HOw do they figure out how much you pay per month?

[blessedmommy]

I am filling out the paper work for my attorney now and I wrote the check for his retaining fee and am starting the certification (pre bankruptcy) counseling today.
My question is I am filling out my budget papers now.
I guess I am questioning how much to put down for groceries etc. Because I could eat beans and rice and have more left over to pay back cards or I can eat like normal people do and have like $200 left to pay back. Will they even look at my case?

We make $47,000 year with 9 in our family

If I put my budget on here can someone tell me what they think?
We have been good at living in this budget so its working but...... that is without paying back debt.
How do they figure out how long you will pay? what if you don't pay it back within that time frame or is it based on a percentage of payback. Before we stopped paying cards our debt was $21,000 now because of fees etc its $26,000 that is with cars etc. TOTAL but all those fees $5,000 in fees. Crapola. what a rip off!! Makes me a bit irritated.

Anyway if I post my budget on here can someone help me decide how much I should put for groceries? Obviously I can go to the food bank etc to lower that. We are already currently getting food benefits from the state so I wasn't going to put that down. *humble me* *sigh*.

Anyway I am wondering if we will be paying for 3 years or 5 years and how they figure out how much we will pay per month and total as well.
$4,000 of it is car loan at 28%

how do they deal with large tax returns?

[Pandora]

I am filling out the paper work for my attorney now and I wrote the check for his retaining fee and am starting the certification (pre bankruptcy) counseling today.
My question is I am filling out my budget papers now.
I guess I am questioning how much to put down for groceries etc. Because I could eat beans and rice and have more left over to pay back cards or I can eat like normal people do and have like $200 left to pay back. Will they even look at my case?

We make $47,000 year with 9 in our family

If I put my budget on here can someone tell me what they think?
We have been good at living in this budget so its working but...... that is without paying back debt.
How do they figure out how long you will pay? what if you don't pay it back within that time frame or is it based on a percentage of payback. Before we stopped paying cards our debt was $21,000 now because of fees etc its $26,000 that is with cars etc. TOTAL but all those fees $5,000 in fees. Crapola. what a rip off!! Makes me a bit irritated.

Anyway if I post my budget on here can someone help me decide how much I should put for groceries? Obviously I can go to the food bank etc to lower that. We are already currently getting food benefits from the state so I wasn't going to put that down. *humble me* *sigh*.

Anyway I am wondering if we will be paying for 3 years or 5 years and how they figure out how much we will pay per month and total as well.
$4,000 of it is car loan at 28%

how do they deal with large tax returns?

If you're receiving food benefits from the state - how do you figure you're going to be able to fund a Chapter 13 plan with 9 in your family being way under median and the state gives you benefits?

as far as tax returns - they can be taken by the trustee to repay your debt throughout your Ch. 13 plan if he/she decides to do so.

ETA: we have 3 in our family and we budget 500 a month for groceries (food items only) and its still not enough sometimes - we are also below the median for our state, and the allowance is like $1200 or something - so for a family of 9 - its got to be up there for your state.

[blessedmommy]

believe it or not we are paying monthly debt just not all of it. We make it work!! Don't ask me how. LOL. but We are paying $350 a month in debt right now. $200 for a car and $150 to a creditor. Our mortgage is through our father in law so it is low. No lying on our food benefit program at all. Apparantely they allow for car payments or extras. We don't buy clothes often and my kids have plenty of clothes. We aren't as deprived as it seems.
We DOOOO have money to pay some of our debts. That is why I am trying to figure out how much we will be paying.
Like I said we live on a STRICT budget. It always works out to get our needs just not wants right now and certainly not able to pay off all of our debt with dh income being cut so drastically.

[Pandora]

well you will have to include all of your debt payments in your case because you wont be paying those, so are you certain you have extra $ to fund your plan? As I stated earlier - its not up to you on what your plan payments are - its really up to what your exemptions come out to, your assets, and whats left over in DMI. Thats what your payments are based upon - and what your plan comes out to. Example - we're under median but because of our assets and exemptions - we are in a 60 month plan vs. a 36 month and are paying $600 a month thus-far.

You have to put money aside for clothing, medical, food, housing expenses, vehicle maintenance, gas, tags for cars, drivers licenses, school lunches, pets, car insurance, newspapers, dental, etc etc etc. your state assistance is going to have to be counted as that is a benefit to you I believe, but double check to make sure. As far as your mortgage, that gets counted as well, even if you are paying it to your FIL.

yes they allow for car payments and extra's - but you have to be able to AFFORD to pay the car payment and those "extras" from what you make. Its not an automatic thing - you actually have to have that money available.

[momofthree]

With a family of 9, the IRS standards allow $2681/mo for food/clothing/personal care items. Food alone is right around $1400/mo. A good starting point might be to subtract out your food benefits from that figure and go from there.

Write out a realistic budget (even if it's negative) to take into your attorney and you will sit down with him and he'll tell you how much money you need to find in your budget to fund a plan, and then you two can work on it together. That is what we did with out attny. He told us we had to find a little over $100 a month to fund our plan and advised which areas to decrease while asking us if we thought we could do it....

You're way under median so you'll pay for 36 months.

[Pandora]

With a family of 9, the IRS standards allow $2681/mo for food/clothing/personal care items. Food alone is right around $1400/mo. A good starting point might be to subtract out your food benefits from that figure and go from there.

Write out a realistic budget (even if it's negative) to take into your attorney and you will sit down with him and he'll tell you how much money you need to find in your budget to fund a plan, and then you two can work on it together. That is what we did with out attny. He told us we had to find a little over $100 a month to fund our plan and advised which areas to decrease while asking us if we thought we could do it....

You're way under median so you'll pay for 36 months.

Unless.... they have assets that exceed exemptions and want to keep them - then they will be forced into a 60 month plan - like we are (well, it was an option really....not "forced"). Its either relinquish the assets to the trustee to liquidate, or pay the equivalent of the value throughout the CH. 13. Its how we ended up in 60 months vs. 36.

Otherwise - momof3 is right - write it all down, regardless if it comes out negative and go over it with a fine tooth comb with your attorney. You dont want the trustee to dismiss your case for not being feasible

[momofthree]

In a different post she said the only assets she has are a few old worthless cars. She should easily be a no-asset....

[blessedmommy]

I am afraid if its negative we won't be approved and literally we are living and paying "some" debt right now so realistically we CAN pay towards debt but at $21,000 with $4000 being secured by my 3 old cars will a trustee accept $250 total a month payments? Like I said we are paying $200 a month well actually $220 a month for cars at that high interest rate (%28) and then $150 and sometimes an extra $50 here and there for other cards and we are making it. not super comfortably though LOL.

and since I can pledge my tax returns of $5000 a year as well. (due to child tax credit, we are exempt all year) I guess that is what I am wondering. I don't want to go through all this paperwork and hassle if its just not going to be approved. My attorney however is a bankruptcy only attorney. He specializes in it. So hopefully he can help us work out a plan. I am hoping it will cut our %28 interest on our auto loan. We have only corrisponded through email so far as soon as I turn my paper work in which is tomorrow then I will be able to ask him all these questions but its keeping me up at night so I thought I would ask here until then.

Mark my words I WILL NEVER EVER EVER OWN ANOTHER CARD AS LONG AS I LIVE!!!!! They are dangerous. And in a way I am pissed at them. More at myself but at them too for allowing us to get them and for charging fees like they do and they seem almost as stupid as I was to give us a card.
We had perfect credit before our business went under in 2005 and now this.


Thanks all, I know my case is sort of a pain!!! as we are considered poor
I must say though we do NOT know the meaning of poor if we compare america with other countries. I still feel very blessed indeed well minus the stupidity of our money mistakes and our job cutbacks.

[Pandora]

In a different post she said the only assets she has are a few old worthless cars. She should easily be a no-asset....

I just saw that .


are you planning on surrendering your cars or paying them in your plan? did you get them over 2.5 years ago - do you know what they're worth blue book? Sometimes you can cram them down to the value - but again unless you surrender the vehicles all together then that $220 in car payments wont count towards your DMI I dont believe. *Scratch this - see below*

Blessedmommy - are you paying 200 towards these old cars that are secured collateral or are you actually paying 200 on the LOAN that secures the vehicles to it? Its a bit confusing because you are posting 2 different things in different posts. ?? Are your car payments between the vehicles $200 @ 28% or is that the actual loan?

Remember too that the child tax credit is only good until the child reaches age 16. once the child is turning 17 in the year you're filing - you cannot claim the credit. i dont know how old your kids are, but something to consider if you're counting on that credit and tax return to pay back your debt. Again its really up to the trustee on if he/she decides to take your return or not.

[blessedmommy]

Sorry for the confusion.

OK we are paying $220 total on a personal car loan which have 3 OLD cars on callateral.
car #1 1995 non running at the moment Chevy astro van
car #2 1980 ford pick up truck running sometimes
car #3 1995 ford clubwagon (was our car to get around in until a few months ago it blew a head gasket) so currently not running but we are wanting to fix it.
The car #3 we do not want to surrender but I am totally willing to surrender the others if thats what will pay down the debt. I wonder if that works. The loan is only for $4000 or abouts. but its 28% interest.
Hope that makes sense.

And then we are paying $150 towards a credit card on top of the auto loans as we were getting sued. we just started that a couple months ago and then we are paying an extra $50 here and there to other cards.
HOpe I am making sense. My brain is all burned out on figuring numbers and I am not the smartest when it comes to figuring these things out.

Here is my budget if that helps.

$400 mortgage interest only to father in law
$600 rent for land for above mobile home
$59 home insurance
$86 for internet and telephone ($40 of it is covered through our homeschool program as it is for learning purposes we get reimbursed for it)
$150-$200 a month for electric bill depends on time of year
$30 for garbage
$25 for water sometimes it goes up in summer due to garden watering to $40 a month
$86 for auto insurance will go down soon as daughter is getting own insurance
$33 cell phones maybe we should get rid of these but when you break down it is handy
$220 auto loan (3 of the cars are callateral) 28% interest
$19 a month with netflix (reimbursed through the school on every 8 weeks)
$55 taxes on manufactured home
$150 chase bank
$50 other cards paying sometimes

$260 month on gas, oil etc for cars
$600 groceries (we get the rest in food benefits)
$150 for pet food (we milk goats and have chickens for food)
$50 in savings is what we want to do
$20 clothing (we buy garage sales or are given hand me downs)

medical is taken straight out of our paycheck and my dh works for health insurance so we have great coverage)
$10 a month gifts

That is my budget

we make net 1381.00 net every two weeks
we get $200 a month for a reimbursement program thing we are part of
and we board others horses for $300 a month.

We get a $5000-$6000 tax return
and we get a $1200 bonus in march every year
We also get an extra $1000 sometimes through the year. We have every year but I don't want to count on it.

So bottom line our income is $3285 per month net
our outgoing is $3053 living VERY frugally and that doesn't include bonus and the tax return.

Now we can easily spend more on groceries as this budget is bare bones for groceries.
And since we are paying the $220 above and $150 to chase can't they take that amount which would be $370 and apply it towards all the debt or is that not enough.

My total combined debt is around 21000 to 26000 depending on if they erase all their dang fees.

is this doable? does anyone know?

We are making it work with this budget however it is not paying down the rest of our cc's only one card and auto payment. We have never been late on auto payment.

thanks all I appreciate this help I really do.

BlESSINGS

[forgotten]

we make net 1381.00 net every two weeks
we get $200 a month for a reimbursement program thing we are part of
and we board others horses for $300 a month.

We get a $5000-$6000 tax return
and we get a $1200 bonus in march every year
We also get an extra $1000 sometimes through the year. We have every year but I don't want to count on it.

So bottom line our income is $3285 per month net
our outgoing is $3053 living VERY frugally and that doesn't include bonus and the tax return.

Your income is actually $4133/mo. You will be counting income from all sources. $1381 * 26 pay periods = $35,906, $200(reimbusement)+$300(horses) * 12 months = $6,000, $5500 (average tax return), $1200 bonus, $1000 extra.

$35,906+$6,000+$5,500+$1,200+$1,000=$49,606 / 12 months = $4133.83

[blessedmommy]

with that being said should I increase my grocery budget to a more 'realistic' level? so to not short change us? I want to make sure that I pay my debts but I want to be realistic in grocery spending for 9. We were spending much more so this new budget is going to take a toll. but is doable I think.

And does it look like we would even qualify for ch 13 at this info above? if so what do you think our payments would be? do we pay 100% of the credit card debt or do they take off their $5000 in fees they have charged. Literally the fees are around $5000. Which is insane!

Thanks a bunch for any help or if you think its even worth my filling out all this paper work.

[forgotten]

with that being said should I increase my grocery budget to a more 'realistic' level? so to not short change us? I want to make sure that I pay my debts but I want to be realistic in grocery spending for 9. We were spending much more so this new budget is going to take a toll. but is doable I think.

And does it look like we would even qualify for ch 13 at this info above? if so what do you think our payments would be? do we pay 100% of the credit card debt or do they take off their $5000 in fees they have charged. Literally the fees are around $5000. Which is insane!

Thanks a bunch for any help or if you think its even worth my filling out all this paper work.

You need to make sure all of your expenses are reasonable. You have to be sure you can get by on those numbers for many years. You are going to pay back whatever your disposible income is.

If you make $4000/mo and have $3800/mo in expenses, your payment is $200/mo. This is oversimplified, but that is how it works for most people. You will however never pay back more than 100% of what you owe.

None of the fees are removed, but if your disposible income is only $100/mo, then you pay $100/mo for 5 years and the rest of the balance is discharged (you don't owe it anymore).

[momofthree]

You'll actually only pay for 36 months. You'll want to "hide" the pet, gift, & savings expenses in your groceries and clothing expenses. Boost up your food to a normal level as well. Like pp said, they're going to consider your monthly income as higher since your dh is paid bi-weekly.

[forgotten]

Maybe I missed something, but why are you not fileing a chapter 7 instead?