Ch 13 mortgage arrears question

[suzychapstic]

We are going to be filing Ch 13 hopefully by the end of February. We are several months behind on our first mortgage. Our second will be stripped and our car is going to be crammed down. So we were told by attorney that the mortgage arrears, the car, and any unsecured debt will be in the payment plan. I understand that we are required to pay priority debts plus a fee to the trustee as a minimum requirement of the plan. We are doing a 5 year. The monthly payment that the attorney discussed with us will just barely cover the crammed down car and the current mortgage arrears if I multiply the payment by 60. As I am understanding this, the longer it takes us to file (and we have more mortgage arrears) the higher our payment would be required to go.

I am not sure if the mortgage company will accept a payment from us at this point. The website that I used to make my payment on has a message when I click "pay now" to call customer service.

So, should we hurry up and file, talk to the mortgage company to see if they will start accepting payments, inform them of the BK, or just accept the higher payment for 5 years? I do not want to get into a payment higher than we can manage. If we are able to pay our mortgage is the payment going to be held in escrow and be stuck there for the 5 years or something messed up like that?

Please advise with experience in this matter. I am fairly new to BK and really want to make the best decisions getting started.

Our numbers (I think) are:
Mortgage arrears on first $6056
Car (crammed down to) $6600
2nd mortgage to be stripped $34,000
Unsecured debt (estimate) $30,000
Gross income $90,000
Attorney proposed payment of somewhere around $200/m due to high ongoing medical costs which put us here in the first place
Thanks for all of the help.

[catleg]

Call them up and get the address to mail a check or do a pay by phone.

A lot of creditors cut off statements and web access on learning of BK.

Sending a bill can be construed as violating the automatic stay.

Wait, you haven't filed yet. They probably want you to call so you can pay the correct amount with late fees and/or they don't want you in a rolling 30 days late situation.

But you should be prepared to lose web access to pay any bills you need to keep paying while in BK such as car loans or mortgages.

Wells Fargo still sends me "information statements" each month instead of bills.