June 8, 2009
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Looking for Debt Settlement; Beware!
Swindle City -- story 3A West Virginia woman wanted to do the right thing. She found herself owing a $25,000 credit card debt. Not wanting to be a deadbeat, she went looking on the Internet for help. This homemaker wound up in the hands of a seducing "credit specialist" from Texas. Note this name: Credit Solutions of America. Watch out. You could be next. This company promised to fix all the problems. I just a few months this company had pocketed about $4,000 of this struggling family's income. Where did that leave the family? Deeper in credit card debt then ever. Moral of the story – Don't allow Credit Solutions of America anywhere near your credit cards.
This one company isn't to be singled out here. There are about 2,000 more possibilities. Just like the housing balloon, the number of contenders has tripled in the last few years. It's getting harder to find an honest business anymore. The consensus of most personal finance experts is that most of them are phony to the point where they don't (of can't) deliver on their promises to resolve credit card debt and they still keep the moneys they were paid anyway (about 15% of the debt-load) without paying off the credit card, themselves).
Complaints to state governments have been pouring in at unprecedented rates. They've doubled in North Carolina, tripled in Florida and quadrupled in Oregon just in the last few years. These leaches are the 3rd element to the perfect storm. First we started with a very inept Bush administration telling us to "just go shopping" to fix the economy. His man, Chief Economist, Paul O'Neal promising us "There is no recession and we're not going into one either." So we all went shopping and ran up credit card debt. The second part of the storm was when middle income wages were subtly switched with low-paying jobs till, even they disappeared. Now, we couldn't pay back that debt we had ran up in good faith to help the country. So, here we are now with thieves in sheep's clothing, raiding the hen house (token lousy cliche).