Avoid being sued before filing

[moses911]

Hello,

I'm trying to buy little extra time before filing. I should be filing March 1st due to waiting for my tax return (5000 to protect) and my Yearly SEV for home valuation will arrive march 1st.

The issue I have a lawyer who represent capital one or Portfolio sent me a letter last month which asked me to pay 5000 and I have 30 days to dispute.

Next week the 30 days will be up. So most likely this law firm will sue me.

How can I pass the time to avoid the lawsuit? And how likely this law firm will sue?

So i really need to pass 45 days before filing.

[justbroke]

It would be quite impressive to go from a demand for payment to a judgement in the next 45 days.

Why are you waiting to file? You write that you need to protect your income tax refund. How is protecting it now any different than waiting to receive it in order to protect it? What I'm saying is that exemption #XXX will always be exemption #XXX. What makes your delay in filing an issue? Do you need that tax refund in order to file?

[moses911]

Thanks for your response like always.

The way my lawyer explained it that the trustee might ask me to give him my tax refund. But by receiving my tax refund in February I will be able to spend it on necessary things such as new tires for my car and pay school for my children (preschool) and other little things.

Also in March first i will receive my home assessment value. Plus the last time i used credit card was in Late November so that will also give me a little more time.

So you think after the 30 days from the lawyer they will not sue ride away? Do they usually send letter such as "Intent to sue"?

[justbroke]

I have never been sued by a credit card company, so I don't know whether they send you another demand letter before (or then) threatening a lawsuit. It reads to me as this was the standard 30-day notice for you to ask for proof of the debt before they can proceed.

[moses911]

Yup that is correct. So i did some google on the law firm and they are one of the nasty law firms here. They are the one that send that famous sheriff who collect things after they win judgement.

I just hope I can buy 45 days before they sue. I was wondering how much time answering a lawsuit will buy me

[leonel9]

Have you considered sending a debt validation letter? It may draw unwanted attention to yourself, but if you're looking to buy time, that's about the only thing I can think of.

[StuckinaRut]

It will take them a minute to file the lawsuit. When they do, don't file your answer until the last day to do so, which is usually 30 days (could be less where you live). That should get you past the 45 day mark.

[newlife13]

I owe a lot of money to Capital One and they have not even once called me. Just send standard form letters and emails. Bank of America calls me every two days, on average. How delinquent are you? I find it hard to believe that they could sue you and win a judgement in 45 days.

[Geeznowwhat]

Concerning paying for your daughters school. I have read of cases where the trustee demanded the money back from the schools...and they had to turn it over. Just saying......

[moses911]

Thanks for all the good info. I will ask my lawyer what is reasonable to spend the money on.

this account is my wife account and the last payment was 12 months ago. I think they law firm will sue very soon from what I read about them.

anyone got served before? Are they rude or polite?

[leonel9]

If you get served, it would be by a process server or the sheriff's office. Either way, their job is to simply give you the document and certify that you have received it. Unless you give a process server reason to hunt you down in extreme places, you really shouldn't worry about the interaction.

As others have stated, IF you get sued, you have time to reply. The trial date would not be set a few days later -- more like a month or more out. There's a good chance that IF they sue, you won't have a trial until the time you are ready to file. And perhaps you could get a continuance moving the court date out.

At this point, you could explore requesting them to validate the debt -- it may take them time to get all the documents ready (e.g. initial contract, billing statement, etc.). You could also offer to make $15/monthly payments if you really want to avoid getting sued. I wouldn't give them anything substantial or worry about being sued though.

[BriOS]

Our Auto finance company sued us. We avoided the process server successfully for about 4 months. Then when we finally got served, we went to court and asked for a continuance 3 different times stating that we were looking for a lawyer to defend us in this case. We strung them along for almost 8 months until we were able to file. Once filed, we went to court with the filed BK papers, and the judge dismissed the case with prejudice. Meaning if we dont follow with our BK, and it gets dismissed, the other suit can be refiled.

So we dodged that bullet and didnt have to deal with a judgement on our credit. Having them get the judgement wouldnt have mattered because the BK would have stopped any court ordered repayment plans they wanted, but the judgement would have landed on our credit files and that would have been impossible to get removed. Our BK lawyer was laughing that we did what we did just to avoid the judgement. He was most concerned with the order of wage garnishment that would have gotten. I was more worried about the mark on our credit file.

So not only did the creditor not get a judgement on us, but they got thrown in our BK and will be discharged later this year.....SUCKERS>!!

[justbroke]

Did you mean that the lawsuit was dismissed "without" prejudice?

[BriOS]

Did you mean that the lawsuit was dismissed "without" prejudice?

You are correct. I switched the terminology. Without prejudice. Im sure the creditor would love it if we defaulted on our BK and they would throw the book at us.

[justbroke]

You are correct. I switched the terminology. Without prejudice. Im sure the creditor would love it if we defaulted on our BK and they would throw the book at us.

This is quite common for Chapter 13s. In fact, there are junk debt buyers (JDBs) that buy bankruptcy debt in bulk with the hopes that a.) there's some distribution and/or b.) the person messes up!

I don't know the value of a particular, average, portfolio of debt that these JDBs purchase, but they are massive multi-million dollar portfolios that they purchase real cheap. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) recently reported that the JDBs purchase these massive portfolios on an average... sit down for this one... $0.04 per dollar. In the report, the JDBs purchased $143,000,000,000 (yes, $143 billion) in "debt" for $6,500,000,000 ($6.5 billion). I did not go on to read how much they actually collected, but it's probably well over $10B to keep them in business!

"Older debt sold for a significantly lower price than newer debt. The price of debt older than 15 years was virtually zero. "

Source: The Structure and Practices of the Debt Buying Industry, Federal Trade Commission, 2013