Just got confirmed, but attny dropped the ball?
We filed back in June. Our case was fairly simple, so we thought, with a couple of "standard" problems we were told would be addressed.
Our attorney was planning on getting our vehicle loan value modified because we had owned the vehicle for x# of days prior to filing bankruptcy. We signed papers in her office for this, when we signed the papers to file the bankruptcy. She said she had to wait however for the credit union to make their claim for the vehicle. In the meantime we had to get an appraisal done at a dealership, which we did.
IRS debt
The other issue was that the IRS claimed part of our debt as secured at 4% interest (about $16k of the $42K we owed in taxes). She was not sure why they filed it that way, but was going to to check it out and argue it if necessary.
Student Loan debt
We were told that our student loan debt was priority, and the plan was filed that way. The trustee said no, it has to be done as unsecured. However, we would come out after the 13 was done and still owe to SallieMae, in fact owing MORE because interest would keep accruing. We wanted to know if we could argue it should be given priority status, since it already has the special status of the unpaid balance not being dischargable like the other unsecured debts OR if we could remove it from the plan and pay it directly outside of the plan so that we don't end up own thousands of dollars more than we do now.
We kept calling her office and would get voicemail, or her paralegal saying she hadn't had a chance to talk with her yet about it, etc. Hubby even stopped in one day to see if she had time to talk, as her office is directly across the street from his, and she just copped an attitude and said "oh I see- how about if I just pop in to your office unannounced one day". Sigh.
So we resorted to writing out our questions and concerns in a letter- the first one being that they were not communicating with us. She finally gave us a call- basically the only question she answered was that our student loan would be treated as unsecured debt (which is different than what she told us, and different than how her office filed our plan) but she wasn't sure what we could do about how that would put us at owing MORE to the student loan company after our ch13 was done than we do now. Everything else she would look into and assured us that they aren't speedily returning our phone calls because these cases take time and it could be months before it's confirmed.
So we decided to take a breath, and relax. She would let us know when something was going on.
Well...the paralegal called this Monday to say our plan was confirmed on the 5th. We were shocked. We didn't even know that the Confirmation hearing was scheduled. (we got notification of the 1st hearing date back in Oct, but since we did not go and only our attny did to extend it we personally never got notification of any new dates after that...I guess that's normal??) I called the office to find out exactly what was confirmed. Voicemail..3x. I emailed 1x.
Yesterday I got our paperwork in the mail and the plan is unchanged (except for the student loan being unsecured, which is what the trustee said had to be).
The vehicle loan is full value.
The IRS is partially secured.
AND for some reason both of those items are listed at being paid off "within 36 months" .??? That's new.
So it appears that nothing was done by my attorney. Not to mention that when we signed all our paperwork the paralegal kept reassuring us that our payment would go down depending on how many creditors put in claims. Everything I read, and my gut, told me differently. I was right- the payment is still $1800.
I called the attny again, asking for an explanation. I also called the paralegal and emailed the paralegal. She emailed me back saying she would need a couple days to pull my file and look it over.
What do I do at this point? I have a feeling that my attny waited too long and couldn't object to either the IRS or the Credit Union claim because too much time had passed. Maybe I'm wrong. But I feel like we just paid $3k and all our attny did was pretty us up to feed to the wolves. Should I also add that this attorney is well versed in Bankruptcy and does a lot of these- she markets herself as a bankruptcy attorney. I think she should have known about many of these "simple problems", and about the student loan status when filing the plan, wouldn't you?
- Vehicle Loan Modification
- IRS debt
- Student Loan
Our attorney was planning on getting our vehicle loan value modified because we had owned the vehicle for x# of days prior to filing bankruptcy. We signed papers in her office for this, when we signed the papers to file the bankruptcy. She said she had to wait however for the credit union to make their claim for the vehicle. In the meantime we had to get an appraisal done at a dealership, which we did.
IRS debt
The other issue was that the IRS claimed part of our debt as secured at 4% interest (about $16k of the $42K we owed in taxes). She was not sure why they filed it that way, but was going to to check it out and argue it if necessary.
Student Loan debt
We were told that our student loan debt was priority, and the plan was filed that way. The trustee said no, it has to be done as unsecured. However, we would come out after the 13 was done and still owe to SallieMae, in fact owing MORE because interest would keep accruing. We wanted to know if we could argue it should be given priority status, since it already has the special status of the unpaid balance not being dischargable like the other unsecured debts OR if we could remove it from the plan and pay it directly outside of the plan so that we don't end up own thousands of dollars more than we do now.
We kept calling her office and would get voicemail, or her paralegal saying she hadn't had a chance to talk with her yet about it, etc. Hubby even stopped in one day to see if she had time to talk, as her office is directly across the street from his, and she just copped an attitude and said "oh I see- how about if I just pop in to your office unannounced one day". Sigh.
So we resorted to writing out our questions and concerns in a letter- the first one being that they were not communicating with us. She finally gave us a call- basically the only question she answered was that our student loan would be treated as unsecured debt (which is different than what she told us, and different than how her office filed our plan) but she wasn't sure what we could do about how that would put us at owing MORE to the student loan company after our ch13 was done than we do now. Everything else she would look into and assured us that they aren't speedily returning our phone calls because these cases take time and it could be months before it's confirmed.
So we decided to take a breath, and relax. She would let us know when something was going on.
Well...the paralegal called this Monday to say our plan was confirmed on the 5th. We were shocked. We didn't even know that the Confirmation hearing was scheduled. (we got notification of the 1st hearing date back in Oct, but since we did not go and only our attny did to extend it we personally never got notification of any new dates after that...I guess that's normal??) I called the office to find out exactly what was confirmed. Voicemail..3x. I emailed 1x.
Yesterday I got our paperwork in the mail and the plan is unchanged (except for the student loan being unsecured, which is what the trustee said had to be).
The vehicle loan is full value.
The IRS is partially secured.
AND for some reason both of those items are listed at being paid off "within 36 months" .??? That's new.
So it appears that nothing was done by my attorney. Not to mention that when we signed all our paperwork the paralegal kept reassuring us that our payment would go down depending on how many creditors put in claims. Everything I read, and my gut, told me differently. I was right- the payment is still $1800.
I called the attny again, asking for an explanation. I also called the paralegal and emailed the paralegal. She emailed me back saying she would need a couple days to pull my file and look it over.
What do I do at this point? I have a feeling that my attny waited too long and couldn't object to either the IRS or the Credit Union claim because too much time had passed. Maybe I'm wrong. But I feel like we just paid $3k and all our attny did was pretty us up to feed to the wolves. Should I also add that this attorney is well versed in Bankruptcy and does a lot of these- she markets herself as a bankruptcy attorney. I think she should have known about many of these "simple problems", and about the student loan status when filing the plan, wouldn't you?
Bankruptcy Wizard
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