The companies that promote services for debt relief programs cater to people who think they cannot manage their numerous debt obligations by themselves. These businesses take the funds from you every month and distribute it between your creditors, with whom they may have worked out reduced interest rates or reduced payments. They assess your financial status, plan out your monthly expense and negotiate with your creditors with the aim to give you the best debt relief program. On the surface this seems like a good way to go but it has its problems..

These services are not cheap and the companies will send you a bill.. This will be over and above what you’re paying to repay your debt. The repayment plan that they will work out with your creditors will be low interest, but payable over a longer period of time. The longer that you take to pay more interest you will pay, this means that you may end up with a much larger bill then you would have made no changes..

Yet another problem with hiring these companies is that once you go through them to pay off your loans, there is a chance that your credit score will go down. In this case, if you apply for further loans, you will be treated as if you had filed for personal bankruptcy by credit companies.

Nevertheless, all is not lost entirely! Even though it may not seem like it, personal debt relief is not as tricky or specialized as you may have been led to believe. You can actually do it on your own. What you do need is a bit of logical reasoning and some planning. The following are some suggestions.

1.Set a Budget: You know what you need to spend each month so it should not be very difficult to jot down your expenses.. Define the fixed expense of the month and do not spend beyond that. Also, writing down your expenses helps you identify the areas where you spend money unnecessarily.

2.Set aside the Repayment money: Budget for some amount of money from your monthly income to go towards repayment of your debts. This would be similar to handing over the money to a third party which then will pay your lenders, except that you do not have to pay anyone for doing it! Also, since you have already set that money aside, you will not be enticed to spend it.

3.Save: With your spending budget organized, you will be able to identify required expenses and areas where you can cut corners. Cutting down on unnecessary expenses means you will have more funds to repay your debts. Some of the spots where you can cut down are hanging out, dining out and chores like laundry, gardening, plumbing and cleaning.

4.Prioritize: Always pay the high interest loans first, before moving on to loans with lower interests. Some experts recommend taking a loan with a lower interest rate to repay the high interest loans.

As you can see, no rocket science is needed in a good Debt Relief Program. All you need is a budget, a proper assessment of your money and how you spend it, a disciplined and intelligent plan of pay back and managed spending.