Saturday, January 27, 2007
Consulting my friend on his finances
I received a text message from a lifelong friend on Tuesday. He said he was considering a debt settlement company and wanted my input. I preferred to call him to let him know that I thought it was a bad idea.
He recently got married and the attempts to get finances under control with his wife are going for naught. The story I got was that they had both used the same checking account and basically they weren't communicating when each other was spending money. She would write checks unknown to him and they would be low on funds. He felt at the end of the ropes and wanted to use a debt settlement company to get rid of his debt. They told him he could pay about $450 a month for about three and a half years. The total paid was going to be around $15k. And in the process his credit would be trashed. Good thing he just bought a house and a car(not sure if its new or not).
He's a salesman for his current occupation and plans on earning about $50k this year. Not sure on his wife's job but it's probably good to bet she makes at least $15k a year. $65k a year for the area they live in is great money.
I tried my hardest to talk him out of it. I told him repeatedly that he'd only be curing the problem and not the symptoms of what got him into debt. Should this ever happen again, he'd look to do it again as an easy way out.
I've offered to drive up to his house to sit down for a couple of hours to go over his and her finances to get their financial life in order. I've even thrown out there that he should come to Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover in Dallas at the end of February.
Does anyone else have any advice I could offer up to him to keep him from making a big mistake??
He recently got married and the attempts to get finances under control with his wife are going for naught. The story I got was that they had both used the same checking account and basically they weren't communicating when each other was spending money. She would write checks unknown to him and they would be low on funds. He felt at the end of the ropes and wanted to use a debt settlement company to get rid of his debt. They told him he could pay about $450 a month for about three and a half years. The total paid was going to be around $15k. And in the process his credit would be trashed. Good thing he just bought a house and a car(not sure if its new or not).
He's a salesman for his current occupation and plans on earning about $50k this year. Not sure on his wife's job but it's probably good to bet she makes at least $15k a year. $65k a year for the area they live in is great money.
I tried my hardest to talk him out of it. I told him repeatedly that he'd only be curing the problem and not the symptoms of what got him into debt. Should this ever happen again, he'd look to do it again as an easy way out.
I've offered to drive up to his house to sit down for a couple of hours to go over his and her finances to get their financial life in order. I've even thrown out there that he should come to Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover in Dallas at the end of February.
Does anyone else have any advice I could offer up to him to keep him from making a big mistake??
Labels: dave ramsey, debt, friends
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