Debt Management As An Alternative To Bankruptcy

Debt management plans and debt settlement programs are considered the leading alternatives to bankruptcy. They allow the borrower to gradually pay off debt on terms that are agreeable to both parties. At the same time as a debt free solution will result in a low credit score the implications aren’t nearly as serious as filing under chapter 7.

It is possible to avoid much of the stress and anxiety normally experienced, provided that the right plan is chosen from the onset for debt consolidation. Whether a debt relief program should even be considered as a bankruptcy alternative depends heavily upon the borrower’s level of disposable income. Both a debt settlement program and a debt management plan will involve making a monthly repayment to an intermediary. If the borrower has lost their job and/or his little money available, neither debt free solution constitutes a viable alternative to bankruptcy. However, those who can afford to offer the creditor a realistic sum of money each month stand to benefit, and certainly could avoid repossession of their belongings by keeping up to date with payments.

Debt management can help you in a number of ways. It keeps the creditors off your back. They will call all of the people you owe money to on your behalf and talk to them about your particular situation. They will negotiate with each creditor to reduce the amount of the monthly payment that you owe them and they may even be able to help you get a reduced interest rate so that more of your payment actually goes towards paying off the debt, rather than paying more and more interest. Your debt management analyst can help you buy going over all your household and living expenses and helping you to come up with a realistic budget. This way you can clearly see what you are wasting money on and what you should be paying for things like groceries and eating out at restaurants. Often times we waste money on things that we don’t really need, especially when we are up to our ears in debt.

Your debt management company can help you out is by consolidating all your monthly payments into one. You send them the total amount that you are paying towards your debts and they disperse it for you and make sure that everyone gets it on time. This takes a lot of burden off you and you don’t have to worry about making sure everyone is paid the correct amount every month. If this seems like a viable plan for you then you should definitely go with a debt management program over filing for bankruptcy. A debt relief program is a lot less harmful to your credit rating and a bankruptcy will stay on your record for up to 10 years. Working with them can avoid you even needing to get help with repossession in case you are having trouble paying off a car loan. For this reason you should opt for the debt management program and get out of debt.

Bankruptcy may not be the answer for everyone who is under financial stress. There are many alternatives and debt relief options to bankruptcy that may be available to you or your family members. I think that a debt management program is a good option – like Consumer Debt Solutions. In some cases they may serve as a good alternative to bankruptcy.

What’s A Good Credit Score?

If you are in the market for a new car or maybe looking at buying a house, you may be interested in what your credit score is.  Maybe you recently found out your credit score and you are wondering how it competes with other credit scores.  Before actually going into what is a good credit score, I am going to give a brief rundown of what exactly a credit score is.

It is a scientific and mathematical calculation that puts together many factors and outputs a score that is supposed to help determine if someone is good to loan money to or not.  It combines two main factors, the situation your credit is currently in, and your past credit history.  There are other factors, but those are the main ones.

Each of the 3 different credit bureaus, Equifax, Trans Union, and Experian all determine your credit score in different ways, but they all use the same system, the FICO (from the Fair Issacs Company who developed the scoring model).    The score range from around 400 to a perfect 850.  The average credit score is around 670, and anything above a 700 is considered a “good credit score range”.

You may be wondering how to get a good credit score or perhaps even an excellent credit score – or a perfect credit score.  Well, you can do a few things.  The first thing is to not make any late payments at all.  Do what you need to do to ensure that all of your loans and debts are paid on time, every single month – so you’ll never face the music of having to fix bad credit problems.  That will help to establish a good credit history, and allow future lenders to know that they can expect to be paid on time if they loan to you.

Another key is to reduce your  total debt.  If you take your available debt (the max amount you can have on your credits), and if your current debt is more than 50% of that number, then your credit score will be lower.  Work on reducing your debt so that it is below 50% of your available debt, and perhaps consider using some kind of debt relief program to assist you with debt reduction.  This will help to contribute to a good credit score and a good credit report.