Vehicle repo 8 yrs ago. Am I required to pay?

Submitted by chillnmellow on Wed, 10/08/2008 - 05:15
Forums

I was contacted by a collection agency today and was told that I am required to pay for a Repo'd auto that I had back in 2000. The last payment that I made was Dec. 2002. The collection Agency that I had at the time said I had to pay a percentage of what the vehicle was sold at auction. This is a new Agency, and of course, they only have the last payment that was made by myself. What do I do? Does SOL come into play? I think they said I owe $4290 and interest at 5% tolled it to over $5000.
Pennsylvania Resident and also Active Duty Military (Non-Residing)

Welcome to the forum. I'm somewhat new to this site, but from what I've learned from here so far is that the SOL begins from the date of the last payment. I'm not sure what the SOL is in PA, but I'm sure someone will answer your post with that info. Also, you will want to send a DV letter by certified mail-return receipt. They must respond within 30 days with the proper validation to collect this debt. I'm currently disputing a number of items on my credit report and am waiting for responses from these collection agencies. From my understanding, if they cannot provide proper validation of the debt within that 30 day period, you can request that the item be deleted from your CR (if it shows up there) and order the CA to cease & desist from further collection activity.

Wed, 10/08/2008 - 17:51 Permalink

I have checked my Credit Report and it's not on there. It was taken off some time in 2005/2006. My credit is good too, and I don't want this to affect my score of 759.

Thu, 10/09/2008 - 00:11 Permalink

SOl in PA is 4 years. The mark actually stays on your credit for 7 years so it looks like yours has "fallen off". Let me explain in detail:
PA SOL is 4 years so you can legally only be held responsible for this debt for that period of time (4 yrs). If they do take you to court, which most won't cause they are aware of the SOL) they wouldn't win anyway because the SOL legally protects you.
A negative marking can stay on your report for 7 years and then falls off. You said this happened in 2000 so it has actually been 8 years so that is why you do not see it there. They can not put this debt back on your credit UNLESS you remake payments and then you are no longer prtected from the SOL and can be sued.
So if you made a payment in 2002 thats roughly 6 years ago..you are protected and do NOT make any payments to this debt or you wil open yourself up to a law suit. You can send them a cease and desist letter by certified mail and then they can no longer even contact you. They can sell it to another collection agency but then you just send the cease and desist letter to them.

Thu, 10/09/2008 - 15:40 Permalink

It is a letter asking them to no londer have any contact with you. They have to cease having any type of contact/. Type in sample letters on the ask part of the forum because there are many listed on the site. You need to be sure to send it certified mail..return receipt requested. If not they can keep contacting you and say they never recieved it.

Mon, 10/13/2008 - 00:47 Permalink

Hi chillnmellow
C adn D letter is basically a legal letter which is normally sent to a a CA if they harass you continuously for a particular debt which you do not owe. When you sent a cease and desist letter to a creditor, the creditor must cease the process of collecting the debt from you. As soon as you send a C and D letter to a CA, they will put your debt account under legal status and may bring legal suit against you immediately. So you should be sure that you do not owe the debt, before you send a Cease and desist letter

Mon, 10/13/2008 - 03:18 Permalink

Whenever you are sending a cease and desist letter, you must be sure that you do not owe the debt. So you should first send a debt validation letter to the CA and wait for 30 days of their receipt of your letter. If they can properly validate your debt, you should not send a C and D letter because you might owe the debt, but if they do not validate it, you can send a C and D letter by certified mail with a return receipt.

Mon, 10/13/2008 - 03:43 Permalink

What if my credit report is clean and clear with no collection and suddenly one collection say i owe them some money and if i dont respond they will bring me to court from what i know i have a collection more than 8 years ago and all my collection either been dispute and deleted from credit bureaus and also expired and automatic deleted from bureaus what should i do now?

Fri, 05/17/2013 - 05:20 Permalink