SOL discouraging

Anonymous · ‎12-18-2016

Recently I moved from Iowa to Illinois. Had made some really stupid financial decisions back in Iowa that are now haunting me, just like most people here. Anyhow, today I learned that the SOL in Iowa is 10 years for the types of debts I have in collections. While I understand paying debts is always better than just having them removed from your CR and forgetting them, my current take home is $800 a month. (I'm a student so I don't have time to work more than part time). With the SOL being so long the worry of being sued is obviously there. Having already been sued for a $600 CO from CreditOne, my fears are pretty legitimate! Any advice on how to tackle my debts? I would love to write PFD letters, but I know I can't PIF if that's their compromise. My biggest concern is a Verizon collection for $1400. Funny when I ditched Verizon I was originally only charged the ETF of $350, and it has ballooned that much.

Anonymous · ‎12-19-2016

Maybe someone else has some better tips- but I would just start a payment plan with these debts so they can't sue you. Get a Visa gift card and load the monthly payments (they should allow you to pay very little at a time) and use that instead of giving them your debit card info.

gdale6 · ‎12-19-2016

@Anonymous wrote:
Recently I moved from Iowa to Illinois. Had made some really stupid financial decisions back in Iowa that are now haunting me, just like most people here. Anyhow, today I learned that the SOL in Iowa is 10 years for the types of debts I have in collections. While I understand paying debts is always better than just having them removed from your CR and forgetting them, my current take home is $800 a month. (I'm a student so I don't have time to work more than part time). With the SOL being so long the worry of being sued is obviously there. Having already been sued for a $600 CO from CreditOne, my fears are pretty legitimate! Any advice on how to tackle my debts? I would love to write PFD letters, but I know I can't PIF if that's their compromise. My biggest concern is a Verizon collection for $1400. Funny when I ditched Verizon I was originally only charged the ETF of $350, and it has ballooned that much.

IA statutes may not be the ones that the creditor uses they could use the ones for the state that they are incorporated in and you might be able to use IL statutes as well if residency terms are met. If you have any open judgments you need to settle those first as they can come for money and property at any time if they wish, once the judgments are settled then move on to settling with the others.

RobertEG · ‎12-19-2016

The prevailing SOL that is used in any civil proceeding will be that of the state where they bring the civil action.

Civil action, for various reasons, will normally be brought in the state of current residence of the consumer, although the FDCPA specifically authorizes a debt collector to bring civil action in either the state of current residence of the consumer or the state where the contract creating the debt was signed.

It is likely that they will bring civil action in Illinois, with the SOL then being the statute for that state.

Some states have "borrowing" provisions, permitting the SOL of a prior state of residence to be used, but only if that state has a shorter SOL period.