The first company that contacted me said that the Fed does have such a program, but to qualify, you need to be behind on your mortgage payment to the point that your lender is ready to forclose. Consequently, with a credit rating in the mid 700′s, and a mortgage payment history that has not had one late payment all the time that I’ve had this loan, I did not qualify. I might make myself qualify by skipping a few loan payments, but if I was rejected I would still have the same loan – be in danger of foreclosure – and have trashed my credit rating. He did not reccomend it.

I pointed out to him how close this comes to “bait and switch,” meaning that Lower My Bills dot com baits with the implied promise of a partial mortgage debt forgivness and the companies that receive the referals (such as his) then has to try to switch me to a better program. He said that he had no idea that this implied promise was being made by Lower My Bills dot com in his name and that he is asking his companie’s management to sever their relationship with them.

I am in an adjustable arm with a sub-prime interest rate that will become an adjustable arm with a normal interest rate after a set period. Yes, it is one of those loans that caused the current financial crises. I got in at the tail end of the legality of these loans. Had I done it too much earlier, it could have been a lot worse. Of course what these companies had to offer was attractive. It would have bailed me out of this terriable situation. But those offers, as attractive as they were, were not what Lower My Bills dot com promised me!

Well, actually, I was not promised that a significant portion of my balance would be forgiven so that I could have a much lower monthly payment. It was only implied – but the use of qualifers such as “you will probably qualify…” and “could cut your payments” made it so that no actual promise was made. But I understand why Lower My Bills dot com is generating so much profit, at leas in the mortgage area. If I didn’t have an ace in the hole, that is other property which we are trying to sell that will most likely cover our outstanding mortgate and then some, I would have gone into one of these deals, even though it would have ment increasing my mortgate debt because of the fees and creating a larger monthly payment.

In my book, it is clasical “bait and switch.” Lower My Bills dot com is baiting with an implied promise that most of the respondants do not qualify for – and they know that. Then, the referal companies have to try to switch the respondants to a mortgage program that is realistic, and they have to do this without realizing the implied promise Lower My Bills dot com used to get the respondant’s name in the first place. However, since Lower My Bills dot com is not the company making the switch, it’s probably leagal under a loop-hole.

Shame on Lower My Bills. dot com. Shame on the parent company, Experian, even if they don’t realize what their subsiderary is doing. And shame on all those mortgage brokers who, after finding out the game Lower My Bills dot com is playing, continue to use their referal service.

I cannot say that Lower My Bills dot com uses these same shady and quasi-legal business practices in their other areas, such as insurance or phone bills. I haven’t checked them out in any of these other areas. But I will say that after my experience with them in the area of mortagges, I have absolutely no desire to even look into what they have to offer in the other areas. I just do not trust them.

Your evaluation of LowerMyBill.com is VERY informative, across a range of financial management areas of my life. LMB.com is making SO much money off folks that are having trouble managing their own money, that I wonder how they actually help, and “who they are in usiness with”? having been married to a Mortgage Banking Vice Presdient, who taught me haow to manage money, in cast anything happened to him, I know a bit about “how bankers thiink.” Hubby had friends who were bank presidents and VP’s and he did no trust them!!! Saying their profit motives were way beyond what the bible warned us about, like over 10% moneylenders. Duh… that “civilized limit was passed in the ’80′s on credit card interest!

Could be that the focus of the Banking industry for the last three decades has been to force America in to “having to build credit” through THEIR systems, or we could “not do business in America.” For many years there has been a silent assault by the “Have’s, with money and money management savvy” to get as much money as possible away from the “might Have’s, who cannot manage well.”

For example, the out pouring of credit card applications to my daughter, a bright young girl on scholarship to a very prestigious university in Boston, was UNBELIEVEABLE! Her mail came “home” for me to see, with credit card ap’s EVERY WEEK! Very expensive advertising! Because she was a student AT BU, they assumed she was rich, and it seemed they wanted her to become “credit card dependent.”

The banking industry is no longer a service to American, it is a big financial “monstrosity,” who took control of teh financial landscape of much of our lives, through our purse strings, no matter whether they are silk or plain ole cotton purse strings. To get credit, one had to have money, to keep credit one had to have very deep pockets, during years when “new earners” did ot yet kow how to manage well… and were vulnerable to being “trained by the profit-taking banking industry” to “do it their way!” We all see where tha thas led.

Thanks to banking industry-wide practices, for at least three decades, since the Reagan era of no anti-trust suits and hostile takeovers, there seems to be a sub-class of people who thrive on “managing the hard earned money of trusing, but ill-advised maney managers.” As the wealth has grown in America, the greed and motivation for dishonest profit-takers.” Who can one trust with one’s money?
If bankers and mortgage officers can no longer be trusted to wisely advise folks with money, who can? When I got a mortgage in 1980′s, I trusted my banker and real estate agent in Emporia, Kansas. We met at that emotinal moment, buying my first house, in the bank’s mortgage officer offive at the cross roads downtown. later when the trustable real estate agent went with me to get him to explain why I a single woman with two teenagers all of a sudden had my mortgage payment double, he laughed in our faces! Saying, I should have read the fine print! Ha! Ha! There are laws against that deceptive practice now, if folks are not too embarrassed to admit they were scammed!

It seems that honor and dependable wise advice, left the “world of banking” in America when the vetrans of WWII retired, and their entitled kids felt making money was more important than delivering an honorable service. Do these young “banking bucks” sleep at night, in their second and third houses? But then, I tend to give too much away, and I let this climate of secret “profit takers” creep up on me. I do sleep well at night, at least.

Seems to me I will go to the free advice from AARP volunteers. These helpful folks are “set financially” and will be helpful for no cost. That is a good place to start to get a dependable “credit advisor.” They will know honorable people who will give good advice, as has been offered here. Thanks, Ask Deb!

Thanks.

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