Welcome to Consumerism Commentary for the 20th edition of the Carnival of Debt Reduction! If you are new to this blog, take a look around. You may want to find out more about me or browse through a categorical “Best of 2005.”

The Carnival of Debt Reduction is a living document that travels from week to week, showcasing great articles or advice on paying down debt. Let’s get started.

Free Money Finance holds the opinion that loans taken with only 0% down are debt traps. Not everyone agrees with this point of view. In his post, Are 0% Loans Good, Bad, or Does it Depend? FMF and a reader-commenter square off.

If you’ve ever felt scammed by your creditors, you have to take a look at this scam. Five Cent Nickel reports on a news story that involved one man being scammed out of $15,000. The scheme involves scammers who pull of a typical scam, then show up pretending to be detectives working on the case. (Didn’t I see this in a movie recently? Yes, it’s here in the script, on page 13 [pdf].)

Within minutes of buying his house, Jim from Blueprint for Financial Prosperity was accosted by refinancing offers. He is surprised to learn that these offers are accepted by people who just paid their closing costs!

Josh Cohen from Multiple Mentality has some news for some Ford owners, or those who are using the company’s e-bill tool to pay down their mortgage. If you fit this category, you will definitely want to read about these changes to and gripes about Ford’s e-bill system.

Do you experience paycheck paralysis? Do you work all week only to look at your paycheck and wonder where all the money went? If the answer is not “into the savings account,” then you need to read about this. Wealth Junkie offers advice from someone who has been strapped for cash—and survived.

Is history doomed to repeat itself? Wenchypoo delivers some Frugal Wisdom from her Warehouse about our conumerati culture. Our borrow-and-spend habits will be downfall of us or our future generations.

Kirby on Finance presents a four-step plan for tackling credit card balances.

The Wandering Indian Monk has discovered the benefits of refinancing HELOCs with the same bank that holds the HELOC. While noting the benefits, he also provides a warning.

Cheapy the Cheapskate is celebrating his/her second anniversary of being smoke free. Read this entry to find out how much money Cheapy saved in those two years.

Amanda from Young and Broke points out the recent changes affecting student loan interest. What will these changes do to students’ education-related debt? Amanda tells us here.

Jay S. Fleischman writes the New York Bankruptcy and Consumer Law Blog. This week, he has submitted an article that provides the answer to the oft-asked question: can the bankruptcy court take a house co-owned with a non-debtor? If you’ve ever been in this situation, or foresee that you will, make sure you read the article. If you don’t think this will apply to you, feel free to read the article anyway!

Dan Melson from Searchlight Crusade presents part five of his series, Games Lenders Play. In this edition, a reader, who writes in to the website suspicious of his bank’s refinancing offer, has his fears confirmed.

Harrison, the webmaster and blogger behind Journey to FInancial Freedom, presents six tips for fighting debt to achieve financial freedom.

The Mighty Bargain Hunter—who originated the Carnival of Debt Reduction—focuses on an article from MSN Money and recommends a newsletter which provides a solution for preventing debt rather than controlling the damage after the fact.

No Credit Needed is proud to announce his new podcast which focuses on debt-related issues. Take a listen!

And finally, this week here at Consumerism Commentary, I put the “personal” back into personal finance and talked about my decision to move several thousand of dollars from savings towards debt—but in a manner not following the advice of your typical finance guru. Some discussion resulted, so check it out.

Next week’s Carnival of Debt Reduction will be hosted by Free Money Finance.