BILL'S ANSWER
Unfortunately, I do not know enough about your financial situation for me to tell you specifically what course of action you and your wife should take in regard to selling your home. If you and your wife have a substantial amount of equity, that is you owe less on your home than what the home is worth, selling your home to cash out the equity may be a reasonable solution to your financial difficulties. You could use the cash proceeds from the sale of your home to pay off your other debts, thus freeing you from both your mortgage obligation and your credit card debt. However, from you question, it sounds like you may not have much equity in your home, so selling your home to pay off your debts may not be a workable solution. That does not mean that selling your home could not benefit you financially. If you cannot afford your mortgage payments, selling your home and moving into less expensive housing may allow you to free up sufficient money on a monthly basis to address your other debts, especially your high interest credit card debt.
If you do have equity in your home, you may be able to borrow money against your home, instead of selling the home, to pay off your credit card debts. This type of loan, often referred to as a ?debt consolidation refinance loan,? are used by many consumers to convert their high-interest credit card debt into lower interest secured debt, thus reducing their monthly payments and saving them thousands of dollars in interest over the life of their loans.
As mentioned previously, even if you do not have enough equity to pay off your debts by selling your home, selling your home may help you financially by freeing yourself of your mortgage payments, and giving you more money to repay your other debts. Before you decide to proceed with selling your home, you must carefully analyze how this move will affect your overall financial situation. For example, if homes in your area are increasing in value, you may be foregoing the opportunity to build significant equity if you decide to sell your home now. On the other hand, if home prices are decreasing, as they are in many areas in the U.S., selling your home now may allow you to pull out of the falling market before you lose any more money. I strongly encourage you to discuss your situation with a professional financial advisor to determine what the best choice is for you given your personal financial circumstances and the economic situation in your area.
If you decide not to sell your home, or if you do not have sufficient equity to pay off your credit card debts after the sale, you may want to consider some of the alternative debt relief options available to consumers, such as Consumer Credit Counseling (CCCS) and Debt Settlement (aka Debt Resolution). A CCCS program would allow you to make payments to your creditors at a reduced interest rate, while a Debt Settlement program would work with your creditors to negotiate reduced balance settlements of your debts. To learn more about these options, I encourage you to visit the Bills.com Debt Help page at http://www.bills.com/debt-help/.
I wish you the best of luck in resolving your financial difficulties, and hope that the information I have provided above helps you Find. Learn. Save.
Best,
Bill
www.Bills.com
May 19, 2010
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