Did Advantage Preferred Financial send you a mailer that claims you might qualify for a loan (similar to the one below)? 

They suggest that this loan will allow you to lower monthly payments, save on interest, and become debt free in 12-48 months.

Have you applied?

If situation happened to you, or you’d like to learn more about Advantage Preferred Financial as a company, we’ll cover all of that in this article. 

What is Advantage Preferred Financial?

Advantage Preferred Financial History

After doing some research online, we’ve discovered that Advantage Preferred Financial claims to offer “fresh starts” through loan programs, home improvement financing, and debt consolidation options. Their website, advpreferred.com, was created a fair amount of time ago, with the registration date being 10/27/2017.

Their operations seem to be headquartered out of the following address: 405 E Lafayette Street, Somonauk, IL 60552. However, after looking at this location on google maps, it simply seems to be a house or warehouse of sorts.

There are also discrepancies with the company’s privacy policy and its terms & conditions. When we clicked on them at the bottom of the website, both links redirected us to the corresponding pages on a website called NewStart Financial. We are not sure why these links on Advantage Preferred Financial’s website would redirect us there and what the relationship between the two companies might be. From a quick scan, it seems like NewStart Financial is also a sort of debt management company, but we were unable to narrow down what type of service they offer. At best, this might be the result of laziness or a business relationship between the two companies. At worst, it could be fraudulent activity or an attempt to misdirect consumers.

Credit Score Requirements

Advantage Preferred Financial does not publicly disclose the credit score criteria needed to be eligible for their debt consolidation loan services. This exclusion is worrying because it fails to give potential customers a clear grasp of the eligibility requirements, which are essential for making well-informed choices. Potential customers should be careful and may want to request further information directly from the company before moving forward with an application.

Advantage Preferred Financial Lending Reviews

Our next step in learning more about this company was looking for reviews online. However, this turned out to be quite difficult as they have neither a BBB page, Yelp page, nor a Google Business Profile page. The best we could do was reference another review written about the company. 

Get Out of Debt Guy

Steve Rhode, a prominent financial advice blogger known as the “Get Out of Debt Guy,” offers a mixed review of Advantage Preferred Financial. He highlights a mailer from the company that promotes its debt settlement program, which claims to offer all the benefits of debt consolidation without the need for a new loan or high-interest fees. Immediately, he also notes a contradiction between the company’s promotional materials, which focus on debt settlement, and its website, which prominently offers loan programs. This discrepancy raises questions about the company’s clarity and consistency in communicating its services.

Rhode’s review suggests caution and recommends that potential clients thoroughly weigh out their options before committing to any financial services offered by Advantage Preferred Financial. He also mentions a concern regarding the company’s business registration and physical address, advising further research to ensure the company’s legitimacy.

Important Distinction: Debt Consolidation Loans vs Debt Consolidation Programs

Now that we’ve brought to light how Advantage Preferred Financial operates as a business, we’d like to explain the differences between debt consolidation loans and debt consolidation programs (aka. debt consolidation / debt relief). In short, there is a huge difference between the two, and it’s important not to get them mixed up. 

Debt consolidation loans are loans you receive (typically with a lower interest rate than the rest of your outstanding debts) to consolidate your debts and pay them off faster. With debt consolidation programs, you allow your debts to fall behind so that a debt consolidation company can settle your debts for ~50% of their value. Debt consolidation companies also typically take a fee of ~25% of your debt’s value. With debt consolidation, it is possible that there might be hidden origination fees, balance transfer fees, closing costs, and annual fees. Furthermore, even though your monthly payment might be lower, the interest will likely accrue over a longer period of time, causing you to pay a higher amount of interest over the life of the loan.

Therefore, it is crucial to compare different debt consolidation programs and be aware of any hidden costs or fees. If you are looking for a loan, however, we have 2 debt consolidation loan options that do not affect your credit score when checking rate and do not charge prepayment penalties.

How Much Do Debt Consolidation Programs Cost?

At Ascend, we believe that debt consolidation programs (debt relief) may be a good option, but often in context in understanding all the costs and duration estimates of all your options. As such we built the free debt consolidation program cost calculator below to help you compare your current monthly obligations to a debt consolidation program.

Generally programs cost between 15-25% of your enrolled debt amount.

Alternative Options to Advantage Preferred Financial Lending

Many people prefer to try to get a debt consolidation loan before looking at options such as debt management, debt payoff planning, debt settlement or bankruptcy. If you’ve searched far and wide for a loan and can qualify, consider taking the free debt consolidation program cost calculator below that allows you to compare to other options.

Closing Thoughts

From our research, although not definitive or exhaustive by any means, we are unsure of the legitimacy of products offered by Advantage Preferred Financial. The discrepancies and ambitious claims from the company make us unable to recommend them in any way. We believe there is too much uncertainty and that ample amount of research should be conducted before possibly becoming their client.