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Hey guys, I'm new here and I've been doing a lot of reading and searching for the past couple days. I have a couple questions now.

I have about 10,000 in credit card debt and for reasons which I won't go in to right now, I messed up and when the bills were too much, I just stopped paying altogether. I know now it was dumb, but it's been almost a year now and I just don't answer their calls. This has got to change obviously, and I need to get myself out of debt because ignoring it will get me nowhere.

Pretty much all of the debt is with a CA now, and I am considering debt settlement. I am also considering trying to settle with the CA myself. Will CAs actually settle with me or are they going to just demand the money then and there?

If I contact a settlement company, will they be able to work with CAs or can you really only work with creditors such as Citi, WAMU...?

My cards are/were with Chevron, USAA, Citi, Credit One, and WAMU

Any advice?

Posted: Thu Jul 03, 2008 1:37 am Subject:

From your post it seems that you have a credit card debt of $10,000 and all of them are with CAs. Now, you are considering debt settlement as a possible solution.

But I don’t think you should go for debt settlement because it is considered as a solution only when you are at the threshold of bankruptcy. Is your situation that bad? If yes, then you can settle the debt. Let me tell you here that Debt settlement will harm your credit score tremendously. But if you’re not in a position of bankruptcy then please opt for any other option like debt consolidation loan or debt management Program.

You can also have a Free counseling session with one of our financial experts over phone.

Guest · Posted: Thu Jul 03, 2008 2:04 am Subject:

I see your point here about it being a last result. And I guess to be honest I don't really know how bad it is - I've ignored it for a while. Your assessment is correct, and I have all my debts with a CA. From my reading here, I was under the impression that consolidation loans were NOT the way to go and management programs were largely scams.

Am I correct to assume that even with my debt all in collections, I can still get on a payment plan?

Posted: Thu Jul 03, 2008 2:10 am Subject:

That was me posting as a guest, still just getting used to the site. I know that settlement would hurt my credit score, but how much worse can it get than not paying a cent on 5 cards for a year now?

Posted: Thu Jul 03, 2008 3:26 am Subject:

Hello gcooksey and welcome to the community! Smile

Would you mind listing the name of the CA's that now hold these debts? Do you know if these CA's actually own the debts now, or are they just representing the original creditor?

Posted: Thu Jul 03, 2008 3:28 am Subject:

Posted: Thu Jul 03, 2008 5:03 am Subject: Debt

SOME of the debt,I have, are un-secured, too. A few have been 'forwarded' to a CA. I know it can get overwhelming, but, you can only do what you can do..ya know? On an un-secured debt, the CA can't do much of anything ( not in PA, anyway). In PA, they don't have Wage Attachments. If you can send $10.00 per month, then that's all you can send. AT least you are sending SOMETHING. Sometimes CA's can make it difficult to deal with debts.

Posted: Fri Jul 04, 2008 4:56 am Subject:

As far I know...debt settlement can hurt your credit score by more than 200 points. So, before selecting settlement as a solution, please keep this in mind.