being sued, what to do?

[batorideikou]

What is the name of your state? PA
Being that I've never been sued before, I have no idea what to do with this. Discover has sent a lawyer after me, and there's a trial or whatever in Sept, but I got served with documents saying that I have to send an "answer" by June 18th or else they "may place a judgement against me by default, and it may result in loss of my rights or property or both".
Okay, a few questions:
1) How do I go about filing this "answer" and can I do it by mail, etc? What is an "answer", what does it consist of? And if I were to not file one, what would happen?
2) I own nothing at all of value, the only thing I have is a car whose title is in my name, and it cost me a whopping $200 (a beater), so is there something to protect my property to the giant value of $200? I mean can I stand to actually lose anything at all? When I say I own nothing of value, I mean nothing, this computer is prolly the most expensive thing I own, and it's probably depriciated to about $300 by now, it's 2 years old. I don't own a house or property or anything of that sort.
Also, could anyone let me know if they know of someone CHEAP to file bankruptcy with in PA? I want to before the deadline of that bill that goes into effect, but the lawyer that I've consulted with so far is like $1000, 500 up front 500 afterwards, and I don't understand how they expect to have $1000 if the person is broke to begin with.
Anyway, any help would be greatly appreciated.

[olgethorpe]

You'll find a lot of useful information over at [url]www.creditinfocenter.com[/url]

There info there on dealing with collectors and related topics...

[marbol]

Originally Posted by FWIW

[...] If you dispute that you owe the money, you should most certainly file a response or appear in court. But if you do owe the money, do nothing.

[...]

That sounds like about the worst advice I've ever heard of. Are you a lawyer? Getting a judgement by default IMO is stupid.

Attempt to settle out of court. Tell them the situation and see what they will do. Don't let them get a judgement. That will go on your credit report as a public record - and it's bad like a tax lien - when creditors look at it.

Answer the lawsuit. Don't just do nothing. But try to get them to drop the lawsuit in exchange for a settlement.