FDR vs debt settlement
Date: Tue, 04/06/2010 - 09:23
We have
Chase - 8500
Citi - 8500
Citi 14000
No payments have been made since November, even though we pay FDR monthly. They took hefty fees the first 3 months, so things have been slow going. They were very sketchy / positive when we signed up and only recently did we find out that our 2 creditors - Citi and Chase are the 2 cards that they don't communicate with UNTIL we have gone to collections & have enough money saved up.
Citi offered us a 45% settlement a couple of months ago that I sent to FDR. Again, they did nothing. Chase has sent us two letters about a lawsuit and we just got a letter in the mail about a lawsuit. We haven't been "served" any official lawsuit info, so is this just a hoax to get us to call them? They did say to call them to talk about a lump sum payment.
I just looked at the Citi cards and we are 113 days on those. I think the Chase may be 130 days.
I guess I'm looking for advice. We are current on car and home payments so I think they all may come after us legally since we can make other payments. FDR has been no help -- just taking our money and doing nothing. If I cancel with them, we will recoup about $1100 but out $1500 in fees. CRAZY!
We've had NO contact with our creditors. They call every 30 minutes, every day of the week but we were told not to answer the phones. I'm really thinking about having my husband call Chase and trying to settle. I see many on here that get down to 35% and that would be great. Should I call Citi and set up payments with them as I know we won't have enough to settle at this time? Or do I keep ignoring them?
We were really trying to get out of our debt in 2 years. I was thinking that FDR was the way to go, but my credit score has already gone from 730 to 550 in 5 months. Not sure I can keep going. Thoughts?
hello! if you want to read up on fdr i know there are many posts
hello! if you want to read up on fdr i know there are many posts about them just search them in the search box above. but as for settlement this is the way it works. my first settlements didnt come in till long after 6 months of stop payments. most were settled 6 months into it to 12 months with a few hanging in there till the end. but settlement is rough on the credit score but its is somewhat easily repaired in a few years with good behavior an timely payments once your settlement program is over keep in mind when working with a settlement company you may want to limit how much you talk to the creditors you may counter act what the settlement company has already negotiated or you may let on that you can afford more than what has been offered.
