That's why I qualify all of this with a legal system that is able to seize the assets of debtors when needed. In that case, it doesn't matter whether you want to pay $1,000 or not, you will be made to.
> That's why I qualify all of this with a legal system that is able to seize the assets of debtors when needed. In that case, it doesn't matter whether you want to pay $1,000 or not, you will be made to.
Sure, if you have a legal system that has zero cost, zero risk of not getting the outcome you expect, takes zero time to operate, doesn't include bankruptcy or other avenues of discharging debt, and debtors never have multiple competing claims on their assets that are not part of the same package being sold... if all that is true, then the amount a third-party purchaser should be willing to pay for debt should generally be the lesser of the face value or the total of the debtor's assets.
However, those assumptions bear basically no resemblance to any set of conditions that applies in the real world, so its all meaningless.
Keep in mind that if I can settle a debt for $1000 I may very well be able to lend money from friends or family to do so, whereas I'd likely be unwilling to do that if I would face certain bankruptcy regardless.
There are many situations where a person may not have any seizable assets, but still have the ability to raise cash to cover a firm offer to settle a debt.
