Coronavirus disruptions to everyday life are spreading rapidly as fear and anxiety grip consumers, business-owners and investors. The amplification of misinformation via social media and governments has become a plague unto itself. For Americans the only “silver lining” is mortgage rates dropping to the lowest level since October 2016. The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage is now…
Equifax offers up to 20 grand cash to American victims of its 2017 data breach as part of $575 million to $700 million settlement reached with federal and state agencies. Nearly 150 million Americans were affected by the data breach between September 2016 and 2017. While the $20,000 cash payment represents the maximum amount a…
Mortgages and retirement can strangle a tight budget and require special planning to be successful. More than a third of older homeowners are approaching retirement saddled, to some degree, with a home with a mortgage. Compounding the struggle is half of retirees without a pension, just drawing mainly on Social Security benefits, will receive less…
Debt settlement companies are most often for-profit companies claiming they can negotiate with your credit card company to reduce the amount you owe. Credit card companies generally do not have special offers available to only debt settlement firms, so you are paying the debt settlement company for work that you can do yourself. The Consumer Financial…
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has lost a few teeth as the top guy protecting student borrowers from predatory lending practices has resigned, lambasting CFPB Director Mick “Mickey” Mulvaney, the “acting,” illegally appointed, and hand-picked by the “King of Debt” POTUS. Education Secretary Betsy “Ditzy” DeVos recently announced she wants to roll back the…
Nearly one out of four U.S. consumers, who are delinquent on telecom services, such landline or cell phone, cable, and internet, have discovered the collection activity listed on their credit reports. While the telecom collections item on a consumer’s credit record will not help their personal credit score, the change in score before and after…
The Department of Defense (DoD) now has 24X7 “eyes” on your credit file looking for past-due bills, excessive debt, collection activity and/or a high debt-to-income ratio that could jeopardize your clearance status. Ironically, the President of the U.S., who has a long documented history of stiffing vendors, bankers, and employees, recently issued a directive that…
Operating a network of 20 companies, Hydra Financial and its principals allegedly collected on fake, short-term, small-dollar online loans, bilking hundreds of thousands of U.S. Consumers out of $227.7 million, generating approximately $69.6 million in gross profits, over a nearly 10-year period. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) alleged that the defendants obtained consumers’ sensitive…
Another Trump appointed Devos-like moron is under consideration to run the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). Kathy Kraninger knows nuttin about protecting consumers in the financial marketplace. Illegally appointed Mick Mulvaney, interim CFPB director, tried to wreck the CFPB by: • announcing its intention to reconsider and delay its payday lending rule. • dropping its…
