I read an article in the last Readers digest that talked about this.. negotiating down your debt or lowering your interest rate etc.. has anyone successfully done this themselves? What do you say to them? How do I go about doing it? I am a HAIR under my limit right now.. & every month they charge me the interest, make me go over, then charge me the overlimit fee. :rolleyes: Its the SAME thing every month & Im never going to get out of this viscious cycle unless I get a lot of money to pay it down! ugh!!

Will they even work with me since Ive never been late, always pay slightly over the minimum? tia!

nak

I think it depends on the company. None of ours would do it, even though we were great customers, until we were late. Doesn't make sense. For example, we are a few months late on Discover, and dh called them and they dropped the interest to 0% and took off a bunch of fees and such, so we went from owing 8K to 6600. This lowered our monthly payments by 50.00, and now all of the payment will go to the actual amount owed, not interest.

Good luck!

Kristi

I only have one CC and I called to close the account. When they heard that, they said, we'll lower your interest rate to 11% from 14.5 if you'll keep it open. I said OK! then cut up the card anyway.

We've done it on cards not maxed out- as in every few months we call & ask for a lower interest rate or we will go to a new card, and usually they give it to us. All it takes is a call to ask, yk?

Though, I think what you mean might be a bit different- maybe you could call & ask to close the account, and want to pay it off, will they work with you, yk? I doubt they will stop charging the overlimit fees, yada yada unless you tell them you are going to pay it off. Can you transfer some of the balance to another credit card? That would alleviate some of the problem, and looks better on your credit report not to have a card maxed out,. Can you use some of your tax return to pay some of it down?

It wouldn't hurt to try. They might not forgive any of your debt, but they might lower your interest rate enough to make a difference in your monthly payment going forward.

Tara

Whoo hoo!!! Thank you! I used your advice, called to close the account giving them my whole story- blah blah blah.. they said.. well we'll lower it 3% for you and credit you back the $35 overlimit fee if you'll keep it open. *lol*

Its still high as S (19.9%!! :eek: ) but at least the interest rate is lower and maybe I'l;l pay it down to under the limit one day!!! ftr.. this card is already cut up, and not in use anymore. She also told me I can call back every couple of months "to find out what new interest rate offers they can give us" so I guess I will try that! Going to mark two months from now on my calendar! :joker:

I'm so thrilled! Just IM'd dh the good news!!!

I was having anxiety attacks all day thinking about opening up two new loans (getting rid of the car we have now and getting a minivan & getting dh a moto since his job is changing and we can't get by with just one vehicle anymore) our debt is so high already, I'm just stressing!!!

Thank you all!
~C