Setting Up Business as a Debt Collector in Oregon

We occasionally get questions from people who want to set up business as debt collectors. It’s a tough business and I recommend an apprenticeship first, but who am I to stop the dreamers who want to set up shop, in the food business, in retail, in debt collection, in private investigation, or any other small business endeavor.

Librarians like dreamers and some of our small business dreamers manage to make their dreams come true.

We also like dreamers who do their legal research. There are a lot of small business research resources all over the Internet, including the ones you’ll find at your public library and others like this Small Business Legal Clinic (and I blogged about it here).

At the Washington County Law Library, we have materials that creditor-debtor lawyers use for research. These are secondary sources (books about the law as opposed to primary sources, which are the law) to read if you want to set yourself up as a debt collector. There are other books on the subject, at your public library and your local or online bookstores:

1) Creditors’ Rights and Remedies-OSB, 2002 with 2006 supplement revisions-Looseleaf

2) Foreclosing Security Interests-OSB, 1997 with 2005 supplement revisions-Looseleaf

3) Fundamentals of Collecting Money Judgments-OSB CLE-2003

4) The Investigator’s Manual-OCDLA-2001-Looseleaf

5) Judgments and Collecting Judgments in Oregon Avoiding the Pitfalls, OLI, CLE-2007

And then there are the laws themselves, state and federal.