Credit card loans-unpaid?

Question

A friend of mine has unpaid credit card loans. This happened 5 years ago. He was not able and can no longer repay the credit cards Company. I believe he accumulated $10,000.00 in debt. What will happen to him? Will he go to jail? I know he has bad credit. He became sick then and his family made him go to the Philippines so they can take care of him. This all happened in California. Thanks

Answer 1

The collecting SOL in Ca. is 4 years (and possibly 2 years if he was not the one who actively sought credit from the company but the company sought him to offer him credit)

BUT - if he left the country before the 4 years had expired, the SOL would have stopped running at the date he left the country. If he returns, the SOL will pick up from when it stop and continue to run for the remaining time.
{For example, he defaulted on a credit card then left the country one year later. He does not return to the U.S. for 5 years. The SOL would have stopped at one year. When he returns 5 years later, the SOL start to run again and will continue to run for 3 more years}

If he left the country "after" the SOL had expired, he would be out of SOL and they "legally" would not be able to sue him - though they often do sue on time barred debts.

It may possible that he could already have a default judgment filed against him right now.
The judgment time limits are like the example for the SOL that I posted. The judgment SOL will stop running until he returns to the U.S.

He would not go to jail over a bad credit card debt.
If they sue and win, they would probably seize any U.S. bank account in his name and place liens on any U.S. property he has in his name.

I seriously doubt they will bother to track him down in the Philippines.

Answer 2

This will affect his credit - as they will show up as collections - the credit card companies will eventually send him to collections, and try to get anything that they can out of him. A lot of times rather than using a debt consolidation company, you can call and negotiate directly with the credit card company and come up with a "settlement" - alot of times they will waive fees (overlimit, late, etc) and work with you, as long as you make some sort of effort to talk to them.

Answer 3

Everything counts, it just depends on the apartment management company and their policies, which usually depend on how nice the apartment and area are. Like the first guy said it also depends on what credit bureau they pull your report from as to what is actually on it. But it sounds like you don't have that great of credit and may have trouble - or may have to pay a higher deposit, just depending on how nice of a place you are looking at.