How do people negotiate with the people they owe money to? Does it work?
I have seriously high bills that I can’t pay. But I don’t know how to approach the people I owe that money to and successfully talk them down. I’ve heard that it’s possible, and I’ve known some people that it worked for, but I’m clueless. Help?
Tags: Money Talk, Money Work, People
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on Thursday, July 30th, 2009 at 4:32 pm and is filed under Personal Finance.
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give them your sob story, it should work
I tried to get my credit card company to come down on the interest. I never missed a payment or was late but they said no. If you find out, please let me know.
#1 do not go for bankruptcy!
gathering my thoughts and will fill you in!
Dave Ramsey has a good discussion of this in his book “Total Money Makeover”. It is in most libraries & bookstores. IN general, if you are already behind on your bills, this is what you do:
(1) Gather up about 50% of the balance on the smallest debt.
(2) Call that one & offer to settle. That means they give you a WRITTEN offer of a SETTLEMENT IN FULL & you send them a MONEY ORDER or WESTERN UNION pymt for the portion of the balance they agree to accept.
(3) If they refuse (& they almost always will the 1st time), keep trying for a few weeks. If they don’t accept, move them to the bottom of the list & go on to the next smallest debt.
(4) IMPORTANT: NEVER, NEVER, NEVER give them access to your bank account by either authorizing a draft or by sending a personal check. Most collectors are bottom feeders & will CLEAN OUT YOUR ACCOUNT.
(5) Just-as-IMPORTANT: Do this YOURSELF. Do NOT go to one of those crappy debt mgmt places advertised during Jerry Springer or whatever. Many are already under federeal investigation & all will ***** your credit worse than you could do on your own.
I wish you all the best. I have been broke, so I know how you feel. I hope you will find the peace of mind I now have.
Some places require you to pay off your bills in full.
Others are willing to take a cut.
Your best bet is instead of avoiding them, explain your situation and offer to pay a small amount. Divide up all of your bills and pay 10-20 bucks to each. Maybe pay a little more to the smaller ones to get them paid off quickly, and then add that money to the next smallest. Eventually you will only have a few big ones, and all of the cash will be going towards those.
Avoid adding more debts in the meantime - do without stuff, or sell some stuff off to pay for things. Once you have gotten on top of your bills, then you can go back to buying stuff - but try to be aware of what you are buying, how you will pay for it, and how much interest you will end up paying. Interest is the biggest killer - and a lot of people don’t realize how damaging it is.
Truthfully, I just have my lawyer do it and they take care of the problem!