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How Can EQ Help You Win the Negotiation?
“Don’t ask your father the minute he walks in the door,” my Mom used to tell me. “Wait till he’s in a good mood. Let him unwind a little.”Then some time later, she would alert me that “the good mood” had arrived, and it was time to ask him. It was a ...
How to Deal with Bill Collectors
So you’ve screwed up. You’re drowning in debt. Maybe the credit card was burning a hole in your pocket and you just had to get the HDTV. Or maybe you or a family member had a medical emergency while you we laid off. It doesn’t matter to your creditors; ...
Negotiating A Short Sale – The High Road to Huge Foreclosure Profits
Buying foreclosures can be extremely profitable for real estate investors. However, most of these homeowners are mortgaged to the hilt. They have no equity, and big loan payments. In fact, many actually owe more than the property is worth!Most investors ...
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Contact your creditors, negotiate payment arrangements, ask permission to skip a payment, or ask for a lower interest rate. These are simple measures you can take as a first step to manage your debt. Try these options first before you attempt any other course of action.
If you have a large amount of debt, a qualified credit counseling service may be able to help you reduce payments and prevent further damage to your credit report. Although credit counseling can provide consumers with valuable assistance, some firms exist only to cheat their unknowing clients. These companies use their non-profit status to attract customers who are then scamed into paying large upfront fees. Those fees are then sometimes funneled to for-profit companies. Recently, the FTC and IRS issued the following tips for choosing a credit counseling organization.
* Pay very careful attention to the fees you are being charged, the nature of the services the agency offers, and the terms of the contract. * Check to make sure that your creditors are willing to work with the agency the you plan to choose * Consider using agencies that offer actual counseling and education, instead of simply enrolling all clients in a debt management
program
Another option for consumers overwhelmed by debt is to consolidate debt by establishing a new loan (debt consolidation loan) with lower monthly payments. A debt consolidation loan helps manage your debt because the loan is usually over a longer period of time and possibly at a lower interest rate than your existing debt. Consolidation should be used when debts are mostly current.
While there are many options to help you cope with unmanageable debt, sometimes debt negotiation may be the only appropriate course of action remaining. For example, debt negotiation would be a good course of action if a long-forgotten debt is the only bad entry on your credit report. However, keep in mind, you may owe income tax on the debt owed. Any forgiven debts of $600 or more are considered income to the consumer. If you do negotate a debt down, the creditor will send you and the IRS a Form 1099-C at the end of the tax year.
As a general safety precaution, anyone who plans on using a third party to handle their finances should remember to check them out with the Better Business Bureau and State Attorney General's Office of Consumer Protection. These agencies keep records of credit repair services that have mislead their customers about the impact the service would have on their credit rating, the fees involved, and the possibility of legal action from the creditors.
About the author:
If you would like to get more credit information you can visit our website which contains many credit resources. http://www.my-credit-report.info This article is copyright 2005, but can be freely reprinted, as long as no changes are made, including hyperlinks.
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Sudan and South Sudan to resume negotiationsChristian Science MonitorAfter weeks of fighting, in which South Sudan took out one of Sudan's last remaining oil fields, the two countries are returning to the negotiation table, under African Union mediation. By Scott Baldauf, Staff writer / May 25, 2012 After a series of ...and more » |
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Negotiation is not a solution in itselfMontreal Gazette“Negotiation” – almost everybody in Quebec still seems to believe in its magical powers to solve the current protest crisis, even after it's already failed once. Three-quarters of Quebecers in a recent poll by Léger Marketing for Québecor-owned media ...and more » |
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