Ch 13 questions

[originalhealer]

I had a couple of quick questions about Ch 13:

1. What if your income increases dramatically and you are able to pay it off early, will the Courts let you?

2. Can you have a savings account while in a Ch 13?

3. What if your income is irregular, like in commissioned sales?

4. If you convert a Ch 7 to a Ch 13, you won't be able to switch later back to a Ch 7, right?

5. Do you have to include every debt in your plan? What if you only want to include debts that are past due or in repayment?

6. Do you have to include all secured debts in your Ch 13? If not, which ones do you have to include?

7. What if you want to pay off a secured debt by itself, outside of the plan payment, because you earned some extra money, even though the secured debt is included in the plan, can you do that?

8. Can you purchase a home in a Chapter 13? How?

Thanks for your contributions.

[HHM]

1. You can only pay off early if you can pay 100% to your unsecured creditors

2. Yes you can have a savings account.

3. Trustee's hate this and so do the courts. The definition for a chapter 13 is "regular" income. So you may have to go back a year or more to show a consistant income.

4. Correct

5. You need to mention and account for every debt in the plan in some way. In a chapter 13, you debts get categorized, (secured, priority, unsecured are the common categories but you can get pretty creative). But just like in a chapter 7, you need to list all your creditors chapter 13, and assign them a category in your chapter 13 plan.

6. Again, you need to mention them in your chapter 13 plan. However, that doesn't mean the trustee has to be the one who pays it. You can elect to pay a particular debt directly, but you state that in your plan.

7. Its not advisable.

8. Yes, but you need to get permission from the court.

Most chapter 13 trustee's have a website and have a Chapter 13 plan guidelines you can get along with there standard chapter 13 form. If you are considering a chatper 13, you should get a hold of your trustee(s) plan guidelines.

[originalhealer]

Thanks