I’m being sued by an entity that claims they’ve purchased an old debt. Unfortunately I have no records of this account except for a payment 4+ years ago I apparently made. I’m not really sure about any of the claims being made, though it’s possible that I closed that account due to the high interest a while ago.
I need to answer this suit and ask for evidence of the debt, but I have no idea what kind of lawyer I need, for one, and where to find one. Google offers me some shady looking law firms with websites designed in 1992.
Is there some official place online provided by the government in NJ I can look through a directory of lawyers? Or maybe a popular online directory like say there are for doctors/dentists?
You can ask for relevant details from the dunning company on your own time vs having attorney charge you $500 and hour to do the same thing. First pull your credit report. You can do so for free and see if the debt is listed on your report. If the attorney has to do the legwork to pull up all these details you would easily get on your own it could get expensive.
Also go to your state website and see if there are judgments against you. If this debt is large enough to be contacting lawyers whom you may have to pay a thousand or more dollars to defend you I would get as much info as I could and research enforceability of the action before dumping it in the lap of an attorney. A lot of the time billing companies chase non-collectible debts they have purchased for pennies on the dollar and rely on fear for compliance. Do a little research on your own before getting a lawyer involved.
Then, once you have as much information as possible, call your local bar society and ask if they have a referral system for lawyers who handle debt defense.
Also, ask around with friends, family, work - see if anyone else has needed a debt defense lawyer and could recommend one they used.
Once you do the first steps should you decide you want a lawyer, check with your county bar association. NJ is like PA in that they have strong county networks and provide a lot of information and referrals.
This last one is quite interesting and outlines how much the debt collector likely paid for your debt when buying it from the original debt holder. 2 to 4 cents on the dollar (even less if it’s a medical debt) seems average. So say you owed $ 1000 they might only have $20 - $40 actually invested. You REALLY need to read this last link.
It’s for ~$4k. Which is not chump change to me, but neither would I want to spend $2,000 on a lawyer to fight it. thanks for the links guys. Anoher confusing thing is that the lawsuit paper says ~4k, but the actual court paper attached says ~$1k. not sure why the discrepancy, clerical error?
I’m going to see about gathering as much info about this on my own and see if I can consult with a lawyer for an answer to the lawsuit, hopefully only for a nominal consultation fee.
So you received an actual summons, from a court? In that case, you probably do need a lawyer, or at least a consultation with one, as soon as possible - if you don’t answer the summons within a fairly short period of time (3 weeks in MA for example) they can petition for a default judgement against you.
Most of the links provided are about what to do if you’ve got a dunning letter or phone calls from a debt collector, before the courts are involved. If they’re actually in the process of suing you, a lot of that information isn’t useful any more.
It’s actually surprising they’d go straight to suing you though - they’d usually try at least a few phone calls first to see if you’ll pay up without them putting in any more effort.
This is not intended as advice or something I’m suggesting you ought to do, but merely trying to help with more information: on NPR a while back there was a story about a person who was sued by a debt collector for payment on something that, as I remember, the individual wasn’t quite sure was his debt or not.
The person in the story showed up to the court date and just happened to talk to a lawyer, who advised him to ask for proof of the debt. The person talked to the debt collector’s lawyer, and asked for proof of the debt. When the case was called before the judge, the debt collector’s lawyer simply dropped the lawsuit.
What became apparent in this case is that the debt collection company would sue people, counting on them not to show up. In which case, the judge would enter a default judgment for the plaintiff, giving them an ability to do other things (garnish wages, liens, and so on) to collect the funds. Further, the debt collectors did not seem to have any actual evidence behind their claim – it sounds like they simply bought a spreadsheet from another debt collector that read: John Smith, owes $4,000 to Home Depot, last known address. No documentation, no proof of Smith signing up for a credit card, etc. So if the lawyer for the debt collection company was challenged on any facts of the case, he would simply drop it and move on to the next case where the alleged debtor was more likely to be a no-show.
Again, and I can’t emphasize this enough: I don’t know that the facts of this case is applicable to yours. Consulting a lawyer is probably a pretty solid idea. Maybe he will advise you just to show up to the court and challenge it in the same manner, I don’t know.
But I did want to share that there seem to be examples of people who can fight off baseless lawsuits without extensive legal assistance. Here is a resource more focused on New York State:
