Are we responsible?

[gophermn]

Got a couple things in the mail today and curious if I am responsible or not. Obviously I will ask my attny but checking for inside info.

1. My rental house is covered in the CH7 petition and I received a notice that I owe for utilities. The property is empty and I am giving it up. The utility bill is only $175.00 so do I just pay it or toss it over to my attny?

2. I had a line of credit ($800) with a bank and listed that in my bankruptcy. The bank is now trying to go after my wife being she was a co-applicant on the account. Any ideas there?

Thanks all and enjoy the upcoming weekend!

[HHM]

1. You can go either way on this one. Since it is such a token amount, you should probalby just pay it...it will cost you $26 to amend the petition (on top of whatever your attorney may charge). If you don't pay it, the only possible consequence, is that the electric company may require a deposit from you if you ever set up new service if you ever move from your current residence.

2. No ideas, you are screwed. If your wife is not filing BK with you and she is a co-applicant, she is fair game, sorry.

[lrprn]

1. My rental house is covered in the CH7 petition and I received a notice that I owe for utilities. The property is empty and I am giving it up. The utility bill is only $175.00 so do I just pay it or toss it over to my attny?

I agree with HHM's take on this, but one additional thing to consider is if the utilities cover a period from AFTER you filed.

Ask your lawyer whether the utility can make a case that the bill shouldn't be discharged because it's post-filing. Will cost you more to prove you shouldn't have to pay it in court than just to pay the darned thing now and be done with it.

Also ask your lawyer if you should shut off utilities to the empty rental home so you won't get any further utility bills.

[gophermn]

Thank you for the advice...

[millerc507]

Pay the utilities. We had to BK a $750 business electric bill and they the electric company required us to pay a $252 deposit when we initially filed a chapter 7--even though we weren't BK'ing our house account. Then, when we converted to a 13, they wanted us to pay another $286 deposit because it was seen as a new petition. Knowing that we were going to be going back to a 7 (long story) they said we would be required to pay a 3rd deposit. Even though we were only BK'ing the one company bill from May 2006. We ultimately had our electric utilities put in my dad's name until we get this mess straightened out. We had already paid the one deposit in December of 07. There was no way we could afford 2 more.

Your wife will have to pay or file. Sorry, I know that is not what you wanted to hear. Good luck!

[gophermn]

Grrrrrrrrrr - oh well I have absolutely no issues paying these two debts considering that is one drop of water in a ocean of water.

Thanks all!!