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     | Thursday, June 15, 2000 - 11:34 am  I have a debt with Chase Manhattan of $9800. With finance charges and such, it is now $14000. They are offering to settle for a 15% one-time payment. After speaking with them for hours, I tried to get them to report the account as Closed but in Good Standing if I paid it. At one point they said they would do it, but now they say no way. I finally got something in writing, but it basically says that it will say Paid but Settled for Less Than Full Amount and it will be reported to the IRS. Should I pay the 15%? They claim they will charge it off and sue me immediately if I don't take the deal. Is the 15% with a Settle rating a good deal - or am I just screwing myself over? Would a lawyer have any better luck? What will happen if they charge it off and sue me? Also, anyone had experience with Lexington Law Firms? Thanks!
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| | Thursday, June 15, 2000 - 11:58 am are you working? if they get a judgement, they can garnish your wages. If not,hold out for a written promise not to verify the debt --you pay, they ignore a subsequent challenge to the credit reporting agencies. Don't take what they are offering right now. You've whetted their appetite.Are you dealing with them directly or their collection agency dogs? These people will say anything and do anything. Hold your ground. Money for no verfication. I'll bet they take your offer. good luck
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| | Thursday, June 15, 2000 - 05:26 pm I tend to agree with Senator, but there is still a LOT we don't know. IMPORTANT: Do a search for IRS and read the topic on having the forgiven debt reported as income IF you have enough income to pay taxes. How old is the debt? What State are you in? Other assets, liabilities, income? Any notation including the word "settled" is as bad as a collection or chargeoff.
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| | Friday, June 16, 2000 - 10:28 am I am going from memory, but I think that the statute on forgiven debt being included as income for IRS purposes is 26 U.S.C. 108.
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| | Friday, June 16, 2000 - 11:43 am Lexington Law Firms appears to be a portal for numerous credit repair "lawyers" operating on the Internet. I put in a request for information at Lexington Law Firms and four law firms from across the country called me in response thereto. So based on my experience, it sounds like a referral site for credit repair attorneys. Attorneys or not, you can repair your credit yourself just as effectively.
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| | Friday, June 16, 2000 - 11:49 am Lexington Law firm is actually a law firm who also works with Johnson & Associates. Both firms do credit repair. We utilize Lex for our clients and have never heard that they were sent elsewhere for assistance. Lex actually performed the work. That is interesting as I was totally unaware of that happeinging. Catherine: We are a financial services broker,based in Anaheim & Cypress. We utilize several brokers for mortgage loans for credit challenged people. Drop me an email with your contact info. If I get any interested parties located near you or us, I can send them your way. Thanks Kristi CarreonandAssociates.com Ps: I may be interested in attending your credit repair seminar. I live for debt negotiations & credit restoration!( 
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| | Friday, June 16, 2000 - 04:23 pm Finally I STRONGLY disagree with Catherine, it was about time There is NOTHING like a good lawyer to get things done. The trouble is that they're so hard to find, especially for the little disputes. I think most consumers could do their initial dispute themselves, although 10 years experience showed me that they will NOT dispute at least 50% of the derogatory data because they don't recognize it as such. But that's no big deal if they're in no hurry to get credit or they already have pretty good credit. I also learned that I could sit with many of my loan clients for 2 hours and explain to them what's wrong with their credit reports, and they'd have the toughest time getting those disputes out. It was faster to just do it for them and put the x for their signature. There are people who are good with numbers and writing complaints and there are people who are good at fixing cars or plumbing or building decks or good in sales or working with kids. Do we all head for the Home Depot and spend $200 on tools and a book and work the next 10 hours fixing the plugged up sewer line? YOU can drive your car to the Depot, read the book, pick up the pliers, disconnect the kitchen sink and run the snake down the sewer line. So why do so many people hire plumbers at $80/hour? I have NO idea WHY credit repair is always supposed to be done by the consumer. Anyone who needs to improve their credit fast, should hire someone who specializes in reading credit reports. When you have an URGENT dispute to be resolved, nobody can get things moving like a lawyer who charges $300 an hour and gets on the phone and promises to file the law suit the next day if the supervisor doesn't call back within 15 minutes with an IMMEDIATE resolution. The only reason why the accuracy of our credit data is so poor is because that's how the CRAs and the creditors make the most money. If they had to pay $300 to correct each mistake, what do you think how many mistakes there would be? Credit analysis and especially increasing credit scores is much more difficult than doing taxes. After all, while I do use a computer to do my taxes, I can easily calculate my taxes with a little handheld calculator or even just with a piece of scrap paper and a pen. I'll get the same results every time. There are no bad tax days when 2 + 2 = 5 just because it's the 31st. It is somewhat of a paradox that I got this web site with tons of info for people to learn about credit issues and to learn how and what to dispute themselves. But I'm sick and tired of working free of charge and having millions of consumers work free of charge just so that corporate can enjoy record profits. There are so many better things to do than dealing with aggravating credit disputes. It must be time to check out the Lexington Law Firm. I have read elsewhere that they're slow to respond to E-mail. If all they do is send out letters requesting corrections on the report, they're probably not very effective. I'd like to know how many suits they filed last year and how many times they got the CRAs and/or creditors to pay for their services. THAT is the key issue. Well, I just read at http://www.lexeclient.com/creditqa/qa.html and I didn't see ANYTHING about law suits. It seems that consumers are just supposed to pay for their services. At https://creditrights.safeserver.com/eclient/1/retainus/signup.html "2. You'll pay Lexington $75 two weeks from now and then you'll pay $35 per month. You'll keep paying your monthly $35 retainer fee until we finish work or you're satisfied with results (we need about a year, but most clients' credit starts improving in 2 or 3 months.)" That is NOT what lawyers is for. I'm going to send them a copy of this posting, maybe I overlooked something. ANYONE can send out dispute letters. Their services might be useful for people trying to get legitimate derogs off theirs credit. Just found the online Lexington Complaint Resolution Center http://www.eclientcase.com/concern.html "We want to hear from you if you feel like you're not getting the counsel you deserve." Looks like quite a few customers aren't happy. Also, read that E-mail is free, but phone calls are $50/hour. While that's CHEAP for legal advice, I don't think that's what you'll get. I'm looking for lawyers to enforce what little consumer rights we have. Lawyers who WILL sue even if it's only for 30 minutes of their time. When the CRA or creditor screwed up, they should PAY THE BILL! Think about this: When you mail your $10 credit card payment and the postal service loses or misdelivers the mailing, or the creditor loses or misplaces your check, MANY credit card companies will charge you a late fee of $20 or more! It's not your fault, you did nothing wrong, yet you pay a 200% late charge. When a creditor screws up, and you spend 15 hours to order reports and read here and dispute and stand in line at the post-office to do your certified mailing, and THEN the CRA responds that the incorrect data was verified by the creditor, you deserve NOTHING???? What happened to EQUAL RIGHTS? c: eanalyst@creditrights.com (the only E-mail I could find at the Lexington site, I find being moved from domain to domain annoying and confusing.)
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| | Friday, June 16, 2000 - 05:32 pm Christine, you may also want to check out http://www.creditlawyers.com. My experience has been that attorneys generally handle the entire disputation process for the client because they do not want to do the legwork. As far as legal remedies, well I recommend using a lawyer instead of a credit repair co because should legal avenues be needed the credit repair lawyer can do what a credit repair company cannot, file suit. You are looking at two issues. First do you want credit repair simply because you don't want to be bothered with the work? if so, an attorney (a good one) is much better and saves the consumer from hiring two sources, should he eventually need legal guidance.
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| | Friday, June 16, 2000 - 07:08 pm Kristi, I think that YOU know a lot more about credit repair and disputes than most lawyers. How about this scenario: you have marriage problems. Do you go for counseling to a lawyer? Doesn't that sound funny? I think credit counseling is very similar to marriage counseling, it involves a lot of very personal issues and takes a lot of expertise to do it well. It's just not something you can learn in class or book. There is a HUGE difference between a credit repair law firm cranking out automated dispute letters and a credit counselor sitting down with someone to find out HOW the problems occurred and how to prevent them in the future. It's really important that consumers have documentation for their disputes, that they have the evidence should they need to sue. I think that YOU can provide that documentation as well as any lawyer. YOUR certified mail receipt is no different than any lawyer's. Some people CAN do it themselves without any big problems, they got desk jobs, speak English well, write letters for living, have access to a computer and printer. But so many people don't have the skills and resources, and they NEED the help of a professional. And, while I think you make an excellent credit consultant, I hope you aren't charging $300 an hour!
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| | Friday, June 16, 2000 - 08:58 pm LOL> Nope, I don't even charge for my advice. I think it's distgusting to charge a person to tell them what you know. The only thing I make is my salary for working for Carreon & Associates. All my posts on forums are totally of my own and done on my time or downtime. My view is this. I was and still am very active in debt collections and credit. When I finally got fed up with all the frauds and scammers taking people for their money and making their life hell (debt collectors mostly)I decided to turn the coin over and teach what I knew. I do credit restoration for a few people on the side and friends but my main job is credit counseling and training. Rest assured, I am NOT overpaid! I bet your not either huh?
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| | Friday, June 16, 2000 - 09:18 pm Christine, Also thought you would enjoy the Debt collectors article I wrote! People are very intimidated and fearful of debt collectors. It's amazing, so many people search the web for "Dealing with Debt Collectors" I am just glad they find this page and can sleep at night finally knowing not to fear them so much. Hope you enjoy reading it if you get a chance. http://www.carreonandassociates.com/battle.htm
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