• 17
  • October
    2011

Federal regulators are finally getting tougher with various scam artists and bad actors who peddle unprincipled and outright fraudulent debt relief services.

It's about time the feds got tougher. After all, unscrupulous pitches offering to get people out of debt have become a bigger and bigger problem in Florida and across the country amid the down economy of recent years.

The smart thing to do, as a consumer, is to talk your debt problems over with an experienced bankruptcy attorney who can help you weigh all of your debt relief options carefully. This blog post is therefore a cautionary one, warning you to wary of what the Federal Trade Commission calls "last-dollar scams."

These last-dollar scams are of various sorts. Many of them involve real estate, specifically dubious offers to help people catch up on their past-due mortgage debt. Others involve bogus work-from-home offers, fraudulent credit-card relief schemes, or fake government grants.

What all of these practices have in common is that they prey upon vulnerable people. Most people with debt problems try to do the right thing, even if it means paying practically their last dollar in an attempt to make things right. Unfortunately, paying the last dollar can make things even worse, not better, if that dollar is paid into the wrong hands.

That's why the FTC is trying to crack down. So far, the agency has been successful in shutting down several companies that charged upfront fees to distressed homeowners but did not deliver the debt relief that was promised. The FTC is also launching Operation Empty Promises to go after bogus business-opportunity offers.

Source: "Down to your last dollar? Don't Let con artists take it from you," Washington Post, 10-15-11