Archive for April, 2007

It is tempting to talk about consumers who “find themselves in default” on a loan. But consumers rarely end up in default by accident, if ever. And really, there is no excuse. I see a lot of consumers who defaulted on their mortgage, credit cards, medical bills, or other loans. I often ask whether they [...]

Ramit solicited stories about debt from his readers yesterday. School loans and consumer debt racked up while in college seem to be the way most people first got themselves into debt. Some talk about crawling out from under that debt to become obsessive with their finances. Others are still plugging away, making minimum payments and [...]

I was a first-hour guest on the CTX Home & Wealth Show this morning. Sue, Alex, and I talked about foreclosures, including looking out for equity strippers and dishonest mortgage brokers, and about using conciliation court. It was a fun experience, and I hope to be invited back to follow up with other consumer topics. [...]

Jeff Sovern at CL&P blog poses the interesting question of what happens if an identity thief signs an arbitration agreement. Is the consumer bound to arbitrate the case even though he or she never signed the agreement? The intuitive answer is obviously not.
However, who decides whether the consumer actually signed the agreement or not? The [...]

Bankrate.com has a free FICO score estimator. I checked mine, and it is probably approximately right, at least given what my score was the last time I checked. The estimator is a quick and easy 10-question quiz about your debt status.
Before you take out your next loan, estimate your rate so you have a pretty [...]

The Office of the Comptroller of Currency is the federal administrative agency charged with overseeing nationally-chartered banking institutions such as Wells Fargo, US Bank, and in this case, Wachovia Bank. However, nobody has been able to say that line without smirking for years, because whatever the OCC does, it isn’t overseeing banks or enforcing regulatory [...]

Perhaps National Arbitration Forum really is made up of “godless bloodsuckers.” I don’t know, but apparently Mary Pawlenty, previously a Dakota County judge, couldn’t stand to work for NAF as general counsel. That’s pure speculation on my part, of course, but if you look at the chorus of criticism of NAF, it is easy to [...]

Whatever Kurt Vonnegut is thinking in death, I’m sure he would be amused to note that while Don Imus spent yesterday on the front page of every major news website, news of Vonnegut’s death–and life–was relegated to the small print. (A distinction he shares, in a way, with Rosa Parks, whose death most news organizations [...]

State Senator Steve Dill (R-Dassel) has brought a bill requiring college freshman to receive a crash course in personal finance during freshman orientation. According to the Star-Tribune article, “Dille said that his plan goes hand in hand with another higher-education proposal that would clamp down on the marketing of credit cards at colleges and universities.”
Sounds [...]

Although cell phone providers are well-known for charging early termination fees, it appears broadband Internet service providers jumped on the bandwagon, as well. A sampling of fees, along with the supposed benefits:

AT&T: $99 for a month of “free” service
Verizon: $59 (FiOS); $79 (DSL), benefit unclear
Qwest: $200 for insulation from future price increases
Earthlink: $149, benefit unclear

One of my favorite things about Consumerist is its uncanny ability to gleefully post phone numbers and e-mail addresses so that average Joes like you and me can reach the special super-secret levels of customer service reserved for the rich and powerful, commonly known as “executive customer service.” So don’t sit on the phone like [...]

The Minnesota Supreme Court came out with its decision in the photo cop saga, putting the matter to bed for now. From the syllabus by the Court:
Minneapolis Code of Ordinances sections 474.620 to 474.670, which make the owner of a motor vehicle guilty of a petty misdemeanor if the vehicle is photographed running a red [...]

Um? Look, I’m all for banning cell phone on airplanes, but is there any real scientific evidence that cell phones in the air will interfere with cell phones on the ground? Because it sounds like complete and utter BS. Do cell phones on the ground have some latent inferiority complex so that they will refuse [...]

Speaking of bankruptcy, the five (at least) subprime lenders now in bankruptcy should perhaps observe their own obligations more closely. These lenders are pretty much in the same position as the freewheeling, irresponsible borrowers who file bankruptcy as often as possible that the credit industry likes to complain about. These lenders made tens, hundreds, or [...]

It used to be that consumers forced into bankruptcy were ashamed of themselves. Think about how embarassed you were the last time your credit card was rejected while waiting in line, and multiply that by a lot. That’s how people used to think about bankruptcy. If this is true, according to Credit Slips, Americans are [...]

The above quote is from Terrence DeFranco, chief executive of Edentify, speaking about the recent appropriation by malicious hackers of information from 45.7 million credit and debit cards from TJ Maxx and Marshalls. The only way to prevent identity theft is to stop using modern means of commerce. Pay with cash, get rid of your [...]

In a recent interview with the Riverfront Times, Mayor Whitteaker referred to Hispanics as “Cousin Puerto Rico and Taco Whoever,” “beaners,” and “wetbacks.” He described being bothered by seeing Hispanics on the street and said that the idea to fight illegal immigration in Valley Park came to him when a Mexican family (who were in [...]

CE apparently got a mention on KTLK’s “CTX Home and Wealth Show” yesterday morning during a segment on identity theft, referencing my post on the risks posed by copiers.
The podcast will theoretically be available here at some point.

If you’ve been paying the least bit of attention to the news lately, you know that the subprime mortgage industry is causing all sorts of problems. There is a lot of talk about the problem, and a bit about large-scale solutions. But when you get right down to it, every homeowner has the solution. Did [...]