Girl on the Brink: Surviving Desperate Times with Desperate Measures

Job hunting is a full-time job. So is keeping creditors at bay. The two creditors you don’t want outside your door are the IRS, the District of Columbia or any state that collects taxes. I stay a good doobie for these two creditors, even if I have to pay a late fee.

I don’t imagine customer service is their specialty. At least the credit card companies employ staff to deal with consumers in crisis, or so it seems.

Remarkably, when I feared I wouldn’t be able to make future payments on my mortgage and called SunTrust for a “workout” (help), I was told that I needed to already be in arrears. Behind? That didn’t make sense. Don’t you want to help me so I can preserve what’s left of my credit score? Keep me out of foreclosure? The answer, apparently, was “no.”

So far, I’ve only been late with the mortgage one time. From month to month, I’m never quite sure of how I’m going to pay it. It sure ain’t a paycheck. One month, my ex sold a domain name. The next month our car insurance company cut us a check to cover the value of our car, which was totaled in a hit and run. Borrowing against my retirement account provided another source the following month. Now I’m waiting for a settlement I won in a legal proceeding.

Believe me; every month I sweat for relief. And, I’m not relying on President Obama’s stimulus package to get me off the hook. Look what happened to President Bush’s HOPE for Homeowners refinancing program, which the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development launched with great fanfare last October. It was supposed to have helped homeowners avoid foreclosure, but not a single house has been saved since December.

While my way doesn’t have the government’s stamp of approval and the analysis of the Congressional Budget Office behind it, it somehow works.

Even after paying the mortgage, enough needs to be left over to pay all of the utilities. I don’t like being cold, so the electric and gas bills get paid. I could live without paying Comcast for premium channels I hardly ever watch, and I suppose I could forego the newspaper since I can read it for free online. But I’m not yet ready to give up my gym membership.

I haven’t taken advantage of promotions to consolidate my debt, but they seem interesting and are arriving with increasing frequency in black-and-white envelopes stamped with “Official Document” and “Open Immediately.” Right now my credit card debt, according to an article in The New York Times, is in line with the national average: about $10,000. It makes me feel better that I’m not in this alone. I have other debt—doctor bills and school loans, but I’m working out payment plans. Don’t be afraid to ask if you need to do the same.

A good opening line is, “I lost my job,” and “would you be willing to explore a payment plan?” No one has ever turned me down except for the District of Columbia finance office when I knew I’d have trouble meeting my property taxes. Have something in mind if your creditor says yes, and make sure your payment plan is reasonable. In other words, don’t come up with a plan you can’t honor. Even paying $200 a month on a $5,000 bill with a promise to pay X amount more after you get a job was a payment plan one of my creditors agreed to. With the IRS, I got lucky. This year it owed me money.