Housing Exemption/Valuation

[bradybunchdad]

For those who filed Ch 7 with a home you wanted to keep, who decides what that house is worth? Did you assign a value to it somehow, can it be based on a recent sale or refinancing? Does the trustee send out an appraiser? This is the one thing that could make or break me and Ch7, I am curious how it is done, or is it different in different districts? We are well under the median and don't have anything else that would call attention to us. No RVs, boats, jewelry, condo, flat screens, nothing. The house is the only thing that I could see being sticky.

[TEW]

I based mine on an appraisal I had done a year ago for a refi. Trusted its worth less now and moved on.

[2Bshinyandnew]

Zillow.com is great for a ballpark, at least in my area. Be careful, houses with red or blue triangles on them are shown at either MLS/listing price and are listed for sale, so may not show a true market value.

[PoorGrammyinBK7]

YOU will be the one to put the amount on the schedule.

1.You could have a realtor do a comparable market analysis (often free, or with very low cost)

2. You could go to www.zillow.com (not particularly reliable but many use it and some trustees accept it).

3. You could have an official appraisal done by a licensed appraiser (about $250-$300 usually). If you have had this done within the last 6 months, you could probably use that.

4. You could use the tax assessment from the county (depends on where you live as to how accurate this would be).

At our 341, we were asked how we arrived at that figure, so be prepared to answer. If your figure seems way off or if you have what the trustee believes is very valuable real estate that may not be exempt - they may send an appraiser to verify what you have listed. I know a few of our members have had that happen. Hope this helps!

[bradybunchdad]

I guess I need to figure out now what constitutes an interest in the property. The house and mortgage are in my name only, and if we could stack wife's exemption we'd be OK almost for sure.

[MixerDriver08]

We Just had ours appraised for the bankruptcy, my attorney insisted on an official appraisal of the property. If the question comes up of value we have a full appraisal with interior and exterior pictures to back up our figures. HE would rather err on the side of caution than have a Zillow appraisal come back to haunt us. plus because the interior pics show the contents of each room that we listed. Kinda reassures the trustee that we aren't hiding a 60 inch flat screen or Gold plated toilet or anything like that...