Just thought I'd report that the credit counseling requirement, at least the one we went through, was a breeze. Time consuming, yes, but difficult or scary, no.
We went through www.cricketdebt.com only because our attorney recommended it to us. It is a non-profit and they only charged $35 for my wife and I together (that is, $35 total).
Basically you read about 30 web pages of easy to read text about budgeting and what often causes bankruptcy, what the other 2 options are besides bankruptcy (debt consolidation and debt [re-]negotiation), and then the only "hard part" is that they have you list all your credit debt, secured and unsecured.
That took me about an hour because I didn't want to estimate, I wanted to have it down to the nearest dollar per our latest statements. That was probably overkill on my part, but I thought it would make a good record that I could then print out and have in case I need it for some reason. In reality it was probably a waste of my time, as is this whole requirement, imho.
Then they asked us about expenses and showed us where our estimated expenses fell in relation to someone's idea of what they "should" be. I can tell you that they are way off base on what expenses "should" be if you live in a high-cost-of-living state like California. They said our rent should be about $300/month less than it is, and we're under rent control and get it cheaper than most for our one bedroom apartment!
Anyway, that was basically it. Then a few more pages to read about debt, and we were done except for the phone call.
There were no questions to answer at all other than filling in the blanks on debt (each card and other debt) and estimated expenses.
Then the phone call was just the woman asking us both if we understood what we read and if we understood how we got into too much debt. She wasn't necessarily looking for a specific reason, just wanting to know if we understood it.
And that was that. We put the counselor on speaker phone and my wife just muttered uh-huh and yes here and there, and that was that. The call took about 5 minutes and there was no "testing" or judging, she just wanted to make sure we both did it and were both present for the phone call.
In reality, I could have done it all myself, all the reading, that is, and my wife could have just muttered yes at appropriate times,
but we didn't know that so we both read all the web pages, in case they asked questions about what we read.
If you use this company my recommendation would be that you just estimate everything and get through it as quickly as possible, I don't think they examine it at all, I think it's just an exercise to show you put some effort into having some idea how much you owe and how much you make.
Are all the counseling companies on the web pretty much the same as this one, in that there is no test questions, and that you have to enter in all your debts and expenses? Just curious. This was painless, just time consuming.
We went through www.cricketdebt.com only because our attorney recommended it to us. It is a non-profit and they only charged $35 for my wife and I together (that is, $35 total).
Basically you read about 30 web pages of easy to read text about budgeting and what often causes bankruptcy, what the other 2 options are besides bankruptcy (debt consolidation and debt [re-]negotiation), and then the only "hard part" is that they have you list all your credit debt, secured and unsecured.
That took me about an hour because I didn't want to estimate, I wanted to have it down to the nearest dollar per our latest statements. That was probably overkill on my part, but I thought it would make a good record that I could then print out and have in case I need it for some reason. In reality it was probably a waste of my time, as is this whole requirement, imho.
Then they asked us about expenses and showed us where our estimated expenses fell in relation to someone's idea of what they "should" be. I can tell you that they are way off base on what expenses "should" be if you live in a high-cost-of-living state like California. They said our rent should be about $300/month less than it is, and we're under rent control and get it cheaper than most for our one bedroom apartment!
Anyway, that was basically it. Then a few more pages to read about debt, and we were done except for the phone call.
There were no questions to answer at all other than filling in the blanks on debt (each card and other debt) and estimated expenses.
Then the phone call was just the woman asking us both if we understood what we read and if we understood how we got into too much debt. She wasn't necessarily looking for a specific reason, just wanting to know if we understood it.
And that was that. We put the counselor on speaker phone and my wife just muttered uh-huh and yes here and there, and that was that. The call took about 5 minutes and there was no "testing" or judging, she just wanted to make sure we both did it and were both present for the phone call.
In reality, I could have done it all myself, all the reading, that is, and my wife could have just muttered yes at appropriate times,
but we didn't know that so we both read all the web pages, in case they asked questions about what we read.If you use this company my recommendation would be that you just estimate everything and get through it as quickly as possible, I don't think they examine it at all, I think it's just an exercise to show you put some effort into having some idea how much you owe and how much you make.
Are all the counseling companies on the web pretty much the same as this one, in that there is no test questions, and that you have to enter in all your debts and expenses? Just curious. This was painless, just time consuming.
A NEW START!!!
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