Single Pay Auto Lease

[cclark346]

Has anyone had experience with assuming a Single Pay Car Lease in Chapter 7.
Is it treated any differently than a regular car lease? For reference our BK Court is in Orlando Florida. Thank you

[despritfreya]

Welcome to the forum.

You will need to discuss this with an attorney but here is how I see it.

1. If you advanced paid the lease within the past two years, the cash transfer (and trade-in if there was one) must be listed on question 18 of the Statement of Financial Affairs.

2. The unexpired, but fully paid, lease is listed on Schedule G.

3. In a Chapter 7 a trustee can reject a lease. Your trustee may elect to do this and demand a portion of the advanced payments returned to the bk estate. I do not know for sure as I have never had a client with this issue. If rejected, you would have to return the vehicle to the lessor.

Make sure you bring a complete copy of the lease agreement with you when you meet with an attorney.

Des.

[justbroke]

Des has written what is the best way to approach this. From what I understand, the problem is the lease, since a lease may have value. Trustees often evaluate a lease to determine whether or not it's beneficial to the bankruptcy estate. As Des wrote, "if" the Trustee is going to attack the lease, they'll reject it and then try to recoup the prepayments.

But, as Des also has written, I think a Trustee would need to be really looking at this with a careful eye. In the end, you must deal with the fact that this may happen and you may need to return the vehicle.

Very interesting, though.