Florida-No One Seems to Know What to Do!

[EyeintheSky5]

Hi all,

I am hoping some of the amazing people on here can either help us out or, at least, help with the confusion.

Here is our story:

When we hired a BK lawyer, we were told to stop using credit to pay bills and wait until court to pay anything. So, we stopped paying our big mortgage.

Five months later, we received notice that Bank of America filed the foreclosure documents.

At that point, we moved our family out of the home to lessen the complication of loosing the house. We accepted the idea of downsizing and knew we would surrender the home.

We filed BK back in September 09 in Tampa FL. With a full Chapter 7 discharge 12/09. We surrendered the home and thought everything was finished.

But...

Let me backtrack a bit.

Even after we moved out of the home (before discharge) we were receiving bills from our local water/garbage company which is County-Operated.

We CANCELLED the service but were told that a $55 charge per month will be due until the bank forcloses on the home.

Our BK lawyer said "Lets just add them as a creditor and it will be discharged with the BK". Done.

At the final hearing, we owed about $600 to that bill but it was discharged 100%.

Here is the part we are having trouble with:

After the discharge, the bill reset to $0 but it just started accumulating again. About $55 per month.

When we contacted the water company and they told us "Until the bank forcloses, you [we] wil continue to owe the bill".

So, we called the county clerk. She told us that the forclosure had ben thrown out because Bank of America failed to act on it within 6 months. So, the home is ours still.

So, we called the bank. We were bounced back and forth and no one seems to know what to do.


Whew!

Now, we are being billed, own the home that has already been surrendered, but we don't know what to do.

Can any one make any sense of this situation? And, what should we do? Just wait it out? Should we rent out the home to recoup the money that is being billed to us? Is there anyway to MAKE the forclosure happen?

Please help.

Thanks.

[Mensa1]

This is a BIG problem in many venues, unfortunately. Mtg lenders are inept and often times take a yr and more to complete what they could finish in a much shorter time frame. With that said, the bills remain the responsibility of the property owner, and until the foreclosure occurs and is completed at a final sale, you remain the owner.

Some utilities can and do run with the property (not trash collection), such as water and/or sewer bills. Meaning that the new owner may become legally responsible for any unpaid balance. Often times utilities are not forthright and honest about this but if it were me I would wait and see just how it gets resolved following the foreclosure sale and see if the lender doesn't clear up the balance. If not, in the end you will be responsible, unfortunately. This is one of the short comings of filing Bk prior to a fc completion. The reverse of the process serves your interest better, but it is too late to consider that. Hope it works out.

[MSbklawyer]

Just thinking out loud here -- but this is similar in nature to the problem where banks won't repo cars but won't turn over the title to the owner/debtor either. The best solution there has been to move to redeem the car for $1.

I've never known it to be tried with a house -- but what if you filed a motion to redeem the house for $1? Explore that with your atty.