Hi

[Mom2one]

Hi All.

Just wanted to know for those of you that are in a 13. When you got your payment amount were you shocked at the amount. Or did it seem reasonable? We will be filing in a few weeks. We have had so much bad news in our life lately I am so scared of what our payment will be. Our attorney assured us he will work with us.

Thanks
Chrissy

[busby]

Chrissy -

When I first considered filing Chapter 13 I made a quick call to the attorney that I ended up using for filing. I was surprised that on my initial call - he answered the phone himself, answered my questions and made me feel confident in his abilities.

During that conversation he said that usually credit card (or unsecured) debts are usually just paid 5-10 cents on the dollar.

Once I started the process and my forms were completed - my payment ended up being very affordable. But that was primarily because I took great care in listing my expenses when filing.

About the only thing I probably exaggerated was what I spend on clothing. I haven't bought a new pair of pants since 2002. But everything else was accurate.

I wouldn't worry about a payment that makes it difficult or impossible for you to live with. But I would start today by making a list of every expense you have even if it's just a bill you pay just once-a-year - divide it by 12 and add it to your monthly expenses.

There are other discussions going on here detailing many ways you can make living in a chapter 13 much more comfortable - check those out as well.

[chloe0724]

Our payment ended up being so much more affordable than what wer were doing before. Now we have a budget for things we had been putting off for a long time.

[parsoc48]

Our initial shock was that we didn't qualify for a 7 and are now in a 13, due to income. I guess we should be grateful we make so much money, ha ha! It all looked good on paper but boy, is it hard. We're still adjusting, but haven't been able to put much "under the mattress". That's my major advice to anyone....get some cash set aside, you will need it. Sounds like you have a good attorney, or at least one you're comfortable with, that's so important as you will be together for the next 3-5 years....longer than some marriages, huh? Good luck to you, keep posting

[filingin08]

Frankly, I was shocked it was so low. Our payment, $1275, includes both car payments (trustee requires it). Our car payments were $1100. So, an extra $175 and in 5 years we're out of this mess. The one thing I am so, so grateful for is that in our budget, we budgeted for things like car repairs, house repairs, haircuts, real estate taxes, vet expenses, back to school supplies, etc. Things we never had a budget for before. Before filing we spent and spent and when the well was dry, we spent some more. Now we are very critical of where are money is going.

[flower04]

filingin08, if you don't mind me asking, what was your amount you BK'd? We are looking at a $250 or less monthly payment due to all the expenses like you mentioned and our attorney said we need to be careful with "cash flow." We are bk about $140,000. $250 seems really low, but liveable and manageable for us.

[filingin08]

flower04, we're close to you - around $130k. i think unsecured are in the initial plan at only 3% (depends on who files claims, etc., but you know that). i hope, hope, hope we're confirmed at our current payments. won't know until next year though...

[cwillie]

We are paying $2431 to our trustee, which includes our house payment of $1420 (which includes taxes and insurance and four months of arrearages) and our second mortgage of $350 per month which was also behind by four months. Of this amount, our unsecureds are only getting 4.34% on a total of $117K. We are paying our car payments outside of the plan. We also managed to get a 36 month plan. We do have some money left over each month - not much, but we are getting by. We feel pretty lucky

[woeisme]

I feel pretty lucky with our $1100/month plan. this does not include mortgage or car payments, just unsecured debt, so in that respect I guess we're paying back a lot more than others, but I am good with that. It's still way less than we were paying on credit cards, and just stopping the high interest rates was the lifesaver for us, we would have been able to pay everything without BK if interest rates weren't near 30% on everything which caused us to just keep digging deeper and deeper into the hole each month. Our plan is very livable, I know this because my husband took a 50% pay hit because he had to go on disability in March, and we've still been able to make our payments and live within our budget, although it's become a lot harder at times. (I've picked up overtime to help, and not paying for gas for his commute also helped offset the change in income.)