a lawyer said filing ch 7 is ok. Is it?

[2Bshinyandnew]

Good advice. I actually tried listing my spending from bank statement in categories. So it looks high in food spending. Especially in the fast food department. The last 3 years have been hell on me so when by son asked for mcdonalds I didn't have to cook and it got me out of the house and bad memories. Same for restaurants but we would always talk about what was happening. So it worries me that it looks like I'm made of money. If u figure a budget for a home and utilities my spending is the same just in a different area. But I still worry I'm going to screw up things worse. Especially if I file and it doesn't go thru and the auto industry tanks and I lose my job. Then I can't file again for 8 years. Yup, I'm a worrier.

What are the percentages of success? What does the trustee do ? Attorney said nothing beyond looking for stuff to take and sell. I'm trying to clean up my bank account and spending so it makes more sense. And most importantly if my divorce papers say my ex gets the house(she's making the payments) will this hurt her or cause the bank to foreclose or insist she refinance now? The property value dropped 10k so maybe they prefer she keep it. How do you know they care?

Is the $15K in unsecured debt the only debt you will be filing on? If so, and you are divorced and no longer have any legal title to the marital home, filing on this amount (small in comparison to most here!) may be premature.

If you are court ordered to pay child support, and have no real assets, you may be "judgment proof" in other words, your creditors may be able to sue you and get a judgment, but if you have no assets and you are court ordered to pay support, they can't really garnish any wages, or at least any significant amount of your wages. Domestic Support Obligations are ALWAYS top priority. Check out the collections forum here.

As far as the marital home, if you do file and your ex continues to pay the mortgage and is not filing, I'm pretty sure they can't force her to sell or foreclose. Even if (or especially if) there is equity in the house. Check with an attorney. I am in a similar situation as you...my ex recently filed a CH7, he's on the mortgage of the house as a co-borrower but not on the deed and quit claimed any equity he may have had in the house to me as part of our settlement. I pay the mortgage and have been unable to refinance the mortgage, nor did the mortgage company allow me to modify the mortgae to remove him. As long as I keep paying, the bank cannot foreclose, even though the co-debtor (my ex) filed a CH7. When he filed his petition, he listed the mortgage as a debt he owed, but his statement of intentions said he planned on abandoning the property. He has no financial interest in the house, no "homestead" to exempt, so he could use the exemptions our state offered for filers not claiming real property as exempt to exempt other personal property. My ex had almost $70K in unsecured debt though. Your state exemptions may be different.

Honestly though, perhaps re-think on filing BK for only $15K. As you said yourself above, you can't file again for years, and if you stopped paying your CC the hit to your credit report wouldn't be any worse than filing a BK7. If you can stay with your folks and really focus on getting yourself back together, you may be able to come to a settlement agreement with your creditors in the future for 1/2 or better of what you owe. Even if you are 1099'd on the balance of the forgiven debt, that isn't really so bad on $15K.

[GreenInkOnPaper]

Just a suggestion: Check your local daily newspaper for open delivery routes. You can make good money throwing papers a couple of hours a day. I paid off ex-DH's 23k student loans in two years.

[Phelan]

the 15k is cc only. I have a car loan and owe about 10 k but figured on keeping it. The house is in both of our names but I gave it to her and everything in it. She was supposed to refinance months ago according to the divorce agreement. She can't. She's in worse shape than me.

I'm a little confused. What do you mean 1099'd and how the heck can you just pay half??if I could do that instead I would. I could possibly pay that off in a year if I stay put. And at this point I couldn't care less about my credit. It only helped get me debt. Yeah now I know better but I don't need a house and I certainly don't need any credit cards. I just want to take care of my son and start over after what happened to us.

[2Bshinyandnew]

the 15k is cc only. I have a car loan and owe about 10 k but figured on keeping it. The house is in both of our names but I gave it to her and everything in it. She was supposed to refinance months ago according to the divorce agreement. She can't. She's in worse shape than me.

I'm a little confused. What do you mean 1099'd and how the heck can you just pay half??if I could do that instead I would. I could possibly pay that off in a year if I stay put. And at this point I couldn't care less about my credit. It only helped get me debt. Yeah now I know better but I don't need a house and I certainly don't need any credit cards. I just want to take care of my son and start over after what happened to us.

Your situation does sound very similar financially to my ex and I, only we have 5X the unsecured debt. Some joint deb and some sole (each) My ex gave me the house and everything in it, including the mortgage and all the "joys" of home ownership.

Once you stop making payments on your credit cards, most (if not all) the CC companies will start making settlement offers, typically they will start at 60-75% of what you owe, maybe dropping the interest to zero, and negotiating on down. They won't make these offers if your are current. Typically the account is closed and charging privilege will end.

The amount "forgiven", the amount between what you originally owed and what they agree to accept is reported to the IRS and is considered by the IRS as taxable income to you. Your creditor(s) will get tax benefits by forgiving part of your debt, so don't feel "bad", it's just business. You will most likely receive a 1099 form at the end of the year, like you receive a W2. So, if you originally owed your creditors $15K, and negotiated each creditor down by 50% and they accepted $7500 (each creditor may vary on what you can negotiate) then they forgiven amount of $7500 (or whatever that amount ends up being) will be added as taxable income for that tax year. The amount you will owe on your tax return for this 1099 amount depends on a variety of factors, such as your tax exemptions, whther you itemize decuctions, etc. Generally, to simplify things, you can expect to pay 15-20% capital gains tax on the forgiven amount, or around $1400. Which is still better than the $15K. I have heard folks say that some CC companies will settle for 30% of the original debt!

This was a totally novice explanation . I'm sure others will chime in behind me with some more accurate info.

Best wishes to you whatever you decide! For what it's worth, after my ex and I split and we finally looked at the mess we were both in financially, we pulled together and decided to help each other out and be supportive of each other. I went with him to 3 attorney consults. The attorney he finally chose to file with is still confused as to who I am, I guess there are not too many ex spouses who attend attorney consults . I will probably be filing myself in the future.

We joke around (now, anyway) that the only ones who can sue us, are each other!

[endisnear]

Phelan is a city in California - about 30 miles from me. We had an UNBELIEVABLE snowstorm this week. OK - maybe to many of you a 1.5 feet of snow isn't much, but to us in California, the whole town shuts down. Nobody knows how to drive and an SUV almost ended up in the lobby of my hotel. Just slid right toward the entrance. I was hoping you lived there so we could chat about this weeks storm.

Well i'm down the hill in fontana, we only got rain of course But the mountains looked so beautiful once the clouds cleared! About half of my office commutes down the hill, so they all got a snow day on Monday, but then had to spend the night down here on Wed with the pass being closed. DH's grandparents live in Apple Valley so we went up there to check out the snow on Sat. Most had melted that far into town, but the pass and Oak Hills still had quite a bit! LOL...i was excited! Having lived here all my life, a little bit of snow puts a smile on my face!

[relief13035]

It snowed last week on Mon. & Wed. and I still have snow today. I'm in Apple Valley. Several of my employees had to sleep on rollaway beds in the hotel offices because they couldn't get home and of course I had sold all the hotels rooms. Some housekeepers even slept in the laundry room. It was kind of a staff slumber party.

[Tbornetun]

This snow talk is funny to me, we got over a foot this weekend and it is business as usual in Minnesota. In fact yesterday morning, I got in the Jeep, locked it in 4 wheel drive and was off to Christmas shop.

I guess you get used to it when you have to drive on solid ice and snow for 4 months out of the year.

[Phelan]

if you stop paying won't they sue you? Is it possible to negotiate with them?

[BROKENN]

You can try to negotiate. Some do deals and then kill your credit and 1099 you.

They don't sue usually for months or years. You have time even if the file.

This is where planning comes in. BK planning is very important

[2Bshinyandnew]

if you stop paying won't they sue you? Is it possible to negotiate with them?

Eventually they will sue, but once you are a month or two late they will usually try to settle. Absolutely it is possible to negotiate with them.

Try reading here:

http://www.debt-consolidation-credit-repair-service.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=181