Collection with National Credit Systems

[Erika3o3]

So i have a collection that is owned by National Credit Systems for a landlord back in 2019 amounting 5966. They have passed the debt over to their attorney Brett M Borland.

I got a settlement letter with no experation date or anything back in February 2021. At the time I was still trying to recover from last year. So i held onto it. Fast forward to the last week i've been trying to get in contact with the woman who has my account at Brett M Borlands office. I finally reach her today and she says there is no settlement available and that offer was time sensative. Even though the paper does not have a date or anything for which I needed to conact back. She then pretty much hung up on me mid sentance.

I really want to get this taken care of but dont know what to do now. I've tried contacting NCS and they keep telling me they cant handle my account because its with Borland now and keep pushing me to contact them....

[Cowboys4Life]

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@Erika3o3 wrote:

So i have a collection that is owned by National Credit Systems for a landlord back in 2019 amounting 5966. They have passed the debt over to their attorney Brett M Borland.

I got an settlement letter with no experation date or anything back in February 2021. At the time I was still trying to recover from last year. So i held onto you. Fast forward to the last week i've been trying to get in contact with the woman who has my account at Brett M Borlands office. I finally reach her today and she says there is no settlement available and that offer was time sensative. Even though the paper does not have a date or anything for which I needed to conact back. She then pretty much hung up on me mid sentance.

I really want to get this taken care of but dont know what to do now. I've tried contacting NCS and they keep telling me they cant handle my account because its with Borland now and keep pushing me to contact them....

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Your options are limited.  A settlement offer is not required to have an expiration date.  Most creditors provide one but it only becomes an issue if they have an expiration date then violate it.  That would be a breach of their own terms.  In your case by not providing effective date(s) means they can withdraw the offer at any time.

They are going to sue you if you don't settle and settling for less is based on leverage.  You have none if the SOL for suit is still alive.  The leverage you do have is in the balance sought.  What exactly totals up that balance?  Often apartment landlords pad their damages to upgrade the unit at the tenant's expense knowing most don't fight back or find out too late to fight back.

[Erika3o3]

Most of the charges came from me breaking my lease. I ended up breaking my lease after new managment took over and were not fixing things I put in maintence requests for. I waited 6 months for a window to be taken care of, I also had a new neighbor move in next to me and then started having issues with bugs in my home. I reported that as well and nothing was done. I got fed up and moved.

[Cowboys4Life]

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@Erika3o3 wrote:

Most of the charges came from me breaking my lease. I ended up breaking my lease after new managment took over and were not fixing things I put in maintence requests for. I waited 6 months for a window to be taken care of, I also had a new neighbor move in next to me and then started having issues with bugs in my home. I reported that as well and nothing was done. I got fed up and moved.

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And there goes your leverage.   Unfortunately there are ways to get out of a lease when the living conditions are terrible but simply leaving is one of the most expensive ones.  If you are ever faced with this again negotiate the exit terms IN WRITING before you move.  In this case your choices are to settle it or live with the judgment.  Landlords typically prevail unless you can prove their charges are excessive.  The best avenue to fight now is their legal duty to mitigate damages.  How quickly did they release the apartment?  How did they promote the unit?

[Erika3o3]

So would it be best for me to contact legal services to get the information on how soon they leased the apartment etc?

[Remi1]

While I can't really say anything on how you should go about negotiating with them or fighting against them, I can say this.. They are one of the ones who will delete it from your credit reports after its paid, without having to ask for it as special favor or anything, it's just part of how they do things. Also, with them, any settlement offer/offer to pay less than full amount will be lowest in the beginning and go up over time, which seems to be opposite of most collections giving lower settlement amounts as time goes on. Supposedly something to do with it being housing/landlord related vs. credit card, etc related.

[Anonymous]

Update? Was your collection deleted off your credit report?

[Anonymous]

I too owed to NCS and they forwarded it over to Moreland's office. I had a similar situation with an apartment who was in the wrong and didn't want to pay as they gave me an apartment that had a flea infestation so I backed out. My debt was about 3k. I first called NCS and got into an argument and told them I wasn't paying. Months later I got the letter from morelands office and just ignored it. Eventually the phone calls and letters stopped. My credit score was hurting from having a collection on it but it was still manageable so I said i'm just going to ignore it and see if they have the time to bring a lawsuit against me. 3 years from getting the letter from the lawyers office and I still never heard anything. If you have the time to wait them out you could be able to ignore them. NCS gave me an offer letter to settle the debt about 6 months after we stopped contact for half the orginal debt owed. It wasn't until just recently i negotiated with NCS to do a pay for delete because I was having a hard time getting new apartments with the collection making me an at risk renter. NCS was able to accept my payment with an agreed upon pay for delete even though "my account had been moved to the office of brent Moreland" years prior, so whoever you spoke to at NCS may not be telling the whole story. These places try to use fear as a tactic and the "time sensitive" letters with attorney offices are just methods use to scare you into paying off the debt. Good luck with the situation!!

[mja1970]

Like another poster said, unfortunately, your options right now are very limited.   They offered you a settlement several months ago, but you did not contact them.  Yes, those settlement offers are usually time sensitive.  Basically, you have two options here - either pay in full or see if they will agree to some sort of payment arrangement where you can pay it off over time, or you can do nothing and wait for them to sue you, which it sounds like they are getting ready to do if it has been transferred to an attorney.  The time for negotiations has come and gone now that it is out of the hands of the collection agency and in the hands of an attorney.  Breaking a lease like that is never a good idea.  It will almost always come back to bite you in the behind, as you have now learned.