Question:
hello and thanks for taking the time.
I have been financing my wife real estate business for 2.5 years hoping she could pay back, unfortunately i have racked up allot of debt as a result and no longer have the cash flow. Credit cards are at 50,000 combined. they have shut down my lines and because i am getting squeezed i have misled one payment. I have assets cars etc to sell but the market is bad so i don't know if i can raise that kind of money. I also anticipate loosing my job in the small town i work in in about a year. I have gone one month behind on my credit card bills only. I have not spoken to the credit card companies yet. I would like to negotiate a payoff! please advise, I have no problem filing bk once i am laid off as well.
Answer:
Your plans sound very rational and well laid. Looks like you have it all figured out as to what is the best thing to do but I don't think I can agree that they are the best course of action you could choose for you and your family. As you now know it wasn't a good idea to try to finance your wife's real estate business. That cost you dearly. I have found that the more money one has to put into a new startup business the less likely it is to succeed while in contrast to that a business that is going to be successful will be that way right from the start and will generate a good cash flow very quickly. Of course, that depends on the type of business. Naturally you can't start many businesses for nothing. You can't start a convenience store without buying the stock the store needs to sell but I'm talking about service type businesses where no stock or inventory is required and the owner's labor is about all that is needed at first. Basically speaking a real estate business only needs the owner's labor to get going. Sell a house or two and the cash to get going should be available.
But now you are in deep trouble and say that even though you sell off all your assets you still wouldn't have enough cash to get yourself out of debt and your situation is going to get much worse day by day because they will keep on adding a mountain of interest, late fees and what have you and when you can't keep up and default entirely they will turn it over to collection agencies who will add thousands more. Sooner or later the debt collectors will send it to their lawyers who will add on even more thousands of dollars.
Of course, you will file bankruptcy and hope to get rid of the mess that way since you will also have lost your employment by that time.
So then what do you plan for a future? Just retire and live on pension or what? Looks like a very bleak future you have planned for yourself to me.
You also say you would like to negotiate a reduced payoff. You might be able to do that in some cases but probably not in all cases. Some won't deal with you at all. But even if you can work out a reduced settlement offer it will be reported to the credit bureaus that way and that won't help your future any either. Bad credit can not only make it impossible to buy things like cars you might need to get to the grocery store, the doctor, and back and forth to a new job if you can find one and with bad credit you might not be able to get good employment.
So why plan a miserable future? Now is the time to start taking positive steps instead of negative ones. Why not do as a North Dakota rancher is doing right now? Dusty got hit with some problems and fell behind on a credit card debt to Citibank. He too owed them about the same amount as you do and they turned it over to a debt collector in Bismark which is about 90 miles from his ranch. As soon as they contacted him he sent them a demand for validation to which they never responded except to call his wife's father and start asking him how many cows Dusty owned and when asked why they wanted to know that they told the old man the whole story and how much Dusty owed them.
Then they turned it over to a lawyer who filed a lawsuit against Dusty. Dusty sent the lawyer a demand for validation which the lawyer ignored and Dusty also filed a response to the court, sent it to the lawyer along with demand for interrogatories, admissions and production of documents. When the lawyer answered he answered one of the questions by stating that he didn't have to abide by the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. He also made a couple of other mistakes as well which also violated FDCPA. Dusty prepared a complaint against both the debt collector and the attorney and got it finished today. Next he will work on his memorandum of law which may take him a couple of days since this is his first federal case and then he will prepare an intent to sue letter and send his already prepared case and the intent to sue letter to both the lawyer and the debt collector and see how they react to that.
If they want to keep from having to answer Dusty's federal complaint they will have to dismiss their case against him and take all related derogatory remarks off his credit report.
If they ignore him and go on to court on the 18th of August as now is planned Dusty will simply file his federal case and then the cheese will become much more binding. He will win beyond a shadow of a doubt
and because they won't want to go to a federal jury trial and try to explain why they violated the law they will want to settle out of court which Dusty will be only too happy to accept but the terms of settlement will be vastly stiffer. Besides what he would have settled for earlier he will tack on the $350 filing fee, attorney fees at $125 an hour for his time preparing the case and he will have added in their violations of Fair Credit Reporting Act. Those violations will cost another $3,000 per month for each month they have been in violation plus damages. They get nothing and pay Dusty more money than his little ranch will make in a year and Dusty walks off with pristine credit. How did all that become possible? Because they apparently thought Dusty was just a dumb old rancher and the truth is that before he started he didn't know a thing about FDCPA or FCRA, much less how to successfully prepare, present and argue a federal court case. He still has a lot to learn but he is getting the job done very quickly.
Now then, whose plan is better? You tell me.
Bill Bauer
405-684-9297
405-227-9423
Make money using this search engine instead of Google, Yahoo, MSN or others and get the same results. Get paid in Visa Reward Point cards.
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/qlmqson
RECOMMENDED READING
Subscribe to Creditwrench mailing list on google groups.
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/iomqson Creditwrench google group by email.
See all my questions and how I answered them.
Just send an email to ceo@creditwrench.com and ask to join my mailing list of all answers. I'll put you on the list and you can easily unsubscribe any time you wish.
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/hhlqson FDCPA EXPERT
www.creditwrench.com/howjudgmentswork.html
www.creditwrench.com/18questions.html
http://shrinkmylink.com/kmlqson
www.creditwrench.com/objections.html
www.creditwrench.com/howcreditwrenchworks.html
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/bnlqson List of community property states
How to answer a summons
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/exlqson
LISTEN TO THESE CREDITWRENCH STUDENTS CHAT ON OUR FRIDAY NIGHT CONFERENCE CALLS.
http://www.creditwrench.tv/MIKEJM-06-27-08.mp3
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/uimqson Mike JM tells about Greentree Financial case.
http://shrinkmylink.com/xsjqson
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/danqson Mark in Rhode Island gets settlement offer
Statute of Limitations for all states
http://shrinkmylink.com/zlwpson
How to set up your hard drive for creditwrench files. Makes them easy to find.
http://tinyurl.com/3lqxaw
The Creditwrench conference calls will start this coming Friday evening at 7 P.M. Central time. It is free and open to the public. There is no cost or obligation other than what it may cost you for the phone call itself. You can join in and ask questions or just listen or whatever you want to do.
Dial-in Number: (712) 432-1601
Access code: 508548#
You might also want to visit our message forum at http://consumers.creditwrench.com to get answers to questions you need answered before next Friday night.
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Civil summons. What should I do?
Judgement Civil Summons
Question: I received a Civil Summons for a Judgement brought against me from a credit card company. The Collection company is out of Kansas. The collection company is going through an attorney in Tucson, AZ. I live in Phoenix, AZ. What should I do?
Answer: What should you do? Respond to the court summons then learn to fight back by taking advantage of their mistakes and violations of federal law. It is the only way to win. You owe them money for your mistake of not paying when due and they want you to pay dearly for that mistake yet they make mistakes all the time and think nothing of it. Of course they want you to think nothing of their mistakes either. Never mind our mistakes it is your mistakes we are worried about they say. Its not fair that you accepted their money, goods or services and don't pay it back. That's their argument and of course we all know that it is a valid argument that the judge will accept and therefore rule in their favor. Of course we should have paid them and we would have if we could but we just didn't have the money to keep up with their demands. We didn't just go out and deliberately run up bills we knew we couldn't pay. Something unforseen happened and we had no choice but to default.
Now they have filed a lawsuit which will end up as a judgment against you and from there it will go into a garnishment which they will use to take up to 25% of each paycheck or go garnish your bank account or maybe even go to your home and grab up any valuables they can find. They will do anything the law allows them to do to get their money.
Things are already tough for you. Its costing more and more to heat and cool your home, buy the gasoline you need to get to work or the store or other places you have to go as well as food and other essentials getting more and more expensive every day. You are barely getting by now so what will you do with 25% less money than you have now? How will you make it? Hold garage sales and sell off everything you can possibly do with out? That's not going to get the job done and you already know that. Or will you go get another job and see them take 25% of your second job too? The second job will most likely pay less than your first job and with gasoline costing what it does today and going up and up daily you won't gain a thing from that second job.
I can't see any alternative but to learn how to fight back and win by using their mistakes against them just as they are using your mistakes
against you. Can you think of any other alternative other than just putting up with it? If so I'd like to know what other options there are too. After all, there might come a time in the future when I might be faced with the same problem you are today but I'll have the knowledge and the skills needed to fight back and make them pay me instead of the other way around.
When the wolf comes to my door which I firmly believe he will do sooner or later he is going to have to bring an awfully big picnic basket with him. First of all I'll be recording every howl he lets out. I'll demand that he validate his claim right away. When he turns his claim over to a lawyer he will suddenly find himself trying to explain to a federal judge why he did all the things he did that he wasn't supposed to do and then when his friend the shark (Lawyer)tries to take a bite out of my hide he will also find himself explaining the same kinds of things to a federal judge.
I'm not worried about my ability to catch them making mistakes. The problem they have is that there are so many ways they can break the law that it is almost impossible for them to attempt to collect a debt without breaking the law one way or another. I'll catch them every time and make them pay before they get to the point of making me pay and I'll use the law against them.
I'm not an original genius. I'm just an average old man so if I can do it so can you. I can't give you legal advice but I can teach you what I know. I can't fix your credit for you because I'm not a credit repair expert and I don't fix anybody's credit but I can teach you what I know and if you use that knowledge to get you out of the fix your are in then more power to you. And if you decide you aren't going to take this lying down you will probably end up teaching me some things I didn't know too. That's just the way it works. I don't think I've ever had a student who didn't teach me something or other and I've had a lot of students over the years.
So what should you do? I think you should learn how to fight them off instead of just taking it on the chin.
Question: I received a Civil Summons for a Judgement brought against me from a credit card company. The Collection company is out of Kansas. The collection company is going through an attorney in Tucson, AZ. I live in Phoenix, AZ. What should I do?
Answer: What should you do? Respond to the court summons then learn to fight back by taking advantage of their mistakes and violations of federal law. It is the only way to win. You owe them money for your mistake of not paying when due and they want you to pay dearly for that mistake yet they make mistakes all the time and think nothing of it. Of course they want you to think nothing of their mistakes either. Never mind our mistakes it is your mistakes we are worried about they say. Its not fair that you accepted their money, goods or services and don't pay it back. That's their argument and of course we all know that it is a valid argument that the judge will accept and therefore rule in their favor. Of course we should have paid them and we would have if we could but we just didn't have the money to keep up with their demands. We didn't just go out and deliberately run up bills we knew we couldn't pay. Something unforseen happened and we had no choice but to default.
Now they have filed a lawsuit which will end up as a judgment against you and from there it will go into a garnishment which they will use to take up to 25% of each paycheck or go garnish your bank account or maybe even go to your home and grab up any valuables they can find. They will do anything the law allows them to do to get their money.
Things are already tough for you. Its costing more and more to heat and cool your home, buy the gasoline you need to get to work or the store or other places you have to go as well as food and other essentials getting more and more expensive every day. You are barely getting by now so what will you do with 25% less money than you have now? How will you make it? Hold garage sales and sell off everything you can possibly do with out? That's not going to get the job done and you already know that. Or will you go get another job and see them take 25% of your second job too? The second job will most likely pay less than your first job and with gasoline costing what it does today and going up and up daily you won't gain a thing from that second job.
I can't see any alternative but to learn how to fight back and win by using their mistakes against them just as they are using your mistakes
against you. Can you think of any other alternative other than just putting up with it? If so I'd like to know what other options there are too. After all, there might come a time in the future when I might be faced with the same problem you are today but I'll have the knowledge and the skills needed to fight back and make them pay me instead of the other way around.
When the wolf comes to my door which I firmly believe he will do sooner or later he is going to have to bring an awfully big picnic basket with him. First of all I'll be recording every howl he lets out. I'll demand that he validate his claim right away. When he turns his claim over to a lawyer he will suddenly find himself trying to explain to a federal judge why he did all the things he did that he wasn't supposed to do and then when his friend the shark (Lawyer)tries to take a bite out of my hide he will also find himself explaining the same kinds of things to a federal judge.
I'm not worried about my ability to catch them making mistakes. The problem they have is that there are so many ways they can break the law that it is almost impossible for them to attempt to collect a debt without breaking the law one way or another. I'll catch them every time and make them pay before they get to the point of making me pay and I'll use the law against them.
I'm not an original genius. I'm just an average old man so if I can do it so can you. I can't give you legal advice but I can teach you what I know. I can't fix your credit for you because I'm not a credit repair expert and I don't fix anybody's credit but I can teach you what I know and if you use that knowledge to get you out of the fix your are in then more power to you. And if you decide you aren't going to take this lying down you will probably end up teaching me some things I didn't know too. That's just the way it works. I don't think I've ever had a student who didn't teach me something or other and I've had a lot of students over the years.
So what should you do? I think you should learn how to fight them off instead of just taking it on the chin.
Bill Bauer
405-684-9297
405-227-9423
Make money using this search engine instead of Google, Yahoo, MSN or others and get the same results. Get paid in Visa Reward Point cards.
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/qlmqson
RECOMMENDED READING
Subscribe to Creditwrench mailing list on google groups.
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/iomqson Creditwrench google group by email.
See all my questions and how I answered them.
Just send an email to ceo@creditwrench.com and ask to join my mailing list of all answers. I'll put you on the list and you can easily unsubscribe any time you wish.
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/hhlqson FDCPA EXPERT
www.creditwrench.com/howjudgmentswork.html
www.creditwrench.com/18questions.html
http://shrinkmylink.com/kmlqson
www.creditwrench.com/objections.html
www.creditwrench.com/howcreditwrenchworks.html
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/bnlqson List of community property states
How to answer a summons
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/exlqson
LISTEN TO THESE CREDITWRENCH STUDENTS CHAT ON OUR FRIDAY NIGHT CONFERENCE CALLS.
http://www.creditwrench.tv/MIKEJM-06-27-08.mp3
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/uimqson Mike JM tells about Greentree Financial case.
http://shrinkmylink.com/xsjqson
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/danqson Mark in Rhode Island gets settlement offer
Statute of Limitations for all states
http://shrinkmylink.com/zlwpson
How to set up your hard drive for creditwrench files. Makes them easy to find.
http://tinyurl.com/3lqxaw
The Creditwrench conference calls will start this coming Friday evening at 7 P.M. Central time. It is free and open to the public. There is no cost or obligation other than what it may cost you for the phone call itself. You can join in and ask questions or just listen or whatever you want to do.
Dial-in Number: (712) 432-1601
Access code: 508548#
You might also want to visit our message forum at http://consumers.creditwrench.com to get answers to questions you need answered before next Friday night.
405-684-9297
405-227-9423
Make money using this search engine instead of Google, Yahoo, MSN or others and get the same results. Get paid in Visa Reward Point cards.
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/qlmqson
RECOMMENDED READING
Subscribe to Creditwrench mailing list on google groups.
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/iomqson Creditwrench google group by email.
See all my questions and how I answered them.
Just send an email to ceo@creditwrench.com and ask to join my mailing list of all answers. I'll put you on the list and you can easily unsubscribe any time you wish.
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/hhlqson FDCPA EXPERT
www.creditwrench.com/howjudgmentswork.html
www.creditwrench.com/18questions.html
http://shrinkmylink.com/kmlqson
www.creditwrench.com/objections.html
www.creditwrench.com/howcreditwrenchworks.html
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/bnlqson List of community property states
How to answer a summons
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/exlqson
LISTEN TO THESE CREDITWRENCH STUDENTS CHAT ON OUR FRIDAY NIGHT CONFERENCE CALLS.
http://www.creditwrench.tv/MIKEJM-06-27-08.mp3
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/uimqson Mike JM tells about Greentree Financial case.
http://shrinkmylink.com/xsjqson
http://www.shrinkmylink.com/danqson Mark in Rhode Island gets settlement offer
Statute of Limitations for all states
http://shrinkmylink.com/zlwpson
How to set up your hard drive for creditwrench files. Makes them easy to find.
http://tinyurl.com/3lqxaw
The Creditwrench conference calls will start this coming Friday evening at 7 P.M. Central time. It is free and open to the public. There is no cost or obligation other than what it may cost you for the phone call itself. You can join in and ask questions or just listen or whatever you want to do.
Dial-in Number: (712) 432-1601
Access code: 508548#
You might also want to visit our message forum at http://consumers.creditwrench.com to get answers to questions you need answered before next Friday night.
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