I'm sure you've seen the commercials on TV made by debt settlement companies. I have...with people saying they got this debt or that debt settled for "pennies on the dollar." Take a close look at the link below, and think long and hard before you even consider believing their sales talk if you're in trouble financially. FOR TEACHER, A TOUGH LESSON IN DEBT SETTLEMENTQuote:
CHICAGO -- Gary Kopycinski teaches religion and ethics in a suburban Chicago Catholic high school, but his effort to practice what he preaches made him the perfect target for a debt settlement company.
Three years ago, Kopycinski was told by several advisers that he should file for bankruptcy. His finances were a wreck. He held $35,000 in credit card debt and was on the hook for a car loan that he'd co-signed for a family member. On his salary as Catholic high school teacher, it seemed there was no other way but to wave a white flag. But Kopycinski believed that bankruptcy "was a cop-out," so he went searching for an alternative. When he heard an advertisement for Debt Settlement USA, he thought he'd found it. Instead, he had hooked his fortunes to an industry that the attorney general of Illinois, Lisa Madigan, calls "a scam."
