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Hello! First off - I promise I searched for the answer to my question prior to this post. I am trying to buy a home and in the loan application process I learned of a $4000 judgement from Velocity Investments Llc. Seems it is 2 years old. All I want to know is what is the quickest way to negotiate a settlement, pay it and have the correct documentation? Is there someone I can hire to do this?

I received a summons on Friday for a $12,000 credit card debt with Barclays. The last time I made a payment was September 2017, it’s listed on my credit as a charge off now. The first collection company was northstar, then one named LTD and then the last letter I received was sometime last year from Lloyd and McDaniel. I got tied up in this after I left my job to stay home with my first daughter years ago my husband lost his job a few months later and was unemployed for about 3 months. We are pretty much paycheck to paycheck especially with two small kids but I do have some money from our tax refund and would like to try to settle. Talked to an attorney and he said he usually can settle for about half of the amount owed but his fees would cost me about $2400 and if I make payment arrangements they’re usually for the entire amount of the original debt. There is no court date listed on my summons, just basically shows me as defendant and Barclays as plaintiff and says i have 14 days to file an answer. I have no idea what to do.

Hey everyone, I am looking for guidance on next steps. I opened my first credit card living in South Carolina with Capital One in college, it had a $10,000 limit (I'm not sure how, I knew nothing about money) and maxed it out and forgot about it. I can't remember when I started receiving calls and letters about collections, but eventually I told my mom about the debt and she suggested I ask for a hardship thing which I did. Interest and late fees stopped, and again I forgot about/ignored the debt. I checked my credit score a couple months ago and saw that it had jumped like 300 points overnight, and found that the Capital One account was no longer on my report, and naturally I was elated, thinking I was forgiven and that I had gotten out of this alive. A couple months later when I checked my score, It was down like 100 points and the new account on my credit score was Portfolio Recovery Associates to the tune of $11,383.67. I began receiving letters again a few months ago, now living in Virginia. I received a letter dated 3/26 that my account has been transferred to litigation department, "at this time, no attorney within the litigation department has personally reviewed the particular circumstances on your account." It appears PRA has purchased my account because Capital One is listed as "seller." I have not responded to any letters or spoke on the phone to anyone regarding this account in years. My guess is that this is within the statute of limitations (6 years for both South Carolina and Virginia), however I don't really know when I stopped paying the credit card bill, probably sometime in 2014. I make very little money (working on it though), have no property except a car which I still make payments on (Capital One Auto Finance), and cannot realistically even settle, their offer for a one time payment of $7,968.56 or monthly payments of $758.91 (I know that it is not advised to make payments to a collections agency) as I simply cannot afford these rates. I don't have a record of these letters (simply threw them out) or of the original credit card details (when I opened it, when I stopped paying, etc.). This is my only debt- no student loans, outstanding bills, etc. aside from my car loan (which is in good standing). Can I even send a debt validation letter? Initial correspondence was a long long time ago. Would they sue me? I don't think I'm a good candidate for wage garnishment or property seizure. I had a rough couple of years in college and after and have been working on cleaning myself up. It would super suck to get sued or have to pay a lot of money, mostly because I don't have any. Do South Carolina or Virginia laws apply? Thanks so much in advance for any guidance.

Spoke to a rep at Carson Smithfield and was offered a settlement for 25% of money owed to Merrick Bank. Called back a couple of days later to set up arrangement and they weren't going to honor the offer. After a bunch of back and forth they said as long as payment is made by the end of the month (7 days away). I want to accept the offer but they say they can not send me the offer in writing. What?! He said that their offer letters are auto generated by the computer and the language in those auto generated offers gives 35 days to make payment but this is a special deal that he wont extend for 35 days. I recorded the call with him , with his permission, where he lays out the deal but don't see how I can send money without a written agreement or letter. Any suggestions?

i have a $1,500 close collection account. the original creditor was verizon wireless, it is indeed my debt so is it necessary to validate the debt or can i just skip ahead to contacting the collection agency requesting a settlement of hopefully 25% or even less of it? i wanted to ask them if they could work with me in hopes that if they honor a affordable settlement will they promise to remove it. i honestly let my family member get service and they basically left me with this ridiculous debt that really hurt my credit. Date of First Delinquency Dec 01, 2013 and here we are May 2017 i still have a long way to go until it goes away and i was going to just wait it out but if i can fix this i surely will. please help with the best way to go about dealing with this. thanks

I live in GA and am being sued by my homeowner's association for unpaid dues in the amount of $3800 which includes court costs, interest and legal fees. I was laid off for 3 1/2 years which caused me to get behind. My court date is at the end of this month. I actually owe $2958 and am willing to try to work out arrangements to pay the $2958 before the court date to avoid going to court. I was wondering if I should contact the attorney's office and offer to make a payment (I could give them at least $1500 now) and see if they'd be willing to settle the debt for the $2958 (I could give them the rest over the next 30 days), what exactly should I say when I call, and if they agree, what should I have them provide me with to show that we worked out a settlement arrangement, and when I make my last payment what I should have them submit to me or any other parties to show that I paid the debt?

- Hello, I'm new to this forum but I'm very impressed how helpful everyone is. I'm hoping I can get some advice from some of the experts here. As a real estate agent, I ran into trouble in 2008-2009 and had to give up paying on some credit cards to take care of other family needs. One of those credit cards, a Disover Card, got a summary judgment against me on 7/6/11 for the principal of $9165.78 as well as the filing fee of $230, the service of process for $79.50, the ex-parte of $30 and the attorney's fee of $500 for a total of $10,005.28 and interest accrueing at 12% per annum. They were represented by Krista L. White and Associates in Snohomish County, WA. Though I was served papers, I was ignorant to the process and didn't attend the hearing. In 2010, they totally cleaned out our main bank account of nearly $1000 which I believe is illegal. I don't think they can take everything out of your bank account. Then, last year they tried to garnish my wages, which they did for a month, before my employer figured out the can't garnish wages for independant contractors. Now, they've put a judgment lien on a rental property that I own and would like to refinance. The lender won't refinance the property with the lien on it. I would also like to buy a home in the next couple years, and I don't think I'll be able to with the judgment. A couple months ago, I received a letter from Suttell, Hammer, & White in Bellevue, WA saying that Discover Bank has now retained their firm to collect the debt owed. So, is Discover Card still involved or do the attorneys now call all the shots? My question is, would Suttell, Hammer, and White ever consider a settlement offer in a case like this or will they always hold out for the full amount? I also have MCM coming after me for a $22,500 Juniper credit card debt where they're offering me 70% off if I pay that amount right away. Just from reading the forums, I don't think I'll go for that at this point. Thank you in advance.

Hi I am new here and I have tried looking for anything that has to do with the NYC Marshals but to no avail. Hoping someone can help me in my situation which is: I'm a single middle aged woman who lives alone in NYC and works a not so great paying job. Just recently last week the marshal started garnishing my wages. They are taking 10%of my gross which comes to be about $97. Working a new job that i just started in December 2014, that pays $12/hour. With my pre-tax medical and 401 taken out I'm coming home with a $600 check every 2 weeks. I have finally said to myself I have to pay off all my debts! I have been thinking of going the debt consolidation route. Any which way the other day I gathered what ever bills/statements/collection agency notices I could find. I even called up 2 CC companies to see exactly what I owed and if those debts where sold and if so, to whom. Then I did some math from what info I had gathered. My question is this: Is there a way for me to pay the debt collector that paid the marshal? Instead of me paying the Marshal? I guess eliminating the third person? If I do debt consolidation can the garnishment also be included in that consolidation? Now this is what my expenses look like: I live paycheck to paycheck I don't have a savings account and I barely have above $150 in my checking paycheck every 2 weeks $600 Rent is $760 Metro card (form of transportation) is $116 month electricity is $70 month Phone $80 month food varies I can spend up to $100 month so this leaves me literally with $74 for the month!! How do I even pay off debt with this?! City Marshall I owe $3000 They are taking out 10% of my gross pay every 2 weeks. Total owed on cards $10,686.96 I still need to call 3 other card companies to see what my debt is with them... but guesstimating I would say this total would be around $2,500-$3000. What can I do? I have been seeing some of the forums on here stating that consolidation is a ripoff. How else can I have this debt off my back with only having $74 available per month? I would be ever so grateful for any help!! Thanks

I have two medical accounts with the same hospital, one from 2009 and the other from 2010. I have already DV'd both accounts and they came back verified. My problem now is how to go about settling both accounts. The largest of the two accounts has a current past due amount of $7200 with an original balance of $5000 which they tacked on $1200 in interest. Originally I was planning on sending a settlement letter to Progressive management, the CA, however I chose to call them instead and see if I could settle with them for a lower amount via phone. They did inform me that they were in fact NOT the owners of the debt and that the hospital was still the OC. They were not very willing to work with me on the debt at all and only willing to negotiate a small portion of the interest they had tacked on. I didn't argue with them, or even make an offer on what I was willing to pay as I did not want to stir up to much trouble until I was prepared to settle completely. I decided I would call the OC and upon doing so I have now found out that the hospital does not keep any records of their debt after a certain number of years and referred me back to the CA. Now I'm not really sure where to go from here. Do I send a settlement letter to the CA offering a lower settlement, or do I somehow try to settle with the OC? It was my understanding that most CA's would generally be a little more forgiving when working with medical debt, however this does not seem to be the case. I can only afford to pay a small percentage of the original debt, but I'm not sure how I can make that happen. Any insight would be appreciated! Thanks!, Josh

Okay, I've been slowing getting my personal credit together and I have a few of curious ones. 1) I have a rather large judgmeent for $9000 (with interest its probably almost 12000 now) that I got in 2011. I do owe it and all the service and everything was proper. I set up a payment plan for $200/month that's documented on the docket with the courts that both the attorney and myself agreed to it. I can comfortably pay the payment plan but with the size of the judgement and the interest on the judgement, it would take me almost 15 years to pay it back and I would pay $16,000 in interest alone!! I don't want that, I'd like to buy a house in a couple years. I don't have enough to pay off the entire balance but I could probably pay around $5000 in a lump sum. I should clarify that this debt is out of my current state of residence and they are unaware of my employment or bank accounts (not sure that matters?). My question for this one is would they have any incentive to take a settlement of less than is owed at this point? Should I even pursue a settlement? My take is I figure since I'm abiding by the payment terms anyway, I can't really lose. Any thoughts? 2) I have another judgement (I only have 2, I swear lol) This one is smaller and older. Only $1000 and granted in 2007 from Capital One and it was done properly. Also out of my current state and unaware of my employment and bank accounts. With interest this one is probably around $1300, which I could probably handle. I don't have a payment argeement with them but I wanted to try and settle for around $600. I'm not sure if that's enough but they havent been able to collect for almost 6 years so maybe, right? Again, any thoughts on likelihood of them to accept a settlement? How should I approach them about a settlement? Call? Write? 3) This one makes me angry. I have a collection account on my credit reports from some CA. They do not own the debt and its collecting on behalf of an apartment complex. It's from 2007 and apparently from an apartment complex I used to stay in. I did stay in the aparatment complex but when I left, I didn't owe anything as far as I know and never got any paperwork for past due owed. It's for about $4000. By the credit report dates, it will drop off my report next year in August. By the state SOL, it will be past the SOL in August of this year. Also out of my current state, unaware of employer/bank accounts...for now I guess. I called the CA and asked them to send me some verification of the debt. Or some documentation that I owed it. They said they did send out info in 2007 (to some address I didn't recognize) and they would not send out anymore paperwork to validate the debt. WTH? Well, Im not paying a debt they won't even send any documentation for. So how do I proceed with this one? Just let it roll off in 2007? If they decide to sue in these last few months they are able, will they have to sue me in my current state or will I have to travel all the way back to the state the apartment complex was in? And will they have to find me first? Maybe I'm worrying too much about it but my plan was to let the SOL pass and then contact the CRA and see if I can get it removed. Also they told me a payment was made on the account in 2009, I didn't make it, does that matter? I've heard it can reset the SOL? Thoughts? Any feedback or comments are appreciated. Also would like to hear from anyone who has ever settled a judgment for less than is owed. What did you settle for (percentage) and what were circumstances (old debt, garnishing wages, etc.), get it in writing?