Then I graduated and got my RN. But at this point we were probably close to 20K in credit card debt, and had a van that we owed 20k on and were upside down on. We owed 7 or 8k on DH's truck. And I mostly made the minimum payments. Then one month, I remember, I paid a hundred extra on one of DH' credit cards(CITI). I was patting myself on the back. Until the next month's bill came, and we were over the credit limit. Say what? Then I looked closer, and they had upped the interest rate to the max at the time, in spite of not being late on this one in about a year. In fact, the extra hundred I had sent in just barely covered the interest if that. We called them. They told us something bad had hit DH's credit report was why they raised the interest rate. So I ordered his credit report. Remember the fleeced vehicle we turned in? They finally gave up on collecting their $400 bucks and wrote it off as bad debt.
. Everything just started falling like a house of cards. I had 2 or 3 cards, and transfered some of his debt to one of mine with a lower rate, trying to get the min payments back down to where we could manage them. DH had several cards, and applied for another one to transfer some of the debt on to. But still we ended up cycling through paying the cards. One month this one of mine was late, next month one of his was late, lather, rinse, and repeat. Oh and during this process we lost 500 a month when the oldest son turned 18 and no longer collected survivor benefits from his other mother. Dh got fed up and called one of the bankruptcy mill lawyers he found in the phone book. We went in with everything one afternoon. He tried hiding the fact that he had a 4 wheeler, but I had the payment book with me and called him on it. I had to admit that I had a bank acct that he didn't know about- money troubles are the main cause of divorce you know, and at the time I had managed to save 300 towards leaving his butt. The lawyer did a quick look at the info the paralegal had collected and told us we didn't qualify for a 7, but our 13 payment wouldn't be more than 700 a month. I wrote a check for 50 out of my freedom stash, and we went back with the paralegal and were asked about our monthly expenses. We had no idea how much we were spending on some of those things, so guessed at a lot of it. And when we left the lawyer's office, we had filed for a Chapter 13 Bankruptcy. That was August of 2004.So we go in in a few days to sign the official paperwork for our pan. We had already figured out that we forgot a lot of things and had made a list of those expenses. My own typed of paper is actually in the official paperwork, go figure. To our surprise, they had our payments listed as 1200 a month. Almost double what we had been told. But we went on anyway. At this point we were having to let several cc payments go, and I was almost a month behind on my van payment. He wanted to walk out and find another lawyer. I convinced him that we could probably make it, after all, we would no longer have to make any payments except mortgage and the regular monthly bills.
We trucked along fairly smoothly, up and down. then DS#2 turned 18, and there went another 500 a month. I called the lawyer about modifying our plan. I was told that we had to submit a new budget, and the trustee would decide if we could lower our payment, but there also stood a chance she would UP our payment if we rocked the boat. I had had several small raises and DH had one too. We did the figures ourself and decided the risk wasn't worth it. So for about a year DH worked extra jobs on the side. We were originally in a 100% payback for 36 months. With one of the modifications we ended up being at a pro rata percent, but still for 36 months. I never knew exactly what that meant. I never thought about it much. I had fixed in my mind that we were at a 100% payback. So finally around June or July last year, as we were nearing the 3 year mark, I started looking at my paperwork again and started to have hope that we were in a 36 month plan. On the 27th of August, Pacer showed an order to revoke my payroll deductions. I was so excited. Our case was discharged Oct 12, 2007 and closed on December 10, 2007. We survived bankruptcy!! Somehow, we always had the money to pay our bills. We had to do without lots of things that we had previously thougt were necessary, but we never had to do without anything we needed.
And I plan to never find myself in this position again. DH wants to finance a tractor right now. I keep preaching "lets keep saving and God will put the one we are meant to have in our way when we are ready for it" He thinks we can go out right now and get a loan with no problems. I havent really done anything to clean up our credit. Our vehicles are all paid in full right now, the only ongoing payments other than utilities are student loan and mortgage. We have been slowly fixing all the things that have run down while we were broke and then in the bankruptcy. Like new screen doors, light fixtures. I still need a new fridge, but since my old one works, I am willing to put up with having the handle duct taped on for a while more. I am trying to get an emergency fund built up. And with the way prices are increasing, I am getting a good stock of staples slowly built up. Looks like beans and rice will remain a necessary part of our menu for a while yet.
If you are just beginning your bankruptcy journey, don't lose heart. It is possible to make it through, with some lifestyle changes and perseverance.
Liz