Solving Credit Card Debt

Call it coincidence, or serendipity. I ended my previous post two days ago with a one liner on credit card debt :

And the road to bankruptcy hell is paved with credit card debt.

Yesterday, at the library, came across a book in the personal finance and investment stacks. It caught my eye because the title was so unlike a finance / investment book - just two simple words. Save Karyn.

For those who missed it, or have forgotten - www.savekaryn.com was one of the earliest “give me a dollar or more” websites that came up during 2002. The story of a 29 year old woman who’d run up over $20,000 in credit card debt, lost her job - and launched a website asking for help to repay the debt. 20 weeks later, thanks to a lot of interest from the media and contributions from readers, the debt was wiped out. The website still continues, though no longer asking for help.

As a book, this is an ok one-time read. I wouldn’t recommend buying it; nothing great or memorable, but having some human interest for a casual weekend read. The website too, is not particularly of note now. A few tips about debt reduction and some random links including charity, makeup, ways to kill time etc. What’s really interesting is the archive of the original site.

And the interest it evoked, back in 2002. The listing of various mails / emails received, together with replies, is worth reading, for an insight into net etiquette and the lack of it, on part of some of the correspondents.

The one part of the book which I found useful was the self analysis of why the site was so successful, and why imitators aren’t as successful. To quote from the book :

So I wasn’t the first Internet panhandler out there. I was technically the third. But I offered more than the Amazing Dollar Guy, and I offered something different from Odd Todd. I was “new” in the Internet panhandling world, and that’s why I think it was so successful.

… The ones whose “owners” (for lack of a better word) put time into updating and keeping them fresh, obviously collect more money than the sites whose owners don’t update them at all, but it’s still not that much.

For a person who’s having credit card debt problems, this book will provide two morale boosters ;
1) You’re not the only one to have these problems - there’s a whole world of such people. And
2) It can be beat. Takes time, and effort. Some manage it faster than the others. But it can be done, if you choose to.

Three years ago, November 10, 2002 according to Karyn Bosnak’s website, she closed off all outstanding credit card debt.

On the third anniversary, let’s hope it continues to provide help and inspiration to others with similar problems.

Written by 2cworth on November 28th, 2005 with no comments.
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