Plenty of organizations are willing to help you negotiate a manageable schedule to repay your debts. However, beware there are also some companies hoping to profit from your desperation and will employ high-pressure sales tactics to get you to sign with them.

Before you seek a counselors' expertise, that you will pay for, have you considered some of the easy solutions. Such as consolidating your debt on a low interest credit card, borrowing from your 401(k) (be careful with this one), borrowing from a family member, and most importantly have you tried to reduce your expenses. Assuming you have tried all these efforts you may want to talk to a debt counselor.

Choosing a Debt Counselor
The first thing you need to do is find a good debt management counselor. This can be a challenge since this is not something we all feel the most comfortable discussing with friends and neighbors. This just means you do some of the legwork yourself. Here are a few things to keep in mind to make the task easier.

You might want to start your search looking for a nonprofit firm. Nonprofits get most of their funding from creditors, not you. They may only ask for a nominal fee to enroll. One of the benefits working with a non-profit counselors is their relationship with the debt community. They can sometimes negotiate better rates with creditors on your behalf.

One-Pay Plans
After you have identified an organization you are ready to work with, pull all your bills together and be ready. When you meet with your counselor they will figure out what you owe. Next they will work with you to determine how much you can pay each month. 

Now, instead of making payments to everyone you owe, you'll make only one payment to the service, which will then distribute the money. The goal is to develop a plan that allows you to enjoy the necessities of life, and at the same time to reduce the amounts you owe. After you have got yourself started in a program, all those dreaded phone calls from creditors should stop.

Once you've set up a payment schedule, the counselor will talk to creditors and try to get them to reduce your interest rates and waive late fees to shorten your time in debt. The counselor may also discuss with creditors that they report past due amounts as current.

Creditors generally are glad to see you enrolled in a repayment program, instead of heading to bankruptcy court. If creditors were to employ the services of a collection agency, the agency would take perhaps half of whatever it recovered. So, it's a better deal for your creditors if you voluntarily repay.

If this type of plan gets you part of the way there, you might want to consider a debt-consolidation loan. When rates are low, this could be a good alternative. If you could consolidate at a 8% rate that sure beats a 17% credit card rate. 

Budgeting Process
Budgeting is a crucial part to anyone's financial issues. This becomes more important as you work to free yourself from debt. Counselors can help you establish a budget process. Many don't know how much they spend each day. They may know about things like, rent, mortgage and utility bills. But so many of us lose track of how much we spend on extras like videos, going out to eat, and gas. To help you start the budget process, begin keeping track of all your daily expenses, you might be surprised.

Counselors can help you track your spending. They teach you to record what you pay right down to the newspaper, doughnut and the cup of coffee you grabbed on the way to work. Counselors usually are trained to walk you through every category and come up with an acceptable budget. Counselors can check in with you to make sure you working from the budgeted plan.