My chapter 7 Pro Se filling Journal

[user33]

I discovered this forum on Monday and found that it is a great self-help resource especially for people who file Pro Se (it is helpful for anyone including those who can afford to hire the lawyer). There are a lot of information in so many threads over the span of many years, it's no very easy to search and find the answers and reference one needs. Since I am starting the chapter 7 filing from scratch, I think if I document my process in details in a journal form, it may become handy for people after me, since there will have a detailed reference of an actual case: the time line, the debts involved, many specifics, the events occurred from start to finish, etc.

I will also be benefited through this process, because I can ask questions from those who had gone through the similar process, or they would read the journal and offer advice and suggestions. I am very grateful for all the help I am finding/getting here, and I hope I can give something valuable back to the community.

Let me start with a brief background introduction:

I had a very successful IT and finance career and a side business from mid 90s to early 2000s (100k to 200k+ gross annually), when the economy and the industries started to go downhills. I gradually accumulated a relatively large amount of credit card debt (unsecured), both personal and small business cards. I stopped charging and using of all credit cards in 2006. The total debt was around 150k, with more than 50% from business cards, most of the debts occurred in last two years before I went default, before that I had 20 years of perfect credit with zero late payment history.

I was self-employed for a numbered of years with negative annual income, I had my last profitable business (sole proprietorship) income (gross just over 30k before tax) in 2006, then shut down the business and work as an employee with 100k salary, I was laid off in 2007 and has since been unemployed (business was closed in 2006).

I was suit by 2 cards in 2008, one has just won the summary judgement against me, and from what I read here, this company is ruthless and will start to collect and harass me, so I decided it will be a right thing for me to do to file chapter 7 now, because I won't be able to pay off the $150k+ debt any time soon giving the current employment and economic condition, and to get this creditor off my back.

I wanted to list the detailed dates, creditors, and court location, but I am concerned I might give everything away and attract attention from creditors and trustee, even though I am doing everything openly and honestly and have nothing to hide, I can not assume that the other side is as honorable, so I can't take the risk. I do promise once the case is closed I will disclose all the details so that they can be of benefit to people in the similar situation.

My only income now is from unemployment benefit (exempted income) which means the means test is passed. I have small amount of money in checking account from unemployment benefit to pay the rent and food and minimum living expenses, I don't own car, home, or any non-exempted property (I am in the judgement-proof category).

I started to study Nolo's "How to file chapter 7 bankruptcy" (14th edition, published in 2007, I compared my book with free sample chapter of the 2009 edition in Nolo website and didn't find any updates, so I assume it should be fine to use the 2007 edition, the new lnaw has not been changed since it become in effect in oct. 2005) last night, till 2 am, and has finished first 5 chapters, am on the chapter 6, the line-by-line instruction part, plan to do as much as I can this weekend to fill out the required forms.

I used the fillable PDF forms downloaded from the government site, plus the local forms.

I will continue to update my progress. I welcome any advice and suggestions.

[justbroke]

Welcome to the Forum! Thanks for wanting to document your journey.

FYI, you may want to use the blog feature for this.

[tigergem]

I meant to do that too, but it didn't quite work out that way. I wish you more success in documenting your adventure than I had. Welcome to bk!

[user33]

Welcome to the Forum! Thanks for wanting to document your journey.

FYI, you may want to use the blog feature for this.

Thanks! That's a good idea, I didn't know the forum has a blog feature.

On the second thought, since I was not aware of the blog feature, perhaps most readers are not aware of it either or even if they do, they never or seldom read the blogs, hence, it might be advantageous to stick to the forum. I want give that more thoughts. My intend is to give back and to make my effort helpful to as many people as possible.

[tigergem]

The blog entries are pretty easy to find, because the link to blogs is up in the top navigation bar, and each of us who has a blog, has links to our blog entries in our profile. Threads, though, tend to get buried after a certain period of time. Although, I have noticed many, many times when googling a bk question (in main google, not here on the bk site) that quite often one of justbroke's threads posts comes up in the top 10 responses to a query I have made.

[justbroke]

Thanks! That's a good idea, I didn't know the forum has a blog feature.

On the second thought, since I was not aware of the blog feature, perhaps most readers are not aware of it either or even if they do, they never or seldom read the blogs, hence, it might be advantageous to stick to the forum. I want give that more thoughts. My intend is to give back and to make my effort helpful to as many people as possible.

What will happen is, that if you do this as a "thread" then it will eventually get buried. The blogs are always indicated under your username, so people can always look at your blog. You can also put a "link" to your blog in your "signature" line so that people can follow your blog as well!

[user33]

Thanks for all your suggestions, blog is the way to go then, I will move this over to a blog.

[user33]

I have a question about my credit card charges

Before I ran into trouble of not able to pay the minimums of my cc's, due to the failing of my small business, this in early 2006, all my credit cards were current and I had a very long history of paying off all my charges for about 20 years up to that point. When I reached (or very close to) the limits of all my cc's, I jingled with balance transfers and cash advances to pay the minimums, until I exhausted my limits.

I had been totally responsible for my credits for 20 years and I was fully expecting that my business would turn around and I would had money to pay them back as I always had been, but that didn't happen. The truth is I never intended to defraud the cc companies, it was a true failure of my business. Can cc's claim that since I maxed out all my cards then stop making payments, I must had been intended to defraud them? since I could had stopped charging before I maxed out. Has anyone been in the similar situation and was challenged?

Please note that I stopped charging all my cc's in 2006, didn't file bankruptcy because I wanted to pay them back, I am forced to file now because one cc just won the summary judgement again me. Would the time factor be to my benefit?

Any advice will be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[justbroke]

I had been totally responsible for my credits for 20 years and I was fully expecting that my business would turn around and I would had money to pay them back as I always had been, but that didn't happen. The truth is I never intended to defraud the cc companies, it was a true failure of my business. Can cc's claim that since I maxed out all my cards then stop making payments, I must had been intended to defraud them? since I could had stopped charging before I maxed out. Has anyone been in the similar situation and was challenged?

This type of intent is hard to prove. I'm sure you made some payments, right? You didn't just run up the cards and never pay? If you never paid... that could be seen as an intent to never pay.

Please note that I stopped charging all my cc's in 2006, didn't file bankruptcy because I wanted to pay them back, I am forced to file now because one cc just won the summary judgement again me. Would the time factor be to my benefit?

It could be, but that's no guarantee. Alas, if the credit card companies have charged off the cards (likely) and sold the accounts (likely), it would be hard for the new "junk debt buyer" to prove anything.

You'll just have to see how this plays out.

[user33]

This type of intent is hard to prove. I'm sure you made some payments, right? You didn't just run up the cards and never pay? If you never paid... that could be seen as an intent to never pay.

Yes, I had been paying the minimums for all cc's, up until the last payment when I ran out of credit limits.

It could be, but that's no guarantee. Alas, if the credit card companies have charged off the cards (likely) and sold the accounts (likely), it would be hard for the new "junk debt buyer" to prove anything.

You'll just have to see how this plays out.

Last time I checked my credit report, almost all cc debts were reported charged off. I think 2 cc's didn't charge off and both suit me, one got dismissed by the judge due to their own screw-up (some technical glitch, they forgot to prepare the charges document in the trial and asked judge to postpone, this judge is consumer-friendly and he denied their request and dismissed the case, the other case the judge is pro-business and she told me they are entitled to SJ even though I was in hardship and wanted to make payment arrangement, judge granted them default judgement even though I appeared in the trial, oh well, they just forced me to file bk that's all, they are not going to achieve anything, makes no sense to me at all that they want to have the default judgement knowing I am unemployed and have no asset).

Amex was shown "changed-off" in my credit report, but I am still receiving the settlement proposals from Amex every month, are you sure "charge-off" means the debt has been sold?

[justbroke]

I didn't mean to imply that charge-off means sold. I meant charged-off and sold as two separate and required actions. Usually, they do sell them, as junk debt, after they are charged off.

[ryan]

User33, I'm looking forward to reading your blog posts. ..should be very interesting.

[CoCoChanel]

Pro Se Filing Worked Out Fine

I have not been on the site for a year, and today decided to return. Some of the questions have not changed since that time. I see that some folks are still filing Pro Se. Best thing I ever did. Only bad thing that ever happen was recently when I tried to trade in my car, I got the worst interest rate ever and Crapital One is my finance company and I was upside down so I could not get anybody else, could not trade the car and since that time have not been able to get out from under the crappy interest rate.