Sued - have 21 days to respond
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Posted by John
(24.210.105.190) on September 30, 2003 at 01:12:12:
I am from Michigan and have just received a "summons and complaint" form saying that I am being sued for a debt I owed a while back ago (5 years). The complaint form says $5000 with the interest and other applicable costs. The debt now appears to be owned by an attorneys office and not the original creditor. As of right now, I have no job, no bank account, no money and no home (living with parents) but do have an old used car that's probably worth no more then $800. The complaint says I have 21 days to respond and has a case# in the top right corner so it appears to be real. I have read through some of the messages here and this paper: http://www.nwjustice.org/docs/205.htm but am not sure how I should proceed. As I read through the "how to answer a lawsuit for debt collection" paper, it said something about if I don't respond then the plaintiff will win automatically and get the amount they own PLUS the cost of the suit? Is this true? If so, what kind of cost are we talking about? Is it in the thousands? I'm wondering what my options are. Should I not respond since I own practically nothing and can't pay right now. Can I just claim bankruptcy? Or is claiming bankruptcy too expensive or just not an option in this case. What's the worse they can do to me? Note that I don't know the last payment date I made to the original creditors off hand, but I'm guessing it's been somewhere around 5 years.
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