Questions regarding timeshare luxury item validity in a Chapter 13 Utah filing?

[UtahFiler]

Hello All (Newbie Here),

My first question is:

Is there a way a timeshare could be considered an emergency real estate property rather than a luxury item by the trustee when a Chapter 13 filer has an elderly family member out-of-state with health issues?

My second question is:

How would my bankruptcy attorney handle this matter before the trustee and what do we need to present to the trustee to get him/her to approve our timeshare as an emergency real estate property and not a luxury item?

We have already had our second trustee meeting and our bankruptcy attorney was all gungho about taking away from us. We are in dire financial straits without our timeshare option!!!

[ColoradoBell]

You might need to post more information before anyone can help you with your questions.

I have 2 timeshares and just filed a 13. IN MY CASE, because I bought the timeshares for literally nothing on EBAY, the timeshare is worth next to nothing for resale. But I don't owe anything on the purchase and only owe ever increasing maintenance fees. Because of this, my timeshares are not really 'assets' but instead serve to increase my expenses. I suspect the trustee might say that I have to get rid of them so that I'll have more money to pay in my plan. On the other hand, it is very hard for the trustee to get anything for your timeshare...so there is room for negotiation. It seems that you might want to have the timeshare valued as little as possible as an asset so that you don't have to pay back your unsecureds that much more.

IF you could tell us if your timeshare is owned outright or if you are still paying for it, how much, what kind of timeshare and why you think of it as 'emergency real estate' (which is just a term I've never heard of before), then maybe others here might be able to help!

[UtahFiler]

You might need to post more information before anyone can help you with your questions.

IF you could tell us if your timeshare is owned outright or if you are still paying for it, how much, what kind of timeshare and why you think of it as 'emergency real estate' (which is just a term I've never heard of before), then maybe others here might be able to help!

Thanks for your reply

Sorry about the missing info.

We still owe on the timeshare and it was purchased in October 2009. By the way, The term 'emergency real estate' is just a term I am using as a reference to why the timeshare was purchased. Hopefully someone knowledgeable on this issue can help us out. Once again CB thanks again for your reply

[UtahFiler]

More info. On this timeshare...

Purchased: October 2009 at timeshare property (not an ebay or resale timeshare)

Value: $19k

Payments: Monthly payments & yearly maintenance fees.

Option to sell timeshare before filing chapter 13: No time (bankruptcy attorney's office failed to give us time to sell).

[NoTomatoCan]

How much are the monthly payments?

What type of relative lives near the timeshare (mother/father? brother/sister? third cousin?)

How/why would this put you in dire financial straits to get rid of it? Guess I don't understand what type of argument you would even attempt to make. Assuming you have the timeshare 2 weeks out of the year, not sure how not having that puts you in dire straits. Couldn't you always get a hotel if you needed to go to visit the elderly relative?

[momofthree]

Unless you're in a very high payback plan, you're going to have a hard time convincing them to let you continue to pay payments and maintenance fees on a $19000 timeshare. How much is your payment each month? Annual maintenance fees? How much time does that buy you? 1 week? 2 weeks? I think a trustee could easily argue that 1-2 weeks time at a hotel when necessary would cost less than payments & maintenance on a timeshare....and the fact that it was purchased less than a year ago will probably raise a red flag as well...

We were able to keep our timeshare, but it's paid in full and we didn't claim a maintenance fee expense.

[momofthree]

lol, posted at the same time as tomato, but to make the trustee's point.

Estimated monthly payment: $250 (this is being VERY conservative & based on a 15-year term)
Estimated annual maintenance: $500 (again being conservative)

Annual costs: $3500

A hotel for 1-2 weeks would cost MUCH less than this figure....

[UtahFiler]

lol, posted at the same time as tomato, but to make the trustee's point.

Estimated monthly payment: $250 (this is being very conservative & based on a 15-year term)
estimated annual maintenance: $500 (again being conservative)

annual costs: $3500

a hotel for 1-2 weeks would cost much less than this figure....

i posted here to get some legal advice on a very sensitive matter ...not to turn this into a convention hotel ruling by the trustee.

Thanks for trying

[mrskal]

i posted here to get some legal advice on a very sensitive matter ...not to turn this into a convention hotel ruling by the trustee.

Thanks for trying

Huh?

[momofthree]

i posted here to get some legal advice on a very sensitive matter ...not to turn this into a convention hotel ruling by the trustee.

Thanks for trying

I'm not sure what you're trying to say here, but I was simply providing insight into why the trustee would challenge the expense, and to give you some comfort, that actually you won't be in dire financial straits without it, you'll actually be better off financially, even if you do have to go and stay in a hotel for a couple weeks, it'll cost you less than the annual timeshare expenses.

Sometimes it helps to see the numbers in black and white. Just trying to be helpful.

[indebt00]

We were still making payments on our timeshare. We had no choice but to surrender it. Our Trustee would not have approved it as a secured creditor. Our's cost almost $15000 but the value was put as zero since they have no way of figuring the value...and....there were 25 pages of Disney timeshares for sale at that time...I am sure its more now.

If we chose to keep it our lawyer warned us we would get way more scrutiny from the Trustee.

We asked if we could just pay it off and keep it...the Lawyer again said...Trustee will not approved maintenance fees either....

it was not worth keeping and having to fight for in our BK...we would have rather had things go smoothly and give up the timeshare...

which is exactly what happened.