When determining your income and expenses...

[optimistic1]

Ok, so I will be filling out paperwork soon and my question effects what my plan payment will be.

When filling out my expenses it comes to the part where my vehicle installment payment is, which is a little over $300 per month.

If I include it into my expenses it greatly decreases the remaining amount left over every month to fund a plan, almost to less than $50 a month.

Keep in mind, that this particular loan, WILL be crammed down, as it is very old, past the 2.5 year mark.

Is it ok to have little to nothing left every month on the information packet or schedules? The attorney will likely remove the expense as it would be paid into the plan, and at a crammed down amount and a lower interest rate.

I want to maximize my plan so that I have cushion, and I also want to be able to provide for my family, not scrape by, and definetely not fail all together and not be able to make the plan payment.

If they remove the vehicle payment, and treat that same amount as a plan payment amount @ 36 months, it would fund all of my claims, according to a funding wizard that I have used on the trustee's website.

[kornellred]

Just list the auto loan as a legitimate expense and that will decrease your disposable income. Handle the payments outside of the Chapter 13 plan. Keep it simple and forget all the cramming down and upside down gymnastics.
From the debtor's perspective, the less disposable income, the better. The trustee cannot argue with the mathematical facts.

[optimistic1]

oh but I want to cram it down, I owe twice what its worth and the interest rate is high in comparison with the prime rate. I am just going to list it anyway, it wont change my other expenses at all, I was developing a budget without listing it, so they will likely look right at the payment I normally make, and remove it, freeing up the 300+ payment, and use it to pay the plan payments, which would pay all of my secured and unsecured priority claims, plus about 2-5k or so extra for unsecured claims.