If you elect to defer, or continue deferring minimum payments to creditors during our debt settlement program, it will result in “late payments”, reported on your credit file. This causes your credit to decline. However, your credit score only considers the most recent 24 months of negative payments. So your credit eventually improves. After a settlement, your debt may be reported as “settled: paid for less” or “settled: paid in full.” This news is more positive than if you had a “bankruptcy” or an “enrollment in credit counseling” reported on your credit file. Either of these negative credit items warns lenders that you obtained third-party assistance to manage your debt. In contrast, “enrollment in a debt settlement program” is NOT reported to the credit bureaus. The other positive news is that debt settlement lowers both your debt-to-income ratio and debt-to-credit ratio, which composes one third of your credit score. Note: After completing our debt settlement program, you can also hire a credit repair service if you wish to continue improving your credit.

The debt-to-credit ratio is a proportion of your line of credit to its credit limit. Lenders will use this equation to determine if you qualify for more credit. To calculate your debt-to-credit ratio, divide the balance of your debt by its credit limit. As an example, if your balance is $3,000 and your credit limit is $4,000, you have a 75% debt-to-credit ratio. A low debt-to-credit ratio, typically of 30% or better, will help you qualify for major loans and the most favorable interest rates. However, once you reach a debt-to-credit ratio over 50%, it labels you as a “bankruptcy risk.” People who have reached debt-to-credit ratios above 70% have seen their credit scores drop over 70 points! Thus, if you have a high debt-to-credit ratio, in order to improve your credit, it is essential that you quickly pay off, or pay down your high credit balances. And if you’re financially impaired, what better, or faster way to achieve this than through a debt settlement?

Debt settlement is 100% legal in almost all 50 states. If you get into hot water, you have the right to hire any debt settlement professional to resolve your financial matters. Nevertheless, creditors and debt collectors depend on a consumer’s ignorance of this powerful legal right. Debt settlement is also an ethical debt elimination procedure that helps you fight back against usurious creditors by reducing exorbitant interest rates and fees.

Ensuring you get peace from collection calls is very important to us. That is why one of the initial benefits of our debt settlement program is helping clients prevent creditor harassment. We help you bring an end to the pestilent collection calls by preparing a cease and desist letter that is mailed to the third-part debt collectors who are assigned to collect your debt. Under the federal, Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, (FDCPA), upon receiving this legal notice, the third-party debt collectors are required to immediately STOP placing collection calls to your home and place of work. Throughout the program, we also educate our clients about their debt collection rights.

Statistics confirm that 79% of the people, who enroll in credit counseling debt management plans, drop out. There are various reasons for this high dropout rate. The main reason is that the only tangible benefit the debt management plans provide is interest rate reduction. The average reduction is 6%. But credit counselors often provide ineffective debt relief for people in financial hardships who lost considerable income. As a result, many dropouts have seen their debt balances barely reduces. People in credit counseling take many years to get out of debt, typically repaying 1 ½ to 3 times their original debt amounts. The unbearable monthly payments also cause many people to drop out and file bankruptcy. In contrast, the aggressive National Debt Relief Stimulus Plan is a bankruptcy alternative that reduces not only the interest rate, but the debt’s principal balance. Thus, our average client has saved 50% of their total debt and became debt free in less than 36 months. Going beyond credit card debt reduction, the National Debt Relief Stimulus Plan also negotiates medical debt and business debt.

Unfortunately, trying to negotiate with your creditors frequently involves dealing with manipulative debt collectors. Instead of communicating with a friendly service rep who may sympathize with your financial problem, you’ll be talking to a debt collector who is trained to ruthlessly harass, torment, and humiliate you into immediately paying money you don’t have. Aside from tending to your family, social life, and work, negotiating on your own with debt collectors will create many frustrating wasted hours of hostile, unproductive communication. Debt collectors are also known to violate the law. Consequently, you’ll also waste a lot of time investigating numerous debt collection laws and regulations. On the other hand, even if you manage to succeed negotiating on your own, you won’t be able to reach the same sizeable debt reductions that our expert debt negotiators have achieved. Besides our key relationships with numerous creditors, collection agencies, and collection attorneys, we employ expert in-house debt negotiators utilize specialized negotiation strategies to maximize the greatest settlement savings for our clients.

Aside from causing you embarrassment by staying on public records for 20 years, bankruptcy destroys your credit for 10 years. Depending on what type of bankruptcy you file, you may have to forfeit assets, such as your home and vehicles, or deplete your life savings in order to repay creditors. You may also be turned down when applying for credit, a job, or to rent an apartment. After October 2005, changes in the bankruptcy law also made it more difficult for you to discharge all of your debt through a Chapter 7 bankruptcy. Most filers qualify for Chapter 13 bankruptcy, which obligates you to repay 30-50% of your total debt in 3-5 years. And God forbid you miss one court-ordered payment, or your bankruptcy case will be dismissed! Considering all of the negatives, bankruptcy should your last option. Statistics also show that if most bankruptcy filers had $250 in additional monthly income they could have avoided bankruptcy. So if you’re financially resourceful, you can avoid bankruptcy.

We rival other debt negotiation companies in EXPERIENCE, HONESTY, and PRICE. The problem with the competition is that most either charge excessive fees, or are new inexperienced companies that outsource their services. In contrast, we employ in-house, knowledgeable financial advisors and have some of the industry’s top negotiators. We also believe in FULL DISCOSURE. Not only do we tell you that your debt may increase because the balance can accumulate late fees and interest charges. But we also charge you about one third LESS in fees. This allows you to offset any balance increases and become debt-free faster. Our company also proudly gives back to the community supporting various charities, such as YME National Breast Cancer Organization, AIDS Walk, Huntington’s Disease Society of America, Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, and I LOVE YOU, ME! Women’s Empowerment Project.

We work with all types of UNSECURED DEBT, such as credit cards, medical accounts, collection accounts, personal loans, business debt, creditor lawsuits and judgments. SECURED DEBT, such as mortgages, auto loans, other loans for personal property that can be repossessed, IRS taxes, student loans, and pensions.

The National Debt Relief Stimulus Plan is a leading debt elimination service only available through Debt Free League. The plan provides the GREATEST BENEFITS PACKAGE in the debt settlement industry and massive reductions of the PRINCIPAL, INTEREST, and FEES on a variety of unsecured consumer and business debts. A key plan feature is the LOWEST FEES in the debt settlement industry. Plan fees are about one third less than most other debt negotiation companies! Other benefits include a 100% MONEY-BACK GUARANTEE, allowing clients to cancel within 30 days and receive a 100% refund of their deposit if they’re not completely satisfied, and a RE-ENROLLMENT CREDIT, allowing clients to cancel in the event of a financial hardship, and re-enroll with a credit up to 100% of the fees previously paid!

It’s easy to apply in The National Debt Relief Stimulus Plan: Step 1: Complete the online application or call 1-800-213-9968 for a FREE, no-obligation 15-minute financial consultation. Step 2: During your financial consultation, a financial advisor will assess your financial hardship, establish your financial profile, and perform your complimentary credit analysis. This analysis will evaluate your credit score, debt-to-income ratio, and debt-to-credit ratio and will help explain how your credit may be affected. Step 3: Once you are pre-qualified for the National Debt Relief Stimulus Plan, a completed enrollment application will be submitted to our underwriting department, which can approve you in 24-48 hours.

Our program is designed to fit your financial needs. You are allowed to exclude certain eligible accounts. However, we strongly recommend that you enroll all of your accounts, especially if the balances are high. You should only consider leaving one account out of the program if it’s for emergency purposes and the account balance is less than $2,000.

If your ex spouse has joint accounts with you, those debts will appear in your credit report until they are paid in full. Even if a divorce decree can prove that your ex spouse is 100% responsible to pay some accounts, if your ex spouse is careless in not paying them, it may be possible that you will be responsible to pay them.

If you and your ex-spouse have joint accounts, these debts will appear in both of your credit reports. Even if your divorce decree proves that your ex-spouse is 100% responsible to pay off the debt, if your ex-spouse does not pay the debt, being a joint account holder, you are still responsible to repay it.

The forgiving creditor must give you a 1099-C tax form and you must report to the IRS for the forgiven or canceled portion of the debt that exceeds $600 as taxable income. However, the IRS does not require you to report the forgiven debt if you were insolvent, meaning the amount of your debt was greater than your assets when the creditor forgave the debt. Note: Under IRS rules you cannot exclude any canceled debt that is more than the amount by which you were insolvent. For example, if you have a $20,000 debt and $8,000 in assets, you cannot exclude more than $12,000 of forgiven debt from your income tax. Any forgiven debt over $12,000 on the same year must be reported as taxable income. Ultimately, consult with your tax advisor on this matter.

We respect your privacy and abide by all privacy laws. We also sign a confidentiality agreement with you indicating that your personal information will not be released to ANYONE!

Yes, we have a guarantee to return your money within the first 30 days of enrollment.

To help more families get out of debt and improve client retention, we reduced our negotiation fee to only 10% of the enrolled debt. That is the lowest negotiation fee in the industry. Most companies typically charge a negotiation 15% fee of the total enrolled debt. Such exorbitant fees hurt your ability to buildup settlement funds more expediently. We'd also like to caution about companies charge negotiation fees based on the savings negotiated on the settlement. Typically this fee is 25% of the savings. However, the fee is calculated on the balance of the "settled" debt. As opposed to the original balance of an enrolled account, by the time the account is physically settled, the balance may have increased due to interest charges and late fees. If you do the math, companies that charge negotiation fees based on the savings of the settled debt, may cause you to pay fees as high as 18-25% of your original debt! But our flat negotiation fee is easy math, only 10% of your total enrolled debt.

No debt management company can give you an exact term because no one can LEGALLY guarantee to reduce your debt for a specific amount. All debt management programs are based on estimates. The good thing about our estimates is that we factor in the lowest negotiation fee in the industry, which allows you to apply more money toward a much faster buildup of your settlement funds. Additionally, our estimates are strictly based on our experience and average settlement success rate of 40%, which is parallel with the top settlement companies. However, we clearly differ from most companies in that we quote your estimate at 50% of your current debt. That's something that from my knowledge, no other debt settlement company has been bold enough to do and it totally benefits you, the consumer. The reason we do this is because your credit card debt will continue to grow due to the accrual of interest and finance charges. Many companies hide this ugly fact. But the bottom line is that we want you to graduate from our program as a satisfied client. Unfortunately, a lot of companies lowball their quotes, causing people to pay more money than what they were quoted. This has been a major consumer complaint against debt settlement companies, which has created a lot of bad press to our industry. So be very cautious.

Yes, there is a $39.00 recurring monthly maintenance fee.

Yes, you have 100% control of your money! We do suggest you to use a third-party escrow company for the purpose of managing your payments and our fees.

No, that is completely against the law.

Yes, our financial advisors are paid a commission. Contrary to what some critics may say, this is a great incentive for motivating and maintaining quality customer service.

It really depends on your financial situation and ability to pay. Typically, settlement funds start building up after the initial deposit, which generally consists of one-three payments.

Yes, the money you will be saving is your money, not ours.

The settlement funds remaining in your reserves are yours to keep. However, we don't refund our fees.

Yes, it is optional to keep the accounts you added to the program. You can add more accounts as well.

No, we are a debt settlement company, not a debt consolidation company. After we negotiate a settlement with your creditor, you will be responsible to remit a lump sum settlement payment to the creditor. A key benefit of our program is that YOU will have 100% custody, care and control of your settlement funds and your money will be held in an FDIC-insured savings account.

That varies depending on your monthly payment and quantity of debts that you have. But for example, we estimate that a client with 6 accounts on a 28 month program can reach the first settlement between the 5th and the 8th month. Additionally, our low negotiation fee, which is only 10% of the total enrolled debt, allows you to reach settlements much faster than most other debt settlement programs because you will be applying more money to your settlement funds instead of fees.

We normally perform a debt negotiation on a client-by-client basis. However, during circumstances that the same creditor or collection agency is collecting on multiple client accounts, we do use our debt pooling power to negotiate better settlements.

Our business executives have 20 years' combined experience in debt negotiation. Our experience in the debt settlement industry accounts for many millions of dollars in savings for thousands of satisfied clients. Our debt negotiation specialists have extensive experience in the settlement of a variety of personal, medical, and business debts.

By definition, a "debt settlement" is an agreement between the debtor and creditor to settle an unpaid debt at reduction of the principal amount owed. "Debt negotiation" is the actual process through which the debtor and creditor negotiate to reach the settlement. However, in business practice, "debt settlement" and "debt negotiation" are essentially the same debt management procedure, which ultimately effects a debt settlement.

Here are key differences between a credit counseling debt management plan and a debt settlement program. A credit counseling debt management plan can only reduce a portion of your consumer debt interest rate and can take 5-7 years to complete. As a result, you can end up paying 1 ½ to 3 times your original debt. In contrast, the aim of a debt settlement program is to reduce both the principal and interest rate of your debt. The benefit can allow you to reduce your debt in about half. It can also allow you to be debt-free in 12-36 months. Another key contrast is that unlike credit counseling, a debt settlement program does make monthly minimum payments to your creditors. As a debt settlement client, you'd be saving up a lump sum to physically settle your unpaid debt. Unlike credit counseling, most debt settlement programs also accept and negotiate medical and business debt.

Any debt management option you take can hurt your credit standing. Bankruptcy would be the worse choice, since it remains on credit reports for 10 years. Credit counseling can also negatively affect your credit because it indicates on your credit report that you enrolled in a "debt management hardship plan." That isn't good news since it alerts potential lenders that because you couldn't manage your debt, you had to rely on third-party financial assistance. Although the initial stage of a debt settlement program can also impair your credit, most debt settlement program candidates already have bad credit. They may have delinquent accounts, or poor payment histories. Oddly, even if they have good credit scores, their credit may still be damaged. The bottom line is that if you're in debt, living paycheck-to-paycheck, and are struggling to make the minimum payments, creditors may no longer qualify to get additional credit because of a high debt-to-income ratio. In sync, you may have killed your credit due to a high debt-to-credit ratio. Since the debt-to-credit ratio is responsible for one third of your credit score, the damage to your credit can be significant. The good thing is that upon completing our debt settlement program, by virtue of creating a positive debt-to-income ratio and debt-to-credit ratio, your credit can eventually improve.

Absolutely! That is why we highly encourage you to do your research. We also recommend that you read this article: Warning Signs to Avoid Finding a Bad Debt Settlement Company. Hopefully, the information will help you make a wise and informed decision.

Our program can help you to reduce the collection calls. However, claiming to "stop all collection calls" would be a gross misrepresentation. Under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), you can only prevent third-party debt collectors who are assigned to collect your debt, to cease and desist from calling you. However, original creditors are excluded. In either case, we will provide you tips that can help diminish the collection calls.

Yes, you can be sued anytime if you don't pay creditors in a timely manner. But maintaining a dialogue with your creditors helps prevent creditor lawsuits. Creditors normally initiate lawsuits as a means to push a debtor into a debt negotiation and we have a successful track record negotiating and settling lawsuits. In the event of a suit, it is imperative that you have funds ready to pay off the negotiated settlement.

Yes. Negotiating business debt is one of our specialties. As long as it's "unsecured" we can negotiate a variety of business debt, including but not limited to, business credit cards, default business contracts, overdue business credit account balances, vendor invoices, and accounts payables.

Yes, we can help you settle various medical debts, such as hospital bills, doctor bills, dental bills, past due medical accounts, collection medical accounts, disputed hospital and doctor bills, and even medical judgments.

Yes, not answering our calls, not saving the money you are supposed to save, and if for any reason, you interfere with a negotiation.

Our job is to negotiate the balances of your accounts, not to repair your credit. By getting creditors to reclassify the reporting of a credit item, we'd be engaging in the act of "credit repair." Since we're not a credit repair company, such action would be a conflict of interest and against the law. Any debt settlement company that verbally promises to do any type of credit repair certainly won't put it in writing. But here's what you can expect to happen to your credit. Pre-settlement, you should reasonably expect some of your accounts to reach "collection" and/or "charge-off" status. This occurs 120-180 days after debt non-payment. Post-settlement, creditors may report the settled accounts to the credit bureaus as "paid as agreed", "settled", or "paid for less than full amount." But the final reporting will be totally upon the creditor's discretion, not the debt negotiator.

Creditors never promote the services of debt settlement service providers, or they'd risk collecting pennies on the dollar. If you appear to be insolvent, a creditor may refer you to a credit counselor. In lieu bankruptcy, this would allow the creditor to collect more money since their debt management plans can only reduce your interest rate. However, our debt settlement program can reduce your debt principal and interest. The unique relationship between creditors and non-profit credit counselors clearly indicates you get nothing free. Credit counseling organizations are partially funded by banks, which also pay them a commission known as a fair share for every dollar they can collect from you. We on the other hand don't get paid by creditors or have special concessions with them. Yet, we maintain a professional relationship with creditors as part of an industry that collects in excess of $2 billion each year on behalf of creditors.

TASC (The Association of Settlement Companies) has been a great resource for the debt settlement industry in passing important legislation. Although we are not a member of TASC (The Association of Settlement Companies), our company executives, who have over 20 years' combined experience in the debt settlement industry, do not feel this professional affiliation is an essential business requirement. However, our company complies with the strict industry standards of organizations like TASC (The Association of Settlement Companies).

Debt Free League is presently not a member of USOBA (United States Organization of Bankruptcy Alternatives). But that doesn't measure our company's reputation or effectiveness. As a consumer, you should be more concerned if our company has a history of unresolved or excessive consumer complaints. In the Internet, bad news really travels fast. You can easily research us or any other company's reputation by performing a Google search. Another great online source is www.RipOffReport.com. There, you can find numerous consumer complaints, yes, even on debt settlement companies that are members of USOBA (United States Organization of Bankruptcy Alternatives), TASC The Association of Settlement Companies), and the BBB (Better Business Bureau).