We negotiate directly with your creditors to settle your debt for less than you owe — typically 40–60% reduction. No upfront fees, ever. BBB Accredited since 2006.
Six straightforward steps — no surprises, no hidden fees, no pressure.
We review your debts, income, and budget at no cost. You'll know within minutes whether you qualify and roughly what your savings could look like.
We document each unsecured debt and build your personalized program plan — including the monthly deposit amount that fits your budget.
You deposit a monthly amount into a dedicated account you own and control. This becomes the fund we draw from to settle with creditors.
Once enough is saved, our team contacts your creditors and negotiates settlements — typically 40–60 cents on the dollar.
We present each offer to you before accepting anything. You stay in control throughout the entire process, start to finish.
Once you approve, we handle all paperwork. The account is settled and closed. Most clients complete all accounts in 24–48 months.
DebtHelp, Inc. is a private company, and is not affiliated with the United States Department of Education or any other academic entity or governmental agency. DebtHelp, Inc. is not a lender, guarantor, or servicer of federal student loans. You can apply for consolidation and other repayment plans without paid assistance through the United States Department of Education. More information is available on the Department's website or through your federal student loan servicer. You can find out who your servicer is through the United States Department of Education.
Debt settlement is built for one specific situation: you owe more on credit cards and other unsecured accounts than you can realistically pay back in full, and making the minimum payments has stopped moving the balances. It is usually a fit when most of these are true:
It is usually not the right tool if you can pay your balances in full on a reasonable timeline, if your main problem is a mortgage or car loan (secured debts don’t qualify), or if your credit score matters more to you right now than your total balance — for example, if you are about to apply for a mortgage. In those cases a lower-interest repayment plan, a nonprofit credit counseling plan, or talking to your lenders directly may serve you better, and we will tell you so. You can compare the main paths side by side on our options page.
Instead of sending minimum payments to every creditor, you make one monthly deposit into a dedicated account that is held in your name at an insured financial institution and administered by an independent company — not by DebtHelp. The money in it belongs to you, and you can withdraw it at any time. The account administrator charges its own small monthly fee, which is disclosed in writing before you enroll along with every other cost.
The deposit amount is set from your actual budget during your consultation. Once the balance in the account is large enough to make a credible offer on one of your debts, we start negotiating that account. Settlements are then paid from the account, one creditor at a time, as you approve each one.
Settlement works because creditors would generally rather recover part of a balance than risk recovering nothing. That leverage only exists when an account is past due, which means it is important to understand what the months before a settlement can look like:
You are never locked in. You can leave the program at any time, and the money in your dedicated account stays yours.
When a creditor forgives part of a balance, the IRS can treat the forgiven amount as income. If $600 or more is forgiven on a single account, the creditor may send you a Form 1099-C. Many people who settle debt qualify for the insolvency exclusion — if your total debts were larger than your total assets at the time, some or all of the forgiven amount may not be taxable. We are not tax advisors, so plan to talk with a tax professional; our plain-English guide to 1099-C forms is a good place to start.
Nothing up front. DebtHelp earns its fee only after a debt has been settled, you have approved the settlement, and at least one payment has been made toward it — that is what federal rules require, and it is how we work. Our fee is a percentage of the debt you enroll or of the amount you save, depending on your state, and the exact figure is written into your agreement before you sign. If we don’t settle an account, you don’t pay us a fee for it.
Choosing a company matters as much as choosing the strategy. Before you sign with anyone, read how to vet a settlement company, check the states we serve, and ask any company you’re considering exactly when it gets paid.
Takes about 5 minutes. No credit check. No obligation.
Important disclosure: To the extent that any aspect of our debt settlement services relies on or results in your failure to make timely payments to your creditors or debt collectors, using debt settlement services will likely adversely affect your creditworthiness, may result in your being subject to collections or being sued by creditors or debt collectors, and may increase the amount of money you owe due to the accrual of fees and interest by creditors or debt collectors.
DebtHelp, Inc. is registered with the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (DFPI) under the California Consumer Financial Protection Law (CCFPL). Registration No. 01-CCFPL-1838203-3488358. View state licenses.
DEBTHELP® is a registered trademark of DebtHelp, Inc.