Credit Cards with no balances what do you do?

[FloridaGuy]

Hi All,

Have a meeting with attorney again on Monday... as it appears Bankruptcy may be inevitable. But here's a question.

We have a few credit cards such as Home Depot, Best Buy, etc. that have no balances on them. What happens to credit cards during BK? I assume any that you file with get closed.

Is it possible to keep any of these or not? If so... is it ADVISABLE to keep them if allowed. I would assume (But could be completely wrong) that they may be able to assist re-building your credit.

Thanks for the input, and great site.

[Flamingo]

If you do a search on here, you will find this topic discussed many, many times. Mention to your attorney that you have these cards and you will be advised concerning them. Most people do not have to list them at filing; however, we had to list them. They did not appear on our creditor matrix and our attorney advised us that we could keep those cards open if we wish (if we did not care to close them ourselves) providing the creditor itself does not close them when they find out (and they do) that you filed bankruptcy. Some cards with zero balances at the time you file survive; the majority do not and are cancelled out by the creditor. If is up to you whether or not to keep them open and there is nothing you can do if the creditor decides to close them. If you are including in your filing a bank such as Citibank, Chase, B of A, etc. and those banks are associated with any open cards you have, the chances of any associated card (department store, gas card, etc.) with that bank surviving your BK is almost zero.

[shado1021]

I stopped paying my credit cards in April 08 and have not filed yet. I had a Sears Mastercard that had a zero balance and no activity since Sept 07. They sent me a letter in June stating they were closing my account because they had looked at my credit report (too many high balances, past due accounts, yada, yada, yada).

However, I do still have a Sears store card - again, zero balance and no activity since Sept 07 - that is still open. Go figure.

[JRScott]

You would not list the 0 balance cards, but so many store cards are owned by bigger banks that it is unlikely they will survive the process.