Posted on: May 30, 2009 by Matt
As many of you know – I have some student loans that have been in collection / defaulted for about seven years now. So far I have been unable to locate a rehabilitation program for them and have been pretty much at the mercy of one nasty debt collector. They yelled, cursed and degraded me in order to get payment and I am fairly certain that they had violated the Federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act.
So when I received letters in the mail last Saturday noting that my loans had been reassigned to another collection ageny I had some mixed emotions. I was disappointed because it appeared that I would now be dealing with the original lender once again but glad that I no longer had to deal with the folks from the previous agency. I was also a bit frustrated due to the amount of digging I had to do in order to contact somebody at the correct location. I had already called the previous collection agency, the processing company and the original lender and thought I had been given the correct place to mail my payments – then I received the letters noting I had someone else to call.
Earlier this week I placed a call to the new collection agency. Much to my surprise – they were courteous, professional and really easy to work with. They did not once accuse me of anything and were glad to work with me on a payment schedule. They were more than happy to honor my previous arrangement and even offered up a couple of pleasant surprises.
First – they noted that there had been a rehabilitation program that was offered up until about a year ago. The program ended due to the economic crisis but may become available again. I had been asking if there was any possible way to get these loans back into good standing for five years and was repeatedly told no but I could settle in full if I paid up $18,000 in cash. I found it a little frustrating that I had been lied to for so long and was a bit angry but I can not change the facts now. On the flip side they also said that should the program become available that they will submit all on time payments made as eligible for the program. That means if the program kicks off a few months down the road again I could be rolled into an automatic rehabilitation and have my loans back in good standing. Of course I do not expect anything yet but the folks over at the collection agency sounded a little hopeful that the economy was headed in a positive enough direction that they have heard a little buzz about the possibility.
Secondly – the new agency will send out monthly balance sheets! It might seem like a standard practice to get a monthly statement for your debts but for some reason the old agency would not send them. If I was to call and request them they would usually say they would send something but it normally would not contain complete records if it arrived at all. I discussed options for additional payments and was told that it was ok to have the normal payments applied and to mail back extra with any of the statements provided to have the additional payment applied to that particular loan.
Given the change in collection agencies I am cautiously optimistic that I can work something out and pay these debts down! Right now the loans I have in collection have followed me along like some form of financial leprosy and I will be happy to see those debts disappear! After paying them off I will be down to my last two student loans which are both in good standing and then will be (hopefully) debt free!
Posted on: May 29, 2009 by Matt
I hopped on the financial genie granting wishes band wagon yesterday and started to look around more this morning and the idea appears to have spread around a number of other PF Blogs. It appears that Your Money Relationship hit a home run with this idea and I thought I would dedicate this week’s link round-up to the concept. So far I have seen the financial genie stop by at (in no particular order):
I had a lot of fun reading through all the different wishes people would have made. I also was reminded that a lot of us that like to read or write about personal finance have made some pretty big mistakes ourselves. In a way the pain from the past has fueled a passion for a lot of us – even the “legends” like Trent over at The Simple Dollar and Dave Ramsey have been through the ringer and share their experience to try and help others from making the same mistakes – a truly admirable undertaking. So enjoy the reading and have fun learning from our mistakes – it is a lot easier than making them yourself!
Posted on: May 28, 2009 by Matt
While stumbling around some of my favorite reads I happened upon a post over at Budgets Are Sexy asking What Would You Do With 3 Financial Do-Overs? which it turns out was an extension from a post over at Your Money Relationship. I know I can not change the past and I am in the midst of dealing with yet another collection agency but if the money genie did happen to stop by my house for a visit I would probably take him or her up on the offer.
After giving it a little thought I think that given the opportunity I would probably wish to:
- Have paid for college without loans: Well since it is a wish then when not go all the way? I suppose I would be happy with not having defaulted on student loans in the past as well though. If the genie was unable to get me through college debt free then maybe it could save me from myself right?
- Learned about personal finance earlier in life: I really had no clue when I left home for college at all. I could not budget or even balance a checkbook and I had no idea how credit worked. It was not until I read Dave Ramsey’s The Total Money Make Over that I got the basics for the first time and that was about 4 years after graduating from college. I think that knowledge of all personal financial essentials probably would have saved me a few headaches in the past.
- Saved more: Only recently have I really started to enjoy saving money. I like to see balances go up for what I have in the bank and debt balances go down. If I had put 10% of what I have earned through my life in the bank and left it there I would probably be sitting pretty happy right now. I can still start doing this but I thought I might as well fill out my third wish.
Really the only thing that I wish I had done differently in my financial past was the way I failed to manage my student loans after college. The rest was a learning experience and while it may have been difficult at the time, I survived. The student loan issue is really the only lingering big financial mistake that I have to deal with and it will pass someday as well. All said – I think that a wish of making it through college without student loan debt would put me in a much different situation today and it is probably the one aspect of my life that I would change if I could.
However – I do keep in mind that by changing the paths I have gone done in life I may not have ended up where I am at today! I have a family that loves me, a place to live, a car to drive and food on the table. If changing my past meant changing my current family situation for any reason I would have to decline the money genie’s generous offer. The people I live with mean more to me than any sum of money – if I had to go through what I have gone through to get where I am today then I would not change a single step along the way.
Posted on: May 28, 2009 by Matt
Well the last theme was a bit too bright for my taste so I have made one more aesthetic change. I am hopeful that this will be the last of the theme changes for a while as I like the layout of this one and have been slowly working on customization.
I will be working on growing the blog a bit here and thought that a theme that did not burn people’s retinas would probably work a little better.
That said – I should be back on my normal posting schedule beginning on Monday after I iron out a few kinks in the works.
Posted on: May 27, 2009 by Matt
Last week I posted asking if anyone else out there used a Roku device with their Netflix Account as my girlfriend and I were considering ordering one for the house. I know it seems counter productive to complain about being in debt and then look to order a device that costs $100 to watch movies. The justification for us was in a decrease in trips to the video store when we no longer had Netflix movies at home to watch. Most of our entertainment at home is based on watching movies and I am all for finding ways to get more out of my Netflix account. So based on a comment by a reader we went ahead and ordered the device.
Anyway – justifications aside – we got our Roku player via FedEx yesterday afternoon. I made a quick attempt at lunch to set the device up without luck and figured I would have to troubleshoot my firewall before getting the device to connect properly. After work I made another attempt and was able to get the device working by allowing ICMP PING traffic on the interface that I was attaching the Roku to. I guess being an IT consultant comes in handy sometimes around the house as well…
After getting the device connected to the internet (which should normally be pretty easy) the setup was straight forward and intuitive. We got the device up and running and have watched a couple of videos on it already and think it is one of the coolest things we have ever purchased. The video quality was surprisingly good from our wireless network and the playback of the Netflix instant view items was great. My girlfriend and I are really excited by the number of documentaries available and also the amount of programming available for the kids to watch as well.
Overall – I am pretty impressed with the little device and look forward to using it for quite some time. So if you were at all curious – I would give the little device a great recommendation so long as you have an adequate broadband internet connection.
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