Motion to Incur Debt

[muzzey58]

My husband and I filed chapter 13 on November 30, 2006.
We have a 2003 Pontiac Grand Am and the car is having serious problems.
The passlock (security system) is not allowing the car to start. Our other
car is a 1999 Cavalier with nearly 200000 miles on the engine and barely runs.
My husband is a manager and needs a reliable car for work. We live in a very rural area and he works about 10 miles from home.
We found a newer car and financing has been approved. We requested a hearing to incur debt. It looked like everything was set to be approved, but the Trustee objected to the request. I quit working in 2007 because of a serious back injury I suffered when I was a nursing assistant in 2006. I tried working as a cashier but the lifting of just ordinary was too painful. I told my then attorney that I had quit work and asked him not to include my income on the bankruptcy. He wouldn't listen at all to me. So they based our income on my income and my husband's. We were barely living because of the bankruptcy payments. In 2008, I fired the attorney after realizing that he had made horrible mistakes on the filing papers. My current attorney reexamined the filing and found major errors and asked for the payments to be modified. The Trustee objected to the modification, but then my attorney appealed and got the modification. The former attorney had our repayment plan at 80%. The current attorney managed to reduce the repayment to 55%. We never thought the Trustee would object to the car. We canceled our 401K because of losing money and found ways to adjust the budget. Our Trustee says that we are trying to cheat our creditors. How are we cheating our creditors, if my husband can't get to work and pay the court payment then we'll really be cheating the creditors. They won't get paid because we don't have any money. The Trustee's response to my lawyer was fix the car or take a bus to work. We live out in the boonies. The closest bus to 15 miles away! There are no buses to my husband's plant! The car would cost $3000 to fix. We're bankrupt. Any advice, please!

[DeadManCrawling]

I don't know the answers to most of your questions, but did want to point out one thing.

Your previous attorney probably included your income because he was required to by law. Asking him to exclude it was simply not an option, as BK is based on the previous six months income, from all members of the household.

He had no way around this, and since you continued working until the next year, there was nothing you could have done differently, except to have delayed filing until six months after you could no longer work.

Yours is a very good example of why people should not rely entirely on attorneys, and should really, REALLY take the time to learn as much as possible.

I am not casting stones at you, far from it. I feel very deeply for you and your husband, and hope that others can offer suggestions for the remainder of your questions.

Best wishes,

-dmc

[woeisme]

What is your lawyer saying? We went through something similar, but with much better results. My hubby got a back injury and had to go onto disability retirement, which was ~50% reduction in his pay. They suspended our payments for 3 months, then reduced the payment to $700 from $1100. We asked for motion to incur new debt for a vehicle, they approved us for $300/month payment for vehicle payment, so now we are only paying the trustee $400/month. Luckily our trustee never objected to either change, so the judge granted it with no problem. Can you have your lawyer appeal the trustee objection to the judge the way you did your 1st change? Good luck.

[Nicollette]

I know exactly where you're coming from with the Grand Am. I had an 03 Grand Am GT that started having serious problems plus it was no way worth what the lender would have got. I asked for permission from my Trustee twice to incur the new debt of financing a car and he denied it both times. I think the reason it was denied both times was the fact that the paralegal that my attorney had at that time didn't include in my request that I wanted to surrender the Grand Am. I believe the Trustee thought I wanted to keep the Grand Am and finance a newer vehicle. Needless to say, I think there were other problems going on with this paralegal so she is no longer there, and was replaced. The newer paralegal filed a motion with the BK court to incur the new debt and surrender the Grand Am, plus modify my payments. Any creditor that wanted to object had 20 days from the filing date to object. No one, not even the Trustee objected, so the BK judge signed off on my motion to incur the debt, surrender the Grand Am, and modified my Ch 13 payments since I'm paying for my newer vehicle outside of the plan.

[muzzey58]

We're trading in the Pontiac Grand Am. We are able to pay for the new car payment because we've made adjustments to our case. My husband received a small raise about $80 a month plus we canceled our 401K. These changes allow us to pay for the car payment outside of the bankruptcy payments. The original lawyer based our initial payments on 6 months of paystubs from January to June of 2006. My husband and I got married in December 2005. He still had his filing status as single which meant he paid alot more into withholding taxes. Since we now have the married status means we pay less in federal taxes. The other attorney was bad. I had asked for a modification after the plan was confirmed in 2007 to reduce the payments because of my back injury. He said that we could afford the payments and refused to change the plan. We paid nearly $1500 into the plan and had only $650 a week to live on and pay our bills. That's why I fired him and hired my court attorney. She had the plan modified not to include my income and lowered our percentage from 80% to 55%. Another item I need to mention to my current attorney is that she stated that we have 2 vehicles. Our other vehicle, 1999 Cavalier with nearly 200,000 on engine, was included on the petition to incur debt. I am going to ask her to mention to the Trustee that the vehicle is not being used right now because of the condition of the car. I think that she mentioned about the cavalier and the changes in the taxes are what the Trustee is looking at when he objected to the motion. You all have been incredibly helpful. Thanks.

[jade73]

Have you tried a buy here pay here car lot, they dont check your credit, so hows the trustee going to know?

[UpsideDownMI]

Although it would be nice for you to have the trustees approval, in the end it is the judge that decides on whether or not you can modify your plan. Have your lawyer submit a modified plan and file a motion with the court to incur debt for the purpose of purchasing a new vehicle.

[Billssuck]

I know your pain. All of my vehicles are older with high mileage. Just two weeks ago, my best vehicle broke down out-of-state with transmission problems. However, luckily for us, the transmission was under warranty with the company that rebuilt it 1 1/2 years ago and paid to repair it for us plus reimbursed us the towing expense to bring it back to his shop from out-of-state. So that worked out for us.

I am trying desperately to save every penny I have to buy another clunker to make it through our plan. I also have my mother's car that I can borrow (it's older too but still an option if necessary). We too live out in the boonies (30 miles one way from my husband's job) so I understand the necessity of a good vehicle. But, unlike others, we couldn't finance a newer vehicle before filing so we are stuck in this situation. I hope yours works out for you.

[optimistic1]

Try Drivetime.com

And also, give this a shot.

http://www.722redemption.com/debtor_wrp_ch13.aspx

[muzzey58]

We will be able to buy the car! The judge overruled the Trustee's objection today in court. He cited the problems with the Pontiac not being safe and that my husband needed reliable transportation for work. He also added that the Chevy could not be counted because of the condition of the car. We still have about 18 months left on our case. I can't wait for this bankruptcy to be over. It will be three years in November. This has been a life changing event for my husband and I. I will never use a credit card again. I buy everything will coupons. I really enjoy it when I can get double coupons at the grocery store and get things for dirt cheap. I want to thank every one that replied to my question. You really made me feel better during the hard fought battle. Thanks so much. I enjoy this site.

[jade73]

That's awesome! Congrats to you!

[Nicollette]

We will be able to buy the car! The judge overruled the Trustee's objection today in court. He cited the problems with the Pontiac not being safe and that my husband needed reliable transportation for work. He also added that the Chevy could not be counted because of the condition of the car. We still have about 18 months left on our case. I can't wait for this bankruptcy to be over. It will be three years in November. This has been a life changing event for my husband and I. I will never use a credit card again. I buy everything will coupons. I really enjoy it when I can get double coupons at the grocery store and get things for dirt cheap. I want to thank every one that replied to my question. You really made me feel better during the hard fought battle. Thanks so much. I enjoy this site.

Congratulations!! Also, I clip coupons too, and they really do help me save. I went grocery shopping one day, and my grocery bill was $111 before the coupons were taken off. After scanning the coupons and doubling them, it brought my bill down to $102.