Chose to re-affirm my mortgage on my house

[saddebbie]

Hi and Happy 4th of July.

I filed for Ch 7 BK protection and my case will be discharged any day now and I did note in the bankruptcy petition that I wanted to re-affirm my mortgage on my primary residence. The mortgage company never sent me papers to sign. What happens now if my case gets discharged and closed without me signing any re-affirmation paperwork? I have been paying my mortgagr on time every month. Thanks a million.

[PoorGrammyinBK7]

I would think thats a good thing - you keep paying payments and you are okay -- and yet you don't owe the debt if anything should happen (job loss, etc), cause its been discharged, from what I have understood here, if no reffirmation agreement has been signed ny the time of discharge. Maybe someone with more experience can tell you more though...

[Stilltheone]

We also said we wanted to reaffirm our mortgage. Mortgage companies never sent us reaffirmation papers, so we just keep making payments.

If you DON'T make payments, you still owe that debt....if you don't pay, they foreclose on your house.

[lrprn]

If you DON'T make payments, you still owe that debt....

This is not true. If a filer and their mortgage lender do not both sign a reaffirmation agreement before discharge and file it with the court, then if the filer decides later to walk away from the house, the filer owes NOTHING to the mortgage lender.

...if you don't pay, they foreclose on your house.

This is true. To keep the house after filing, the mortgage payments must be made on time without fail every single month. Otherwise, the mortgage lender can start foreclosure proceedings. But even in this circumstance, if the mortgage lender files to foreclose and take the house, the filer does NOT owe whatever is left on the mortgage.

[b_girl]

We're struggling with the question of re-affirming our home. Our lender did send the papers to us, so now it's down to 'do we sign or not?' Our lawyer told us we should re-affirm for 2 reasons--to re-establish our credit faster (the payments will be noted on our credit reports) and to preserve our right to keep the home in the future, as the lender could foreclose on us for very little reason. However, you can't force your lender to re-affirm. Have you contacted them directly to ask them about this? Sounds like your time is about up..I'd call them Monday.

[Stilltheone]

This is not true. If a filer and their mortgage lender do not both sign a reaffirmation agreement before discharge and file it with the court, then if the filer decides later to walk away from the house, the filer owes NOTHING to the mortgage lender.

This is true. To keep the house after filing, the mortgage payments must be made on time without fail every single month. Otherwise, the mortgage lender can start foreclosure proceedings. But even in this circumstance, if the mortgage lender files to foreclose and take the house, the filer does NOT owe whatever is left on the mortgage.

I had no idea that even if you DID decide to sign reaffirm papers and wanted to walk away that you owed something. If you stopped making payments and they foreclose, what would you owe? Fees?

[JRScott]

If you signed a reaffirmation agreement stilltheone and later they foreclosed. Then you would owe the difference between what they sell the property for and the mortgage value of your loan. If they get the same amount or more than you owe nothing, if they get less you owe them the difference.

[Stilltheone]

If you signed a reaffirmation agreement stilltheone and later they foreclosed. Then you would owe the difference between what they sell the property for and the mortgage value of your loan. If they get the same amount or more than you owe nothing, if they get less you owe them the difference.

Ahhh....I didn't know that! Thanks!

[rrockinggramma]

signing a reaffirmation is no guarantee that the lender will report on time payments. You need to ask your lender if signing reaffirmation means that they will report to the cra's. Many just say IIB anyway.

[deafbroke]

I origionally filed saying I wanted to reaffirm the mortgage and a line of credit on it from a seperate mortgage company. Never got a reaffirmation agreement from first mortgage company but I did get one from the line of credit company. I ammended not to reaffirm and did not sign the agreement sent by line of credit company.

In my opinion it is a bad idea to reaffirm. I would not sign anything!

DB