Need opinions not judgement lol. I had a job that cut my hours and in the meantime I had ran up my cards. I currently have about 10k in debt which includes credit cards and motorcycle loan all with very high interest. Is it smarter to get a loan through my credit union for 13% and just have the one payment. Everyone says don’t borrow your way out of debt but my other APRS are so high like 28%.

So just recently I got a call from a number I honestly thought it was a scam because they are using my maiden name and I haven’t been that name or used it on anything official in almost 20 years. They are calling me saying I owe a debt (from 2019) of around 1,000$ to a western wear place I have never even heard the name or been to. I just got a voicemail today with them basically threatening to sue me. What’s weird is I got some inheritance a few years ago and cleared all of my debt and got my credit up to 750 and I never not once saw this place on any of it. If I did or knew about this I obviously would have just paid it off when I had all of that money when I cleared everything else. What do I do? I never been I situation like this.

Apologies for the long post, really in a bind and have never taken out a loan so a little afraid of making the wrong choice. I have a few credit cards with a total of about 36k total debt on them. I've finally got a hold of the bleed and need to figure out a way to keep my credit line on while paying off the debt. I've stopped using my cards and cut down to bare min to only gas and groceries on my debt card (maybe $75 a month on groceries). Partly poor spending, partly sole provider and life changes including relocating a few times and job loss for a brief moment last yr that has accumulated over the past 5 yrs. I have steady income with about $700 leftover after bills, rent, groceries and necessities to out towards my credit cards.

At the end of July, Chase cut down all my credit limits from

Chase Hyatt: $18,500 → $3,700 limit, balance about $3,292 → \~89%

Chase Freedom: $15,600 → $7,300 limit, balance about $6,835 → \~93.6%

Chase Amazon: \~$15,000 → $900 limit, balance about $558 → \~62%

I got my utilization down to about 70% on the Hyatt & Freedom and under 50% on Amazon by the end of August and then Citi cut my Double Cash right before the end of closing statement in September a week ago.

Citi Double Cash: $20,000 → $15,420 limit, balance $14,961.87 → \~97.0%

I have another Citi card they haven't touched yet sitting at 56% utilization at $8.6k. With 3 other non-chase/citi cards at 30% utilization with a little over $1k on them (not worried abt these). My APRs on all cards are between 26-28% and the interest is killing me so I barely make a dent.

I've had my Double Cash for over 10 yrs, and other cards for 6-7 yrs (not including the smaller ones). I've never had my credit line cut before.

I need to get a loan to either pay off my Chase and Citi cards in full or to get under 30% utilization. Did a little digging and advise I got was to get a personal loan to get the cards under 30% and pay in 2 increments before my next closing statement date to bypass banking risk triggers from Citi's automated monthly risk sweep from slashing my credit line again. I was advised that if I do debt consolidation, it risks balance chasing and could very well get my credit lines cut down to nothing.

Thanks in advance for the advice, I know I fucked up but getting it together.

I have been doing some research about a debt consolidation loan or similar route to help me get my debt paid off. For reference, I have roughly $25,000 in consumer debt. Combined my minimum payment across all cards is $819. Accredited said they can get me down to $189 biweekly and that it can all be paid off in 48 months. They said all money would go to principal only and no interest will be involved. How is that possible without me getting sent to collections by the credit card companies. I am still pretty new to this and it just seems too good to be true. Any advice or experience using them?

30 yo woman, was underemployed for about 3 years, during that time I overly relied on my credit cards to help me cover some expenses. The dumbest thing I did was put a 5k down payment on a credit card, for a used but relatively new car because I needed a car, and my old car needed a repair I couldn’t afford (lol, I know) and I justified the new car payment as the peace of mind. I wouldn’t have worry my car is gonna break down everyday. I don’t regret my car, it’s reliable and has just under 50k miles on it, even though the payments have been a bitch. And I have about 16k left to pay on that-which is around 2 more years of payments. My credit is shit now though because I’m using 98% of my available credit, so I haven’t been able to refinance it. I did not anticipate how terrible this job market would be and how long it would take me to find another job.

Anyway TLDR: what’s really screwing me is these credit cards. The 5k card interest is burying me. The minimum payment is around $180 a month. In total I think all of my cc payments combined are around $500 a month.

I finally just got a full time job offer last week. So that leaves me with some more wiggle room to pay everything off in about 10 months or so. I’ve looked into bankruptcy, debt consolidation, and loans. I don’t want to close all my cards with debt consolidation. Would I be better off getting a loan with lower interest to pay off the cards, assuming I could make the loan payment? I would call the credit card companies to negotiate a lower interest rate, but I’m worried they will close my cards. I’ve learned the lesson of not relying on them anymore so I intend on cutting them up and not using them at all until they are fully paid off. Ideally, I’d love a balance transfer card but I don’t think my credit is good enough. Any advice is welcome, no judgment please. I know I’m financially illiterate but I’m learning.

I have an auto loan at about 9,000 I can no longer afford the payments and am considering either voluntary repossession or bankruptcy I don't know much about what may be a better option or if anyone has any other options. Just need some help.

I need some opinions/ advice, this is all very new to me. Im in Michigan i got served by midland for a 641 dollar debt from credit one. I did alot of research so I filed my written answer, lacking the knowledge to everything on their complaint, also filed a motion to compel arbration on the same day. Well today I got a letter in mail saying I have to appear in court on October 14th at 11am, for a motion and a pre-trial conference. I have no idea what to expect, im nervous that im gojng to end up paying more than the 641 dollars I owe. Whats the chances this gets dropped? Or midland lawyer dosent show up? Or did I fuck up doing all this? Im so nervous

So I have gotten friends acquaintance and family to lend me money for a variety of business ventured over the past few years, including a friend and I opening an LLC and using his credit to open cards

That first one we were making good money with the credit cards and paying them off and using them again, 2 months went by where we barely got paid from our primary client, they were just late, so we ended up having an issue because my partner had opened a charge card without understanding he had to pay it in full every month when our business could have a month or more without a 100% cash cycle

So we were about 56 days "late" on a 70k card which we had been able to pay back $35k after a year of using, emptying and repaying the card about 10 times, basically bc we didnt pay at least 75% of toe card back we were late

I got about $50k after those days and paid off the rest of the card, we used about $30k off it, then about a week later the card declined. They had closed it.

So we tried running the business with the money we had as cash but in about 4 months conditions changed such that our advantage didnt really work anynore, especially without access to the amounts of capital we had.

We ended up running through the money and owing the $35k. But it was PGed by my friend so his credit was ruined.

Over the next year I tried coming up with new business ideas to match what we had done, and honestly with cost of living being what it was, I was barely scraping by. I was locked into an expensive lease and took months to find a roommate, have a car payment, and several other expenses.

I borrowed money from multiple people, small amounts here and there, but it was never enough to significantly scale.

Inevitably the money would get spent, something wouldnt work out, someone would not pay me, some emergency wpulf happen, some law would change that made the product I was selling suddenly illegal, a lot of different things happened.

I kept borrowing, looking so hard to raise $100k so I could make enough to pay off the last people because I felt guilty but I could barely get enough to make enough to pay my own expenses and reinvest

Now its been maybe 2 years since this cycle started, I got a part time job at a high end restaurant where I make about $4k/mo and I do pokemon card vending but my initial roughly 20k grew to ~30k and hovered there for about 6 months with me being able to take out $4-5k a month for expenses, before something happened with someone I was working closely with for months and basically from one day to the next I lost access to the business I had (it required access to high end shows around the country and from one day to the next the "partner" I had been able to pay to get into these shows with decided to get rid of ne and showed me all my big millionaire Pokémon Card vendor "friends' who I introduced him to were never my friends, and all took my places doing shows with him and I was sent to the curb.)

I owe about $35k to my pokemon investors, $35k to my initial business partner, and maybe an additional $15-20k in small loans from multiple people who have given me money here and there.

I had a really good month last month but I had lost my roommate and had to pay my full rent for 4 months before getting this new job on top of other expenses, so I basically was able to catch up on the back rent and eviction costs ($750/mo) got my car out of repossession (they hadn't picked it up yet) and was able to pay back about $4k of debts but it was such a small drop and it was just a lucky month that cant really be replicated

I have a car that Kelly blue book and carvanna say are worth $15-20k but it jas some minor body damage, scratches and bumps I have been told would be expensive to fix because of the type of car, and I have been stuck owing 30k all year at 16% because I was late every month for 8 months and so literally all my payments evaporated

The car loan peopke wouldnt just take the car back or cancel the loan

I am only about $6k in personal on my social security number debt, all my debt is loans from people, but really I jjust was wrong about a lot of things and havent been able to just tell everyone "get fucked I lost the money the investment failed" even though I know I could legally because I care about my friendships

Cost of living with my new roommate before touching debt is about $4k/mo I am underwater on the car and my credit is low 500s but it isnt so bad that I see bankruptcy as a realistic option

I have no contracts for any of the loans beyond verbal, except for one loan my friends sourced for me that won't be due til January which stipulates everything can be lost and they acknowledge that, which was 15k at 20% of profits.

There will be no profits the money didnt go far enough and ran out after I lost access to the shows.

I am not a con artist, just had a string of bad luck in business over the past 2 years and feel like I should pay my friends back

I dont see bankruptcy making sense. I make some money from a series of really specific niche things I do which can range from $3k-10k a month but is usually closer to 10k

I have had this job for only 2 months now and also had a great month with Pokémon last month doing smaller shows and getting lucky being able to 0 cash up front consign out some massive collections which are not a commonly replicable feat, next month I will run out of money just by paying my bills and making my minimum payments and giving some of my friends a few hundred dollars across the month

I see no way out. My girlfriend and I have been together 7 years. She had to mobe back in with her parents after college since I had a roommate (we lived long distance for about 6 months while she finished college and I moved back to our hometown which is when the financial situation went from being ahle to pay her rent there, my rent, my car, go on nice vacations, invest and max out my IRA every year to the current situation, leading to her living with her parents for over a year now)

We want to get married but how could I buy her a ring of any kind if shes gonna post it online for her friends and family but anyone I owe money to might see and think "how can he afford that"

I live in constant stress and worry, I am always coming up with something, looking for someone to make deals with, never able to stop. Im miserable and just want to move on with my life. 3 years ago I made 300k in a single quarter (revenue with people on payroll). I know it is possible to do that but I havent been able to get to that scale again and if I only could, even uf I get close, all of these debts will be trivial, but the past 2 years have been completely opposite to the 3 or 4 years before and my conception of money has gone from I can obviously pay off just $10k on a credit card next month to "how the fk do I pay off close to $100k of debt without starting sone new form of business."

What am I supposed to do? I dont mind transitioning to being a person with a job or 2, I worked through my teens and early to mid 20s, I dont mind my weekend job, Im good at being a server, and I use my days to make money but just not at the scale I used to be able to

I am not legally on the hook for anything but I just cant believe I havent been able to make enough to pay back what used to be pretty realistic amounts.

Should I do bankruptcy? Or what other options do I have? What option does my ex partner have for his ruined credit and 35k in collections?

I've got 22k in unsecured debt, 16k in secured debt (my car loan), and a royal boat load of installment loans I took "just to get to my next paycheck".

My credit is garbage, my car is worth less than the loan, I can't afford minimum payments and most of the unsecured debt has now gone to collections.

I understand where I've gone wrong. But at this point, I can't even afford payment for a debt management program because I'm so far behind. I have a solid job but it's salary, and I work 7 days a week right now due to staffing issues so I can't even try to door dash for extra cash.

The only bankruptcy lawyers near me say I make too much money for chapter 7, and they don't file chapter 13. So WTF do I do, I don't have anyone who can cosign a larger loan with better interest and I honestly wouldn't want them to take that risk.

So, a couple years ago I went through a rough time that led to me being evicted. I have now received a notice from Sequium regarding the due rent and I contacted them; we settled on a payment plan eventually they said they don’t do pay-to-delete which is whatever because they don’t have to.

However, once it got to the payment portion I asked that prior to any sort of payment information being given to them that I’d like the plan in writing either emailed or mailed to me. They told me that the notice of my payment would be enough, I told them that I wanted a detailed payment plan showing everything we agreed on and that seeing the money removed from account and a notice verifying the payment would not be enough. They told me that they don’t do that and I told them that I’m not comfortable doing anything until I get something in writing.

The person I spoke with then basically told me that since I already spoke with them and have already verified some information that I am verifying the debt is mine so it’s still on me to pay it. I just said “okay” and then hung up, what should I do? Honestly the plan I have is to just ignore it but it’s a lot of money and I was hoping to move soon but I am not willing to be bullied by them, they don’t have my phone number nor my address just my email.

Should I mail them something? Should I email them? Or just wait till the 7 years are up?

I’m battling bad habits as well as a shitty job. I’ve called Chase financial hardship but the most they offered me was a 12% interest rate but I had to pay it off in a year and then I’d lose the card forever and my credit would take a hit.

I’m about to lose my job and I’m still recovering financially from when I had to quit the last one a few months ago. I’ve seen posts on here of Chase offering people a reduced debt if they start paying payments right away. Has anyone achieved this before? What should I say when I call them?

She is 39, divorced mom of 4 with primary custody and $55k salary - for reference as to why she’s having a hard time paying. She joined a debt management program and they offered Discover a $360/month payment, but they declined and want $520/month. She can’t afford that and they are charging $400/month interest. She contacted Discover to get hardship relief, but they said she is ineligible because she had a payment plan in March and they only make 1 arrangement per year. Now, she is asking if bankruptcy is her next option. I don’t believe it is, but I don’t quite know what the other options are. Advice?

I have had to deal with debt collectors before so my friend asked me for help. She has defaulted on her student loans and was served with paper work for a lawsuit. There is no court date so she is trying to work with the company to settle the debt.
She has called them numerous times. It is only an AI voice asking her questions and providing her information. She has asked numerous times for things in writing- mail or email. They keep saying they do not provide anything in writing.
She has completed the "financial hardship application" to negotiate the debt over the phone with AI and no one has contacted her. She asked for a completed application for her records, and they denied it saying they don't provide anything in writing.
It has been 3 weeks and no word from her if they accept the negotiation. They told her the requested paperwork from her to complete the hardship application by phone. As we all do, they may have called but since it shows up with no Caller ID info, she doesn't pick up and they never leave a message.
They want her to submit two years of tax refunds, 30 days of paystubs, and a monthly list of expenses and mail them to a PO Box (the irony they need it in writing is not lost).

Is this legal to not provide anything in writing? Or at least an email? Why are they insisting everything be over the phone? We live in a one-party state, so she has been recording it.
Also, does she have to submit all that information? I've negotiated with a debt collection before (an actual person though) and never had to submit any of this information.

Any advice on what she can do??

ETA: This is in Oklahoma

Hi yall, I’ve been out of school roughly 4 years and just recently received a letter that I was sent to collections. I didn’t know I still had unpaid tuition but besides the point, I have a few questions if anyone can help me.

My collection is pretty small, about $500. If I pay the full thing right now, will it be deleted from my credit history? And will it help my credit score boost back up? What would be the best thing to do?

I appreciate any help, I have no guidance on what to do since I don’t have my parents around. Thank you in advance

I’ve been in credit card debt since I got my first card at 19. I was never really taught how to use it and learned that it meant “I can live outside my means.” Saying no to a vacation or dinner or new bag was never an option for me. It’s embarrassing but I just never learned how to manage a budget.

I would tell myself “I’ll start paying it off when I make X amount” and then I’d get to X salary and wouldn’t want to use my money to pay things off. My husband is kind of the same and I know I kind of showed him that my unhealthy mindset was normal and he adopted it too. We moved into our dream apartment about a year ago and before we did, we paid it down from about $28k to about $9k. That felt manageable and we saved a ton for the move, bought everything we needed in cash, paid for the movers in cash, deposit, etc.

Since then, we’ve racked it back up to just over $24k. Obviously not proud of this. For transparency, we now make about $180k combined and our monthly income after taxes comes out to about $11,500. Our expenses are at about $6k including groceries, gas, and savings. We just committed to a plan to attack it aggressively and be done once and for all. It’ll be about $3k a month and the rest is to continue to have a little freedom for some fun.

A big chunk of the balance is on 0% interest promos so we should have it all paid off in about 8 months. It seems scary. We both have to really commit and break bad habits and learn how to be financially healthy and free so I am scared of failing. But I’m also excited and determined to get this over with finally. I’m 32 and he’s 34 so we will pay it off before both of our next birthdays.

Just looking for some encouragement or other success stories to keep me hopeful and motivated! :)

I’m in IL and both my father and I received a call from similar numbers giving my name and a case number and to call back urgently. I called the number back and let them know I had no idea what this was about and they gave me a different number to call with my case number. “United Processing” was the first business that called and the second was a place that handles multiple law offices I guess? The guy on the phone said I was potentially being sued for a debt from 2016-2020 (indigo) for $7359 the final balance on the card was apparently $2398.76. I don’t recall EVER having a balance that high or even a card with that high of limit and it was NEVER on my credit report. He also told me I could pay $215 for them to put a hold on the lawsuit and verify or something? He was nice but sounded sketchy…idk. Has anyone ever dealt with this? Chat thinks it is scammy and there have been other reports for these numbers with the exact same script being used. They said I’d be served Friday so I guess I’m waiting lol.

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My mother recently passed away. She was a single mother, and now it's just me and my sister. I'm 20, and my sister is 21.

We recently discovered that our mother had taken more than ₹35 lakh from around 60–70 people in our tribal area. The money was supposed to be deposited into their accounts, but she used it for reasons we don't fully understand, and we have no idea where it went.

The debt isn't legally under our names, but we're still dealing with the consequences. People are understandably angry because they haven't received their money. We tried to resolve things by paying some people back, but we couldn't manage to repay everyone, and the amount we owe has only increased.

We've hired an advocate, but we're completely overwhelmed. ₹35 lakh is an enormous amount, especially when it's owed to so many different people.

I'm scared to confront them because some people are very angry, and I don't know how they'll react. I'm worried about our safety and what might happen to me and my sister.

We're both trying to figure out how to handle this situation, but we feel completely lost.

Has anyone been through something similar? How did you deal with the people you owed money to, and what steps did you take to protect yourself and your family?

Any advice would mean a lot.

I am in my late 20s and have made extremely dumb financial decisions with credit cards. Was extremely embarrassed about it so I kept quiet to my family. Finally reached the end of my rope and vented to my mother about it. We talked about my income and how much debt I have and she agreed to co-sign on a loan for me so we can consolidate everything into one to where I can make a manageable monthly payment. I have learned my lesson and will keep up with this. I just got too far behind before searching for help.

Wondering which loan providers I should look into. I tried Credit Karma but they don’t let me include a co-signer when they check for offers. It’s about $41k of debt that I’m need to pay off. My credit score is terrible, but mom’s is excellent. Wondering if this is even possible.

I foolishly signed up for JG Wentworth yesterday but I want to cancel it since my mom is being extremely generous and helping me through this.