To answer your question. If a creditor wants to sue you because you can\’t make the minimum payment then so be it. You shouldn\’t be FORCED into paying something you don\’t have simply because you made some bad financial mistakes. Your family comes first. Secondly, garnishment doesn\’t just happen. Usually you are sued and then a long process starts to collect. When that process fails, then the creditor will usually decide to \”execute\” on the judgment. Even that is a process and the way I teach people to handle that is by using the Pro-Rata Method. (I wrote this article on the self reliance exchange explaining the process) A creditor will generally not execute on a judgment, or even try to, if the person owing them money is paying them something—even IF it is not the minimum amount they would like to receive.

Also if someone files bankruptcy, and they owe less than even $100,000, they are taking it lightly. In which case, they aren\’t filing because they can\’t pay, they are filing because they don\’t want to pay. They are simply taking the easy way out that requires NO WORK or sacrifice from them to resolve the debt.

The only time I think bankruptcy is an option is when someone owes millions of dollars (or they are TRULY bankrupt), or a creditor does execute on a judgment forcing the borrower to protect the income that provides for their family.

I can see the lure into filing bankruptcy in order to keep from the embarrassment of having wages seized, especially if you work in the dept that handles that. I would be mortified if a wage garnishment came across my co-workers desk for me. My company isn’t too keen on finance people with bad credit and I could possibly lose my job if that was to happen to me.

Thanks for visiting and thank you for taking the time to comment. Sorry to hear that you had to go through such a painful process but it sounds like you are now on the right track. I may not have made it clear enough in my blog but when I wrote it I was really referring to people that used it like some people use morning after pills, filing for bankruptcy multiple times and not really seeing the need to make better decisions. I think that was a direct result of being able to file for bankruptcy so easily at one point. I personally know people who have filed three and four times in their life, and I have not ever heard anything from them that would suggest they are remorseful for leaving someone else to take the hit financially. I was also mainly referring to the fact that some people really do not need to file bankruptcy, but instead of pay their debt off, they choose to take the bankruptcy option. For those people bankruptcy is easier than paying off the debt, and that is why they choose it. I do believe that bankruptcy is sometimes the only way out but I must add that I also feel that just because someone files bankruptcy doesn’t mean they can’t pay the bills at a later time when they have corrected their situation. Dave Ramsey did that on millions from his bankruptcy and I just think that is AWESOME! Good luck with your new found path and I wish you the best!

Thanks again for sharing your experience and I hope you continue to read EOD.

I am so glad I had people in my life that were able to get through to me about why bankruptcy was a bad idea.

We were among those, making well above the average household income, but on the edge of that cliff that was built out of greed, insatiable appetites for new toys, wanting it all now, and not wanting to build up our foundation first.

We were poised to jump into that rocky ravine that is bankruptcy, then we found FPU. It pulled us back, gave us a new way to look at things, allowed us to reorganize our priorities and the way we spent.

While we are still “broke” right now, we are able to pay for everything we NEED to in a month and are slowly plugging away at our debt without incurring any new debt.

It is hard, but it is working, and we can see the light at the end of the tunnel, and it’s not 10 years away like it would be with a bankruptcy.