Ask The Money Coach

A Facebook fan would like to know my opinion on debt settlement companies and government grants as a way out of debt.

To answer his question about getting out of debt, here are my thoughts.

First, I don’t recommend using debt settlement companies. They typically advise you to stop paying your bills for a few months. Then they go to your creditors and try to negotiate a settlement on your behalf. Their logic is that after a few months of not getting paid, creditors will be eager to take some money (instead of no money), so they will settle for pennies on the dollar, in terms of what you owed. The problem with this is that you do some serious damage to your credit rating. And there’s no guarantee that it will work. Creditors may just decide to sue you, get a judgment against you, or garnish your wages. I think a better strategy is to try to negotiate directly with your creditors. If that doesn’t work, then try credit counseling. A good non-profit credit counseling agency is the National Foundation for Debt Management. (www.NFDM.org). I’m a spokesperson for this organization, and I know that they do good work and are trustworthy.

Re: government grants, there are no programs that I know if specifically designed to give people money to get out of credit card debt. Some programs offer grants (i.e. free money) for other things … like financial assistance for starting a business, or monetary help to pay for childcare, that sort of thing. There are government programs to help people pay off student loans, but that’s another story.

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