Tips on spending less and getting more for your money
Manage your money wisely, stop accumulating debt, and start paying it off today!
Are you carrying too much debt? Relax! This practical guide gives you simple, effective methods for paying off your bills as quickly as possible and getting your finances back on track. You'll find proven strategies for slashing spending, consolidating debts, dealing with collectors, handling high-risk debt such as a mortgage or car loan, and avoiding future debt problems.
"Managing Debt For Dummies arms consumers with all of the tools and information they need to pay down their debts. It's an essential guide for anyone with money troubles."
—Richard Alderman, Director of the Center for Consumer Law, Associate Dean, University of Houston Law School
Discover how to
- Create a debt-busting budget
- Improve your spending habits
- Use credit cards responsibly
- Negotiate with creditors
- Manage past-due debt
- Rebuild your credit history
About the Author
John Ventura: John is a best-selling author and a nationally boardcertified bankruptcy attorney. He is also an adjunct professor at the University of Houston Law School and the director of the Texas Consumer Complaint Center at the Law School.
As a young boy, John dreamed of becoming a Catholic priest so he could help everyday people, and he spent his high school years in a Catholic seminary. After graduating, however, John decided to achieve his dream by combining journalism with the law. Therefore, he earned an undergraduate degree in journalism and a law degree from the University of Houston Law School. Later, he and a partner established a law firm in Texas, building it into one of the most successful consumer bankruptcy firms in the state. He subsequently began a successful consumer law firm in South Texas.
Today, as Director of the Texas Consumer Complaint Center, he supervises law students as they help consumers with their legal problems. He is also a regular speaker at law conferences around the country and serves on the Bankruptcy Council for the Texas Bar Association.
Mary Reed: Mary Reed is a personal finance writer who has coauthored or ghostwritten numerous books on topics related to consumer money matters and legal rights. The books she has coauthored with John Ventura include The Everyday Law Kit for Dummies, Divorce For Dummies, and Good Advice for a Bad Economy (Berkeley Books). Mary has also written for the magazines Good Housekeeping, Home Office Computing, and Small Business Computing, and she has ghostwritten numerous articles that have appeared in national and local publications.
Mary is also the owner of Mary Reed Public Relations (MR•PR), an Austin, Texas-based firm that provides public relations services to a wide variety of clients, including authors, publishers, attorneys, financial planners, healthcare professionals, retailers, hotels, restaurants, and nonprofits.
