Waiting to file ?! Deciding which bills are more important ?

[MyLadybug]

Sorry if this is a stupid question. I have been lurking on these boards and soaking up all the information I can. I just ordered Nolo and Bankruptcy for Dummies. I am also in the process of coming up with a few lawyers names to meet with.

I keep seeing people mentioning they have decided to file but will wait X number of months ? What would the cases be that you would need to wait ? Why wait to file if you have decided already this is what you want to do ?
Sorry if this is self explanitory but I am still learning.

Also I think this is the road we are heading down $60K in CC debt, 14K in Car loans (cars worth less than loans combined), was laid off job and am now only work 20-30 hours a week at a lower paying job. We were month to month before and now I am having to choose which bills to pay and I hate that. So far none of our accounts are overdue. When do you decide you just really can't pay them all anymore ? I had to skip a CC payment this month and they call 3 times a day. It isn't even 10 days late yet !! I plan on paying them but just can't until next paycheck on the 15th. YIKES !! We have had perfect credit up until this point but am getting ready to hit a brick wall.

[sisterfunkhaus]

I keep seeing people mentioning they have decided to file but will wait X number of months ? What would the cases be that you would need to wait ? Why wait to file if you have decided already this is what you want to do ?
Sorry if this is self explanitory but I am still learning.

I personally am waiting for several reasons. First, I have lots of overdrafts on a credit card from my bank account from just not handling money well. I want to put some time between those and my bankruptcy. Another reason is that my husband had three paychecks that were significantly larger than usual from teaching summer school (we used the money to make BADLY needed repairs on our house and car.) He won't be teaching summer school next year, and I don't want that extra income on our means test b/c if we were forced into a chapter 13, we wouldn't be able to afford the estimated payments since that isn't regular income. It was a one time thing so we could do house repairs and get things we needed without putting them on credit cards. Also, I just lost $785 a month in income and haven't been able to replace it. Daycare prospects are thin in this area right now. Sometimes I can go six months without a call (Murphy's law--when I am full I seem to get plenty of calls though) I don't want income I no longer have on my means test if possible. I would also like time to get all of my forms and what not in perfect order. I am having to dig through file after file to gather everything I need. We are also close to judgement proof. The only "asset" we have that can be seized is our bank account (which is pretty pathetic and not really worth seizing.) Of course if someone gets a judgement against us, this all goes out the door. We will file an emergency petition if need be to keep judgements from going through on our bank account b/c we still need to pay rent.

Sorry if I got to specific or went on and on. I thought maybe getting into detail might help you understand better.

[MyLadybug]

I personally am waiting for several reasons. First, I have lots of overdrafts on a credit card from my bank account from just not handling money well. I want to put some time between those and my bankruptcy. Another reason is that my husband had three paychecks that were significantly larger than usual from teaching summer school (we used the money to make BADLY needed repairs on our house and car.) He won't be teaching summer school next year, and I don't want that extra income on our means test b/c if we were forced into a chapter 13, we wouldn't be able to afford the estimated payments since that isn't regular income. It was a one time thing so we could do house repairs and get things we needed without putting them on credit cards. Also, I just lost $785 a month in income and haven't been able to replace it. Daycare prospects are thin in this area right now. Sometimes I can go six months without a call (Murphy's law--when I am full I seem to get plenty of calls though) I don't want income I no longer have on my means test if possible. I would also like time to get all of my forms and what not in perfect order. I am having to dig through file after file to gather everything I need. We are also close to judgement proof. The only "asset" we have that can be seized is our bank account (which is pretty pathetic and not really worth seizing.) Of course if someone gets a judgement against us, this all goes out the door. We will file an emergency petition if need be to keep judgements from going through on our bank account b/c we still need to pay rent.

Sorry if I got to specific or went on and on. I thought maybe getting into detail might help you understand better.

Thanks for explaining that. In July 2006 I was hired for a hiring paying job with a larger company (Pay raise of $5k year over what I made last year). But on 9/1/06 the company did a mass lay off and I was one of those employees.
I was able to get my old job back but not at 40/hrs a week - only 20 and some weeks depending on what is available 30 hours.
Will the means test go off of my 20/hr a week income or do *we* need to wait a few months for the 20/hrs a week to be reflected as our true income ?

I am not sure I can hold off the phone calls/collectors with only 20/hrs a week.

Sorry to make this confusing. I am just trying to understand it myself.

[sisterfunkhaus]

They go by your last 6 months income, even if you lost your job or had to take a lower paying job. If you want to give an accurate reflection of your current and expected future income, you might want to wait.

As far as holding off collectors, I simply do not answer my phone. I turn the ringer off. Friends, family, and daycare clients have my pay-as-you-go cell phone number. I don't even know why I keep my landline these days. I guess I figure once this is all over I can use it again. It also has a recording that makes it very clear that the phone number belongs to me and my husband so that creditors won't have an excuse to call my friends and family all over town (not that that will stop them.) But if they do call them, they can give them my address and my home phone, which they already have.You could get caller ID and screen calls.

I have heard many people say that it took a year or more for creditors to take court action. I don't know if that is how it plays out in every case though. I guess it depends on where you live and what you have that they can get. I have been getting calls and letters since July when I lost a huge source of income and my student loans came due. Nothing has happened yet except for me getting a nasty letter from USAA telling me they were going to write me off.

[anonymuse]

The means test computes your current monthly income (CMI) based on your last 6 paychecks prior to filing. Therefore, your "goal" to file Ch 7 is to be under the median income (around $41K for single filers with no dependents in Colo) and to have minimal disposable income (<$100). This "goal" is just the ideal/easiest situation, but you can still file being above the median income.

First thing--stop using any of your credit cards and don't do any cash advances or transferring balances. You want to show minimally 3 months of cc inactivity prior to filing.

The first bills to pay are things you want to keep, such as your home. Next, make sure all of your utilities are kept up-to-date. Overdue utility bills can be cancelled through bankruptcy; however, getting the utilities reconnected/maintained can require some very big security deposits. Student loans cannot be discharged, but are easily put into forebearance if needed to so don't be paying them.

Best thing to do about those phone calls--get caller id!

If you know you will be filing, stop paying the cc bills and save that money for a lawyer and filing fees. In my case, I made some minimal monthly payments to doctors that I was continuing receiving care from so that they didn't stop seeing me--you'll need to be the judge of that for yourself.

Looks like you said "we" in your post so you might have a husband and/or kids so here's the CO median family income by family size:

Colorado: 1, $41,544; 2, $58,880; 3, $61,619; 4, $70,300

Keep asking more questions and this will all start falling together.

[Brokerthanbroke]

I am not sure I can hold off the phone calls/collectors with only 20/hrs a week.

unplug the phone! That's what we did. They hound us on the business line and the cell phones but we have caller id.

[bethe23432]

I too had perfect credit meaning I had not missed a payment nor made a late payment ever, although your credit is not "perfect" according to the CC companies if they consider you overextended. When I stopped making payments on five credit cards, including Amex, Chase, a credit union, my personal bank and a gas card, it took about a month or more before I got one call. I told them what my lawyer said to tell them, which was I am filing for BK and here is his name and phone number. It was still several months before I filed because I had to pay him completely ($1800, payments took about four months) before he filed. Some asked for a filing number, which I didn't have since I hadn't yet filed, but all were polite and sympathetic. Later I got another call from Amex cajoling me to try to catch up and save my credit rather than go BK. That's when I explained at length to them how their raising my interest rate to 29%, along with Chase who did the same and my personal bank who did the same, was the reason I was throwing in the towel, and I asked them if that was how they thanked customers who busted their ass to never miss a payment or make a late payment in five years. After that I got no more calls. Made my last payment in May, appt with my lawyer in late May, filed in August, 341 last month, waiting on discharge in late November.

I have one phone, it's a cell phone. I did not avoid their calls, I talked to them when they called. If you don't have a lawyer already, get one, make at least one payment to him/her, decide when you are going to file in consultation with the lawyer, and then field the calls calmly and decisively. If they harass you, tell them you are going to report them because it's not allowed.

Good luck.

[SinkingFast]

We were pretty close to being past the 70/90 day period when we found and hired our attny. But we'd been having problems with our Landlord that had escalated just before seeing our attny.

During the Consult, our issues with our landlord were discussed. The attny told us then to find a new place to move to and get out ASAP. So that's what we did.

We had the Consult the end of March. Moved the end of May. Then we had to have several months of bills from the new place to establish our new expenses.

We went 9 months of not paying CC's before we filed. At first I tried to get help from our Creditors. We really thought we'd work thru things, sell our house, and be able to start paying again. They would listen to the sob story, say "I'm sorry. Can you send $XX by Friday?" NO! Did you not hear a word I said. So I gave up trying and did not answer the phone.

BOA was THE worst. They'd call 6-8 times during the day on week days. A dozen times a day on Saturdays and Sundays. Relentless.

You just learn to check that caller ID number or listen to the answering machine. If it's family or friends you answer. If it's a collector, you don't answer.