I can’t think of any better day than Friday the 13th to revisit the topic of debt consolidation. By and large, Americans carry too much debt. (I reckon I do.) Perhaps some folks look at the way our government’s been operating lately and think that it’s okay to spend so much without having the income to back it up. (I reckon I don’t.)

But here’s the question … when you end up with a few extra dollars at the end of the month, do you use it to pay down your personal debt or do you end up blowing the cash on a whim? After all, how much debt-financed stuff can you cram in your garden shed? When done the right way, debt consolidation makes good financial sense.

You owe it to yourself to get a handle on things. The first steps in debt consolidation should include a bit of time with a pencil, some paper, and a good debt calculator. Once you have all of that debt in one place and staring you in the face, you can make the decisions to clean it up.

Debt consolidation offers come from all sides. I’ve seen scads of offers in my snail (USPS) mailbox. If the offer is from a reputable, recognizable company, I’m more likely to trust it. But I don’t trust any of the offers that land in my email box. It sure would be nice if there were an internet filtering system for dubious financial offers!

I’m also very wary of debt consolidation offers from outbound telemarketers. To the best of my recollection, I have never agreed to anything financial based upon a cold call from a predictive dialer equipped outbound call center.

Inbound, perhaps. But not outbound.