October 16, 2007

Consolidation

Consolidation - Some people are just built to argue their way out of debt. Personally, I am not one of them, with two brain surgeries under my belt and having a mom that works high dollar collections in a hospital. I have asked that she kindly take care of my bills, which are outrageous, especially since they did a better job of almost killing me than taking care of me (But thats a long story).

I dont know the entire game of debt collection, but I do know a little bit. Threats, pity, denial and negotiations are all a part of the game of consolidation. For my part, my mom negotiates a discount directly with the doctor, not with the collectors. Collectors have no authority to change the terms of the debt, but the doctor does. She tells them my situation and sometimes I get up to a 50% discount.

For the most part, thats all I know of it. I used to work across from a debt consolidation office, they worked with people close to foreclosure/repossession and they basically just called all the creditors and asked for more time. Then in some cases they would take out a loan with them on the house and consolidate all their debt. Pfffft, I could have saved them the thousands in fees from consolidation if they just refinanced their home.

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