Smart Money

Greetings,

Ever since I first put up this howtogetridof.com website I’ve been trying to figure out why anyone would even hesitate to use our services.

I mean, there are over 20 million people delinquent on just credit card debt. There are over 1 million people a year being sued over credit card debt. And 800,000 of those people are losing by default. They don’t even show up for court.

It just didn’t make any sense. Then one day, a few years ago, my wife got a summons. Her first words were: “I don’t care what you do, just don’t expect me to go to court. I can’t. I won’t.”

At that point it finally dawned on me. People won’t stand up for their rights, won’t defend themselves, due to FEAR. Its not that they don’t want to – its because they are afraid to.

They’re afraid to go to court. They’re afraid of what might happen. They’re afraid to stand in front of a judge and fight for their rights.

The sad thing is, fear is exactly what the collection attorneys and their puppet judges want and expect. They just enter a default judgment and from that moment on, their stealing is completely legal. You’ve given them permission.

So, what’s it like to go to court?

First off, let me warn you – it ain’t nothing like you see on TV. The chances of going up against attorneys like Denny Crane or Alan Shore is one in a million, it ain’t going to happen. However, don’t be surprised if you run into a judge or two that reminds you of Judge Clark Brown (Henry Gibson).

In real life all the fighting and arguing is done via “motions.” I’m not sure I know of anyone who has gotten to a jury trial. A jury is something attorneys, and the judge is an attorney, don’t like. It gives you, a pro se litigant, an advantage. Generally, the bank’s attorneys will ask to settle or the judge will render a verdict which you will appeal. The verdict will be over turned, then the bank’s attorneys will agree to settle. By settle, I mean the you walk away owing nothing. Its as if the debt never existed.

Now, what you really want to know.

The first time I walked into court to defend myself against a collection suit I thought I would pee my pants. Literally. I was scared poop-less.

In our county court they have “motions days.” These are days when a judge hears motions. Motions are arguments, in writing, used to try and get the judge to decide the case in someone’s favor before it can get to a jury.

There is a list of all the cases and motions that will be heard that day. Listed in the order they will be called.

So, you can pretty well tell how long you’ll be sitting listening to the boring arguments. I ended up waiting about 45 minutes.

During that time I went back and forth to the restroom no less than 6 times.

I was nervous and scared to death.

When I finally got in front of the judge, he read the motions, made a decision and we left. If memory serves me correctly, I didn’t say a word. Didn’t have to. Everything I wanted to say was already written down in my motion or my reply to plaintiff’s motion. I just stood there, trying not to pee my pants, and listened.

We moved on to the next step – more motions, more replies, more hearings.

Defending a law suit can be time consuming and tedious. But, when you think about the $5,000, $10,000 or so that you won’t have to pay, it sort of makes it all worth while.

Does it get easier? Absolutely. Now, after 50 – 100 hearings, I only go to the restroom once or twice.

And my wife…

She ended up having to go to court.

At her first motion hearing we were sitting in the court room, I looked over at her and start to talk. She looked back at me, with a very stern face and said: “Don’t you dare say a word to me. I may never speak to you again.”

I held my tongue.

When her case was called she walked up to the podium and waited.

The judge started to talk. He was very disrespectful to her. He berated her. He was a pure jerk. He tried to intimidate her. He made a very big mistake.

Instead of intimidating her, he made her mad. And, once he made her mad, instead of saying he was sorry and shutting up, he kept at it. Something I’ve learned over the past 30 years not to do.

As we were walking out of the court house she was fuming. She was still mad as hell at me; but, she was even madder at the judge. Or, “that asshole judge” to be precise.

She made a few more appearances. The judge continued to be a rude inconsiderate asshole and eventually granted the bank a summary judgment. They had temporarily won.

We appealed. The “asshole judge’s” decision was overturned. Strangely, we haven’t seen him around the court house since.

Now, she still doesn’t like going to hearings. Not because she’s afraid; but, because its just such a waste of time. Unfortunately, its part of the games played by pseudo professionals.

One additional thing I would like to point out.

The first time I went to court, I did so with documents that I had created, and I’m not an attorney. They hadn’t been tried. Some of the arguments hadn’t been used since the 1960’s. Some hadn’t been tried ever, in a debt collection case. I was basically flying blind and by the seat of my pants.

Something you don’t have to deal with.

Don’t get me wrong. I can’t say you won’t be scared. You will be. At least during that first appearance. But, you have nothing to lose.

If you don’t stand up for your rights the bank or collection company gets a free ride. You end up paying the entire amount of the debt, on going interest, attorney’s fees, and court costs. You can get your assets confiscated and your wages garnished.

If you do something and lose. Same thing happens.

But, if you fight and win. You pay nothing.

Your chances of winning? About 80% – 100%!

You become a slave by doing nothing.

You over come fear by gaining knowledge and taking action.

So, if you’re ready to confront your fear, keep reading and learn how and what we can do to help.

Regards,
Jim

By Robert Ringer

It’s a serious mistake to allow yourself to get caught up in the “what-if” and “how-to” trap before taking action. The reality is that no one can ever hope to know all the problems in advance, let alone all the solutions.

Further, most of the things people worry about never even come to pass. Or, if they do, they end up being not nearly as bad as envisioned. Even better, some of the most minatory circumstances often turn out to be nothing more than disguises for great opportunities.

I thought about this a couple of weeks ago when my son asked me to take him to a University of Maryland football game on a perfect-weather Saturday.

It was quite a request, considering:

1. I had never been to Maryland’s Byrd Stadium, and was not certain how to get there.
2. I estimated that the University was at least an hour away in modest traffic.
3. It would take us about an hour to get ready to leave the house.
4. It was 10:00 a.m. — two hours before kickoff.
5. We had no tickets.

Nevertheless, seeing a chance to be anointed Father of the Week, I replied, without hesitation, “Sure. Let’s do it.”

Some might call this impulsive. Others might refer to it as abject stupidity. I would argue that a fair and enlightened individual would recognize it as nothing more than temporary insanity.

But something just felt right about it. It was a beautiful, sunny day. I felt like I could run a marathon backward. And I saw it as one of those great Steve Martin-type bonding opportunities (as in Father of the Bride).

We pulled out of the driveway at 11:00 a.m., an hour before game time. Surprisingly, traffic was light, even as we began to near the campus. Even more surprising, the stadium came into view about 40 minutes after we left the house. I still haven’t figured out how that was mathematically possible.

Now for the not-so-small matter of parking. Cars were jammed into every square inch of space on the side of every road anywhere within sight of the stadium, so I frantically looked for a parking garage. But before I could locate one, would you believe that a parking space suddenly appeared on the side of the road — about a five-minute walk from the stadium?

After I parked the car, my son and I jumped out and joined the crowd walking toward Byrd Stadium. At this point, I was thinking what a shame it would be if it were a sellout and we’d have to turn around and go home.

Amazingly, however, as we approached the front gate, two men were standing right in front of us, one of them holding up a pair of tickets. He said they were his season tickets, but that he was going to be sitting elsewhere with his friend that day, so he just wanted to “get rid of them.”

He told me they were on the 50-yard line, and I braced myself for his asking price — $75? $100? $150? Another surprise: Almost apologetically, he asked if $20 a ticket sounded reasonable to me. I refrained from hugging him, and quickly peeled off two $20 bills from the cash stash in my pocket.

Thus far, I had been wrong about every dire thought that had crossed my mind before agreeing to take my son to the game. But I felt certain I would be right about one thing: No way was I holding 50-yard-line seats in my hand. Scalpers are hardworking entrepreneurs, but they have been known to shade the truth a bit.

Surprise again: Our seats were, indeed, smack-dab on the 50!

At halftime, since we hadn’t had time to eat lunch before leaving the house, we were starving. Perusing the menu board at a garbage… er, concession… stand, it became evident that our substitute lunch was going to be a hotdog, an ice cream sandwich, and a Pepsi.

To avoid apoplexy, I reminded myself that what we were about to eat was at least healthier than cyanide-laced Kool-Aid… though not by much. Besides, the dogs were only $2.50 apiece, which wouldn’t even buy you a bun at a pro football game.

After we finished “lunch,” we stopped by one of the restrooms for a little relief. How pleasant. It made the restrooms at Washington, DC’s RFK Stadium look like the Ritz-Carlton. Shows how easy it is to please college kids.

The bottom line is that it was a great day, a day when everything that seemed like a problem ended up being a plus. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that things turned out so well, because I’ve witnessed the playing out of this type of scenario so often over the years.

The moral is that when you really want to do something — but are apprehensive because you see so many “problems” on the horizon — do it anyway! Don’t worry about it. You won’t bat 1,000 percent. But if you continually fail to take action, you’re guaranteed to bat zero.

And even when things don’t work out, you’ll find that, in a vast majority of cases, the fallout won’t be nearly as bad as you’d imagined.

The many wonderful, unexpected things that will come into your life as a result of taking action will more than offset any pain you might endure from your few missteps.