Posts Tagged ‘ACORN’
Running out of debt relief options
Monday, February 15th, 2010What are your debt relief options? Honestly, people become so overwhelmed with their financial burden they often lose sight they have other options to take care of their debt. When all feels hopeless they can file for bankruptcy. People tend to lock themselves in a financial lock box when it comes to the word “bankruptcy” and the negative aspects or perceptions the credit industry has lobbied for and advertised to place on people who are unable to pay or do not pay their bills or end up filing bankruptcy.
The credit card agencies and banks have lobbied against debtors rights for decades, they have lobbied to pass bills to make it harder to file bankruptcy. In addition, the banks and credit card agencies have included so many little fees while increasing percentage rates on its consumers during a time when it’s most inconvenient for the holder of the loan or credit card. It may seem inconvenient; unfortunately it is a tactic that is deployed by thousands of mathematical analysts that would make NASA’s head spin. Therefore, statistics is on the side of the credit card companies which are running your credit accounts and spending habits through a myriad of statistical databases and algorithms that distinguish when is the best time to increase your annual percentage rate. This arithmetic and statistical computations are all done to evaluate ways to force you to stay deeper in debt to the company while allowing you enough room to still pay off your revolving debt without ever paying on the principle of the debt.
This type of lending has become almost predatory, the only difference is people don’t have to worry about the local mob sitting outside their home with a baseball bat to break their legs for not paying the bookie back. They now have to worry about something more sinister like the financial lobbyist paying US senators and congressman to pass bills that pad their pockets or make their life a little easier. The time when these representatives have fundraisers that cost $1,500.00 to sit down at a dinner and eat is a time when Americas days of being a truly capitalists system is going to die.
In a time when payday loan companies are rampant in areas where citizens generally have low income while charging fees of to 300% of the rate of loan on people that will get sucked into paying over and over until it becomes difficult to get out of debt. People come to these payday loan companies having to turn over their whole paycheck to pay off the balance they owe. The customers then have to turn right back around and take out another loan from the pay day loan company to get their full paycheck back and then they rinse and repeat. Here is an excerpt from a payday loan company.
“A borrower usually writes a check for the amount borrowed plus the fee, postdated to the next payday. If he can’t pay the full amount then, he might roll the loan over, paying just the fee — say, $110 on a $500 loan — and agreeing to pay the $610 — the $500 balance plus another $110 fee — in another two weeks. Consumer advocates and some lawmakers criticize payday loans as predatory, because fees correspond to annual interest rates of 300 percent and up.”
As you can see you could quickly end up borrowing more than your pay check could cover and therefore placing you under the thumb of some local or online payday loan company while going to the store or website every two weeks to give them your paycheck and applying for a new payday loan to get some money back to continue to cover your bills. This is when you really need a payday loan lawyer to get you out of this vicious cycle.
In addition to the obvious predatory lending practices listed above it is not a coincidence that groups like ACORN come in advocating for people that are minorities and may be uneducated without a solid education or work history, trying to stir up the emotions of such groups by telling them they are not living the American dream and they are entitled to a home even though they do not have enough funds to pay for the home. They collaborate to work system with low adjustable home rates that will adjust to a ridiculous price leaving the owner the home open to foreclosure because the mortgage company will not give them a new fixed rate home loan they could afford.
The debtor can gain control of their life by taking into account that if they truly want to get out of debt they can hire a bankruptcy attorney and file bankruptcy. The law of the United States has been put in place for people that have over extended themselves or have had such bad luck or life changing events that they can no longer pay their bills. People have to realistically come to the conclusion that when they took on the debt they being a typical debtor did not say; I want to charge as much as possible so I have to pay the cost of bankruptcy, take out bankruptcy loans or use other extreme measures to figure out what debt relief options I can use to stop creditors from calling the home five times a day while calling the work and family members to get a hold of the debtor.
People have to come to the grasp that if they are taking loans to avoid bankruptcy or because they fear the cost of bankruptcy they should come to the conclusion that these credit card companies and special interest groups have worked minimum payments to a point that it would take over twenty years to pay down a five thousand dollar credit card balance with minimum payments at a rate equal to twenty percent.
Now with the housing market crashing and equity in homes being diluted to nothing people are being forced to look at their debts in a way that seems almost impossible to get out of rather than using HELOC or home equity lines of credit to borrow against their homes they have to find new methods to pay credit card debt. The days are gone for borrowing on the potential of what your home is worth. The only possibility is if you have been in your home for 20 years and you want to borrow against the home.
