Why Are/Have You Filed BK?

[momisery]

We did not have credit card debt until the last year really. We were not concerned as we figured hubby's job was just around the corner. Being in the car business we are use to staff changes. It is common to hire someone and then have a mgmt change who lets people go to replace them with his pals. In our case I was worred, hubby would leave one job because there simply was not enough business and move to another, then suddenly they started letting him go. When times are really slow you could at least count on min. wage and we could get by with his and my income because all we had we the house and the cars. But then gas went thru the roof, and I drive a distance to work. Hubby was looking for car jobs an was willing to do sales, but no one was hiring for anything. So he took up selling insurance. That happens to be self employed and comission only. He drew unemployment to make up the difference. We tapped out the savings because of the nightmare house in GA, we simply thought it would get better. We used the cards, thinking it would turn around. Then, he had to have dental surgery and I had a horrible tooth ache, so we put a few thousand on cards. I put my doctors charges on the card too and the doctor ordered more tests that I thought were unnececesay so I did not do all of the tests. He gave me blood pressure meds, but he wanted me to come back every three months. My insurance is a 75-25 as of this year. It costs me 230.00 just for the healthcare portion of it for hubby and I and the deducatable is 500-1010 and the max out of pocket is 4500-9000. Which means I would be paying every 3 months to visit the jerk doctor for no reason. I can and do check my own blood pressure. I am not fat, and I exercise but this is genetic. I think the state you live in makes a huge difference during this time. My state brags about the lower cost of living and our homes are cheaper. But so are the wages, and everything else is higher than CA even. Then early summer my Dad had to have surgery and he is 90. We charged the car trip out and back it was much cheaper than flying. The fear of never seeming him again was in my heart. We came back only to find out that a lot of what was being told to hubby about making bonus at work was smoke and mirrors. He works for less than min. wage basically because they change the rules on bonus all the time. On our trip we thought we were okay still because we thought he was making bonus and things were on an uptick and we did some stupid stuff, we charged up a bit more on dinner for Dad and we bought our birthday/annivesary gifts and figured we could pay for them. I admit using the cars to buy toys was foolish, but the money was in the bank according to hubby and he thought he understood the pay plan. Now I am still trying to pay our credit cars which are at 12,000.00 and part of that is the dental about 7000.00 of it. The remaining 5 was groceries during our leanest times, and the 500.00 we spent on vacation. This is hard for me as I have never been late in my life! I guess I thought things would turn around, I never intended to not pay this debt. Now I am looking at the house, the unsecured loan which is our two cars that we paid off with it, and the credit cards and wondering what to cut. We need the cell phones for his job sales always requires that. We need internet hook up again his job, but we do use slow hookups. I do not get my hair done, nor my nails, not even a facial and buy lipstick at the dime store and use that for my cheeks too. I have always lived like that. I never thought we would use the savings, the 401K and he still would not be making but 100.00 per week. Crazy. We are talking to another BK attorney today, and I hope this ones consult is better than the last one. A Paralegal talked to us and she made me feel like a criminal. Plus they could not make up their minds if we should pay the unsecured debt or not. It is "only" 8 months old?? At the time it lowered our car payment by about 200.00 per month, seemed like a good choice and it kept us alive a lot longer to pay and wait out the recession. I am afraid they will take our cars because they are not secured and the are worth about 13000.-14000.00 total. Then what? We both have to drive for our jobs and buying a clunker that breaks down will cost us our jobs and put us from a 13 into a 7 if that is possible? I have thought about letting our house go we owe more on it than it is worth too. Geesh what a mess.

[DebtDame]

Intro from NY & My Story

I've been lurking around this forum a couple weeks now. I hear a little bit of my story amidst the posts of many of you here. Unlike many of you though mine was not due to a job loss or medical issues/bills. At least that isn't the immediate cause though we have certainly had both of those things at one time or another. I thankfully can say that not all of the reasons for my current state are due to unpleasant experiences but believe me we have suffered our own tragedies over the years.

I have been robbing Peter to pay Paul while Mary keeps knocking for so long that I had become convinced that was just the way our life was meant to be. There are very few short periods of time during our entire 20 year marriage and the raising of our two kids who will be turning 17 and 20 this summer that we could even come close to claiming we were debt free. At first Credit cards were for those extra little things one thinks they need/deserve but eventually they became a means of getting through the week between pay periods. Someday the income would match the outgo and everything would work out right? Sometimes it was a minor charge for lunch, sometimes it was a weeks worth of groceries, sometimes it was for heating oil to keep the house warm while we were paying on our credit cards. Of course there were also those little fixer up projects needed around the house or the appliance that needed replacing. Then the squeeze began.

The town decided to do a reassessment and we learned our house was worth a good bit more than we had thought - unfortunately that meant we would be taxed a good bit more as well but we can worry about that later right?. Since our daughter was starting college it seemed like a good time to dip into a bit more of the equity after all we could recoup it when we were ready to sell as we planned in three years especially if we used some of the money to fix things up a bit. But wait, our debt to income needs to be improved to get the loan so what we need to do see is sign up for the home loan such that we consolidates all of those awful credit cards. What about those other things we wanted to do with the money - Put it on the credit card!

Sending the little girl that once was off to college and into a dorm is more expensive than one might realize especially when you haven't been able to save one dime over the years. That's okay she can borrow student loans for her tuition, room and board PLUS mom can always take out another loan too. Wait she needs books? A new computer? Dorm Decor? Put it on the credit card!

Hmm those credit cards are climbing up there again maybe a 401K loan will help us get them down and close the monthly gap. Which works for awhile until the car needs work and its Christmas time again. Put it on the credit card!

Then the noose begins to tighten as that inflated property tax bill comes due, gas climbs sky high and the credit card companies start wanting more each month, or charging me more interest. They didn't bother to lower our limits cause we were maxed out and every time we made a payment we had to use the card within days minus the now lost interest to pay some other creditor or to put food on the table.

The husband begins juggling his multitude of credit card accounts and making his own credit card payments on the computer. Trouble is he is not really computer savy so once in a while we miss one of those ones where you got to pay three days ahead of the due date in order to get it in on time. That's okay just click the little button and pay the $15 rush fee. Oh but don't worry dear this doesn't effect our checking account cause they just charge it to the card so you can pay interest on it. Hmmm I don't have the minimum today for that card - well just let it go a day or two until payday and then catch up. Holy geez how did our interest get up to 33%. Well you go ahead and catch up dear meanwhile I have to let one of mine go so I can keep the lights on okay don't worry its just a measly store card or the SL maybe I got time with them.

Then May 1 it catches up to us at last. Husband ends up with three cards due that day and signs on to the first and sets the payment no problem, then the second one he hits a snag his online account has been shut down because the company is fixing a security gap and you've been issued a new card but the payment is due today so we need to call them and make it via phone. After that ordeal sign on to the third and all but submit that payment. Two days later time to see what available credit I have so we can get some milk and bread. Hmm says we have a late fee on our account call up to find that the one taking your information on the phone misentered your bank account number and since the payment couldn't be retrieved from your bank charged you an bad check fee too. Manage to get that worked out with supervisor but then realize card number 3's payment never cleared the checking account either and it too has new fees assessed. Seeing has how something must have gone wrong over the Internet lets call the creditor and beg them to waive the late/overlimit fees as a one time courtesy while offering them payment on the spot for the minimum that was intended to be made two days earlier. No such luck now they want $400 to bring the account current and your $170 previous payment amount is not enough.

So it begins a trip to CCCS gets us nothing but a wake up call and an attorney is the only next logical stop. Then there is a few more weeks of isn't there some other way maybe we can catch it up some other way. Keeping paying those cards and using them just as fast but before you know it the end of the month is here there is still no way to catch up that one card and one day later they want $800. Now we'll just have to let the cards fall where they may.

[erober3]

I'm contemplating Bk because of $25,000 in cc debt. some of this was misguided spending over my means, then last year was out of work for a while and put necessities on credit cards. I have not used a credit card in 8 months, and have paid off 3 of my 11 cards. Since all the CC companies are doing whatever they like even to those customers who pay on time (keep raising my interest, and my minimums) it has become impossible to pay my minimums even though I'm on a tight budget. job isn't guaranteed, I want to declare bk while I still have enough money to pay the lawyer...

[momisery]

I am lost as to how I got here. I will say just in 2001 I had 60,000.00 an a nice life starting up with my hubby. Then in 1.5 years he lost his job and did not want to drive so far and could not find anything in our town. He always wanted to leave CA, so we did just that. He had a great job in SC, we sold our CA home and it started out really good. I found a job, didn't pay really well, but his did for about 6 months and he was let go. He bounced around again unable to find a job that paid in sales. And so we moved from that small town to GA for him to find a job. We had a little house outside of town things were fine. But the patriot act required a background check, and it took them 3 weeks to do it, then 4 more weeks for hubby to clear up his driving record to prove he had paid a stupid speeding ticket in AZ in 1989 and had insurance in IA in 1976, that would explain why he didn't have it in Ill since he didn't live there. Anyhow, he lost that job before even starting because they couldn't wait that long. Anyhow, he found a good job, we decided to move closer to our jobs after a couple years, and hire a realtor who found us the "PERFECT" place.. close to our jobs. The bank had the "APPROVED" appraiser, and the agent gave us the name of the "FANTASTIC" inspector. The end result was a bloated appraiser in a neighborhood full of illegals, and when we tried the tell the house 1.5 years later every realtor we talked to told us we paid too much. The one offer we had the inspector came in wanting the sideing and the deck replaced for 40,000.00 and ther termite people said we had termites even though we were on a bond and it was treated every month for the past 1.5 years. The termite people found, the inspectors fought.. and our buyers walked. The second offer we had was a short sale and Wells Fargo lost the paperwork so many times that the buyer walked. We left GA because we had one too many visits by ilegals with butcher knives tucked in their shorts. Geesh! My husband worked a lot of hours and did not want me at home so much. So, we rented the house out, and moved. We really thought we could sell it and pay a bit of difference if we had to. We had no idea the downturn was coming. So, we ended up with a rental house and the tennat is gone now, has been for 1 month. And hubby has not found a job since oct. that pays. So, the blame all rests on our shoulders since no one else that ripped us off can be sued. I have to admit we are to blame too, but I do think that far to many dishonest people had made this much worse than it had to be for many Americans.

[graciemae]

We were doing ok, had debt but were always able to pay our bills on time-never late. We weren't saving like we should for emergencies so when they came up we relied on credit cards, but we were still ok, as we were able to pay all bills on time even though it took some juggling. I became a consultant for a scrapbooking/sales company and it was taking off, doing well, and I enjoyed it. My 3rd daughter was born 3 months premature, and that was the beginning of the treading water phase.......we spent the next year in denial that things were getting worse until we finally got the the point that all the juggling in the world wasn't going to work. We were still paying everything on time but we were starting to have to use credit for normal daily living expenses, that's when we knew we had to do something. A good friend of ours had filed a 13 and she was open with us about it, it made me think it could be a viable option for us. I NEVER, EVER thought we would resort to bankruptcy...it still embarasses me to admit it, but it was the best thing we ever did even if it was the most humiliating. We are now able to live our lives without the stress of owing everyone. We are 4 months away from discharge and after 4 long years I can't believe we are so close. We actually recieved the title to one of our vehicles 2 weeks ago. In 4 months the only debt we will have is our mortgage and our student loans......I can't imagine!! We are able to save for emergencies (and a new home, too). Financial freedom is going to be great!

[smiley]

Times are tough .....I really feel for you. Just keep your head up....

[denisejohn65]

Going through a divorce, loss of a job in summer of 08 put me behind.

[smiley]

I do have a laywer......... But I guess i'm wondering if the trustree would convert the chapter 13 to a chapter 7. I just don't want the mortgage co to come back after me. If they refuse to convert then I guess I'm screwed.

[Surfside]

We converted from a ch 13 to a 7 w/in 1 yr later. We let go of an RV and gave it back to the bank. Our lawyer filed additional paperwork with the court and the judge approved that when the RV was sold and it was most likely sold at a lost by the bank, the bank could not come after us for additional charges of depreciation of the RV and selling it at a lost on the auction block. It is best to hire an attorney because this could get tricky.

[smiley]

I''m currently in a chapter 13.... I have a small condo that i still owe 31,000.00 there are 48 units in this complex with a deliquency amount of 32,000.00 I am curious to know if i can convert to a chapter 7 (have a chapter 7 on my credit report discharged)..
want to walk away from this property without the mortgage company coming after me.

[nomoreccs]

What caused us to file?

Well we weren't trying to keep up with the Joneses. Never have. Never will. But we DID make a lot of bad decisions in the last 3-4 years, racking up more than $35,000 in credit card debt and an unsecured personal loan. I feel mostly responsible, because I managed our finances. I played the credit card shuffle game for about 2 years, which just increased our debt every time a balance transfer fee was added on.

DH worked OT to keep us afloat and we never had a single missed or late payment until we decided to file in March. The first payment I skipped was the hardest thing for me to do, but I had to put my pride aside and face reality. We went from credit scores above 800, and over $100,000 in available credit to bankruptcy. What a lesson, but at least we know we DID learn a lesson.

I felt guilty at first, but I know that bankruptcy is here for a reason. To get a fresh start. Thank goodness there's a way out of our mistakes. But I'm still very embarrassed to have allowed this to happen.

DH was diagnosed with an illness earlier this year and he's not physically able to work any OT because his treatments have horrible side affects including anemia. No OT means no money for credit card payments. I haven't worked in almost a year and have recently filed for Soc Sec Disability.

We lived below our means for the majority of our life together (15 years) and as soon as our case is closed, we will go back to that way of life. We WILL. That's a guarantee.

[frogger]

I have over 3.5 million in Real Estate loans that was valued at over 5.2,
and is now more like 2.9 million, had a partner walk out on over 600K
in a partnership, and another on 725K. Basically I have no late payments
right now, but the banks are going to want the overage back at sometime
and I am now sick of trying to off these things withthe only result being
ME owing a half million to them. I think I am really doing this to get the
burden of 41 rentals and some commercial R/E of my back.

Pretty much the same situation here, without a partner. What had been good in rentals for many years has pretty much crashed and burned due to the devaluation of the real estate and the tenant cesspool.

I'm tired of feeding the beast that never gets full. Between bank payments, insurance costs, and property taxes, there is no way I can make any money. I've run the numbers up one side and down the other and my only solution is to get out. 20 + years of work down the drain...

[stevieweavie]

I have over 3.5 million in Real Estate loans that was valued at over 5.2,
and is now more like 2.9 million, had a partner walk out on over 600K
in a partnership, and another on 725K. Basically I have no late payments
right now, but the banks are going to want the overage back at sometime
and I am now sick of trying to off these things withthe only result being
ME owing a half million to them. I think I am really doing this to get the
burden of 41 rentals and some commercial R/E of my back.

[Surfside]

1/23/09-Filed for Ch 7
2/23/09-341 hearing
5/28/09-discharged

[Doomonic]

I worked as a graphic contractor (from home) for a company 7 years with many ups and downs. Using credit cards to get by when needed. Work dried up and I started the job hunt. I've found a part time job but still looking for full-time. I'm no longer able to pay minimum payments. The final decision was made when I got a Warrant of Debt from Capital One Bank. I filed the day before the court date and it was dismissed.