How to take action to resolve your debt situation ?

Great story. However, I think Agung was just setting us up for a spam advertisement for a bulletproof solution to your "debt situation". Being posted in 3, 2, 1 ...

There are several ways to resolve a debt issue, but remember this: NEVER NEVER carry credit card debt if you can help it. But if you must owe cred card debt, many credit card companies offer 0% interest rate balance transfer for a set period of time, just make sure you know how long that period. If you have an outstanding student loan, you may lock it into a fixed rate 30yr loan. You can only do this once, so make sure you lock in at a good rate. I locked in my private student loan at a fixed rate of 3.375%. This will decrease your monthly payment significantly because traditional student loans are amortized over 10 year period, while a fixed rate conversion will allow you to pay back in 30 years. Here is an example: if you have loan balance of $25K, and you lock in your fixed interest rate of 3.375% for 30 years, your monthly payment will only be $110. Also, look into your 401K plan. Many companies will allow you to take loans out against your 401K (this is NOT early withdrawal, so you will have to pay back the money). Aside from taking money out for your 1st home purchase, you usually have to pay back the money in 5 years. But, the advantage is the loan won't show up on your credit report, and, if your company admister the 401K accounts on individual basis not on a pool basis (most large companies admister on pool basis), the you are basically pay yourself back on interest. This is how it works: if you have an individual 401K account (not pooled), then you should be able to take out a loan that equates to the minimum of 1) $50K, and 2) 1/2 of your total asset value (this is a general case, but do check with your company on the details). You will be paying back the amount to your 401K account within 5 years period (with the exception of 1st home purchase you may pay back up to 30 year period), and usually with a rate of Prime + 1% or 2%. Now, if your 401K account is admistered individually, then the interest you pay back will be credited entirely into your own account. So essentially you are making investment on the money you borrowed, on yourself. However, if your 401K is pooled with the rest of the company, then the interest you pay back will be spread among ALL the 401K participants in the company.

Gah, I feel like such a sucker.

How have I NOT seen this before...?

Anyway.. hey, anyone want to go in halvesy on this $20,000,000 some Nigerian prince is offering to send me?

What can I say.. I'm a somewhat-naive, bleeding-heart sucker. Was just trying to help, however little it might, since this kind of stuff strikes a bit of a personal chord..

Holy fuck, my little sob story about 60k of "good" (non-CC, school0-loan) debt is pretty weak in comparison. Grats to you. I couldn't even imaging working through that..

Daver, how did you live life differently? Like not going out and eating generic and stuff?

daver wrote:
That included house @ $215k owed, cars, CC, personal loans, lines of credit, everything. Which is to say that I didn't save up $400k and pay it off, a lot of it was decisions to live life differently. Although there was a significant cash outlay to clean everything up. Lou Reed, first two verses of Strawman:

We who have so much to you who have so little
to you who don't have anything at all
We who have so much more than any one man does need
and you who don't have anything at all, ah
Does anybody need another million dollar movie
does anybody need another million dollar star
Does anybody need to be told over and over
spitting in the wind comes back at you twice as hard

Does anyone really need a billion dollar rocket
does anyone need a $60,000 car
Does anyone need another President
or the sins of Swaggart parts 6, 7, 8, and 9, ah
Does anyone need another politician
caught with his pants down money sticking in his hole
Does anyone need another racist preacher
spittin' in the wind can only do you harm, wow

Cat Power's 'Fool', somewhat related:

apartment in New York, London and Paris
where will we rest?, we're all living on top of it
it's all that we have, the USA is our daily bread
and no one is willing to share it

why can't we see our fortunacy,
living as legends have lived?
bane and dismannered
we coax all the time
knowing that nothing is left when we die

come along, fool
a direct hit of the senses, you are disconnected
it's not that it's bad, it's not that it's death
it's just on the tip of your tongue and you're so silent

wanting to live and laugh all the time
sitting alone with your tea and your crime
children with kids and people with parents
any which way, there's no past and no present

when the day comes and all of them bums
will reveal enchanting persons

come along, fool...

when it's a rut and baby's no luck
half of it's misunderstanding love
the war we have won we're winning again
within ourselves and within our friends

come along, fool...

Ok... until WhiFi stops me I'm going to keep saying this:

FREE MONEY NOW!!!!!!!!$$!$!$!$!$

daver wrote: [quote=possibly_maybe]What can I say.. I'm a somewhat-naive, bleeding-heart sucker. Was just trying to help, however little it might, since this kind of stuff strikes a bit of a personal chord..

Seriously, totally cool. Getting out of debt is very personal to me also. I spent a lot of time and effort and soul searching in eliminating over $400k of debt in recent years. Debt free, and proud to be! That is me. Whee! Whoopee.

And stuff.

Congrats to you daver! I myself just got out of debt at the end of May - just in time for my birthday. It was much less, but it was ridiculous credit card debt that took me years to pay off. I ended up going to one of those consolidating services when I still lived in San Francisco. That helped immensely. Yeah, and it's a great feeling being debt free. Now I can actually save some money and put a little towards an IRA. Yay!

Mamacita wrote: Ok... until WhiFi stops me I'm going to keep saying this:

FREE MONEY NOW!!!!!!!!$$!$!$!$!$

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO !!!!!!!1!!!!1! STOP IT!!!

(was that good?)

One thing to keep in mind when it comes to debt management programs (CCCS) - many issuers of credit will look at participation in the program in a similar light to filing chapter 13 bankruptcy; resort to it only if absolutely necessary.

I don't have to worry about debt. Nobody will give me any money.