| Volume 143 Number 94 |
Subscribe to the Newsletter
Forward this news alert to your family and friends
Helpful Links
Texas Consumer Complaint Center
Credit Reports and Identity Theft
Your Guide to Small Claims Court
Contact Us
1-713-743-2168
The People’s Lawyer’s Tip of the Day
Nobody likes getting debt collection calls. But have you ever gotten one for a debt you already paid — or you know isn’t yours? Or have you been threatened and harassed by a debt collector until you paid up? If so, here's how to protect yourself. Click here for more.
Consumer confidence took a surprising turn higher in September
Consumers appear to be feeling a lot more confident heading into the fall months, despite an uncertain election season, spiking cases of the coronavirus (COVID-19), and the prospect of more businesses falling victim to the pandemic.
The Conference Board reports its Consumer Confidence Index for September leaped higher after falling in both July and August. The September index was 101.8 compared to 86.3 in August.
But where did that confidence come from? Click here for more.
Your Money
A 20% down payment on a home was once the benchmark, but many buyers can't or choose not to come up with this amount. One downside of skipping a traditional down payment is that you'll owe private mortgage insurance, or PMI. Here's an introduction to PMI and why you might need to plan to pay for it each month. Click here for more.
For the Lawyers
Who decides if an agreement subject to arbitration exists? The Third Circuit recently addressed what’s been called the “queen of all threshold issues” in arbitration law: does a court or an arbitrator decide whether an agreement exists, if the purported agreement delegates that decision to an arbitrator? The Court answered this circular question by holding that, under the Federal Arbitration Act, questions about the making of an agreement to arbitrate are for the courts to decide “unless the parties have clearly and unmistakably referred those issues to arbitration in a written contract whose formation is not in issue.” In the instant case, formation of the contract was in dispute, so the Court had authority to decide whether an agreement existed. In MZM Constr. Co. v. N.J. Bldg. Laborers Statewide Benefit Funds Click here for more.