subject: Settle Credit Card Debt – When Does It Makes Sense To Use A Professional Debt Relief Service? [print this page] While a number of financial counselors somewhat defensively insist that ordinary borrowers would be able to take charge of the settlement negotiation process on their own, we would strongly counsel against such endeavors. It's apparently tempting for onlookers only vaguely familiar with the settlement process to presume that there's little more associated with debt negotiation than a brief telephone call and sincere promise to the lender representatives. Of course, if settlement negotiation were anywhere near that easy, why would any borrowers ever think about paying back the entirety of their unsecured loans?
As a matter of fact, successful debt settlement negotiations will involve a series of strategically orchestrated discussions as well as written estimates that feature the experienced settlement specialist's best guess as to what the lenders would accept in terms of balance reductions. If you try to push forward a plan that asks for far too much in the way of debt cuts, the lenders might permanently halt negotiations altogether. Conversely, you wouldn't want to spend the next few years helplessly wondering if the creditors would've taken thousands of dollars less as settlement. There's just no way for average heads of household to approximate the lengthy training regimen that top debt settlement companies expect their counselors to fulfill before handling their own negotiations.
Furthermore, during the settlement negotiation process, the time demands could be extreme - almost like a second job. In order to make things more difficult for the borrower (or their settlement counselor proxy), the lender representatives often make themselves irritatingly hard to reach so as to motivate the other party to give up that much sooner. The lenders will be far less likely to play such games if they know there are professionals on both sides of the negotiation. Also, not only does employing a settlement specialist make tactical sense as far as the negotiation process goes, signing a professional debt counselor to handle your financial affairs effectively disallows the creditors or their collection agent counterparts from ever contacting you at your home or workplace once they've been informed of the formal agreement.
There's more to settlement than simply erasing the sums owed, though. You'll also want to check and see how the lenders will report the settlement to the three primary credit bureaus. Essentially, once a loan has been charged off, future settlements will either be recorded as paid or unpaid collections, and this is largely left to the discretion of the lender currently in legal possession of the debt. At the same time that you receive a written formal estimate of the settlement agreement, you'll also want to ask the lender for some verification that the credit bureaus will report the loans as having been paid so as to protect your FICO score from further abuse. In this process, too, the assistance of a professional settlement specialist can speed things up immensely.
We still tend to think of consumer debt as a shameful topic in this country, even as we grow increasingly dependent upon credit cards for everyday purchases, and it can be especially difficult asking for help with loans you're having trouble paying back. This is one of the less heralded aspects of the settlement negotiation program. Many satisfied settlement clients report that just being able to talk with a responsive and attentive counselor about their troubles alleviated so much of the bottled stress and anxiety. Since the settlement professionals - unlike employees of the Consumer Credit Counseling firms, to take one example -receive money just from their clients and only deal with the lenders as adversaries, you know from the first conversation that they'll be on your side.
Settle Credit Card Debt When Does It Makes Sense To Use A Professional Debt Relief Service?
