USAA Collections (Portfolio recovery?) Contacted

They are offering you a 25% settlement. I'd run with it because if it goes to court you will owe the full amount plus attorney fees. That is a decent offer.

I agree it's decent. I'm just not sure how to settle on the wording for the settlement. SHould I be verifying they own the debt or just a collector and that the debt will not be collected upon (the writeoff amount) Plus they never mentioned doing a 1099, which is odd!

If this is USAA's collections offering you the settlement, then you wouldn't have to validate it. I would jump on the settlement before they change their mind. At the time you accept they will give you the info on the 1099. If it's a collection agency, in order to avoid losing the settlement, you could call USAA and verify that the collection agency has your account. That's what I did with one of my accounts and I settled with the collectors for 25%.

If they are willing to word the settlement as "settled in full" that's great. Usually they will state "settled for less than amount owed", but I didn't let that affect my settling. Just wanted to get rid of the debt and start with a clean slate.

When I called USAA they said USAA owned the account and don't sell their accounts. So I assume this collector is hiered by USAA to collect on their accounts.

Then your settlement will be with the collection agency. If you go forward, make sure they fax/e-mail you the settlement letter before you pay them.