[crazygringo]

This headline/article is silly.

Yes, it's optional in the sense that you won't go to prison.

But if you want any chance of being able to take out a mortgage on a house, or to finance a car purchase, then it's not very optional. Not to mention a bad credit score makes it much harder to even rent many apartments.

Also, lenders will sue you if you have the money. In which case it's no longer optional either, when they win.

The article is about shady practices of debt collectors, but in no way does that ever make a leap to the idea that paying consumer debt is "optional". If you don't pay, it generally has real negative consequences. It's up to you whether those consequence are worth it.

[NovemberWhiskey]

>If you don't pay, it generally has real negative consequences.

If you owe a lot of money on your credit cards, the lender will actually sue you - rather than selling the debt - and then put a lien on your property. I once bought a house in an estate sale which was also a short sale (I do not advise this) and both American Express and another bank had done this to the prior owner who owed $20-30K.

[latchkey]

> I do not advise this

That sounds like an interesting story...

[NovemberWhiskey]

It's not that interesting - it's just that there is a much larger number of parties who have to be in agreement about the sale, and the sale price, than is typical - you end up with probate court judges, lien holders, the executor, the estate's attorney as well as possibly a second real estate attorney for the estate and absolutely all of them (and their staff) can be sick / on vacation / golfing which wreaks havoc on the closing timeline.

Plus if there is any FUBAR paperwork it is much more difficult to fix if it means going back to probate court to (for example) add a spouse who was wrongly omitted from the approval to sell ... in this case, I ended up getting the mortgage and deed by myself and then quitclaiming the property to the two of us because that was less hassle.

Oh, and short sales in probate are basically always as-is because the estate has no money to make good any repairs to the property.

[latchkey]

Thanks for the explanation... so yea... it sounds like everyone dips their fingers into the pie and by the time you take ownership, you've paid almost as much as a regular house purchase. I mean "paid" not just in the financial sense, but also in time/energy/sanity.