Totally new...any advice appreciated...

[holdingon]

I have scheduled a consultation with an attorney for next week. For three years I have barely kept my head above water, "robbing from Peter to pay Paul" by moving money around to credit cards, using all my savings and any spare income. It's now caught up and is not enough. I can't make it work anymore.

I am getting married in early September. My fiance is in as bad a shape as me. Do we file before we get married, or after? I am moving to her place once married..and I have a mortgage on my home...do we give my home up in the bankruptcy? I'm just at wits end. She is totally stressed and depressed about the financial situations too....we really need a fresh start...any advice would be appreciated...

I know many people who have filed and have come out better off...but for some reason I have this feeling I will be the one that falls flat on my face..regardless..

[originalhealer]

If you want to keep the house, depending on how much equity you have in it, you should file a Chapter 13 bankruptcy. Whether you do this before or after you get married should not matter being that your credit file and your fiancee's credit file are two different things. If you only recently bought the house or have equity lower than your state's exemption amounts, you can file a Chapter 7 and still keep the house as long as you keep up the payments on it. If you include the house in a Chapter 7 bankruptcy and it falls within the exemption guidelines, you can reaffirm the debt.