report, which means it will be there for seven years. The junk debt buyer will make an effort to collect the debt, and you need to be ready for that, according to the Credit Card Debt Survival Guide. On the other hand, if you are unaware and waiting for the debt settlement firm to finish what they started, you could be vulnerable to a debt collection attorney. So, your settlement fee is gone. Your debt is not settled. Your credit is bruised. And, you are fighting debt collectors. If you are lucky you still have $5000, but only if the settlement firm put it in a third-party escrow account. If you are seeking credit card debt relief, whether you can afford to pay or not, read Matt Highlander’scontributions in Credit Card Debt Survival Guide. |