I'm just shy of 30 days into my 90+ days of cash-only living and avoiding all forms of credit.
Among the reasons the 90 days is important to me is because the months leading up to the bankruptcy decision consisted of charging living expenses and using my paycheck to make credit card payments. I didn't realize at the time, but now I know that there's more than $3,000 a month worth of charges on my credit -- approximately $10,000 in the 90 days before I started living on cash only. Even though virtually everything I charged is non-luxury, I'm not sure it's a good idea to file without puting some time between me and those charges because they add up to a bunch of money.
To make matters more difficult, my wife and I visited a world-renowned clinic 400 miles away so my wife could be seen for some ongoing medical problems and we stayed out there for a week. On the way home I had a connecting rod fail in my engine and got stuck with the wife and three kids 150 miles away from home. The hotel reservations for the week we spent at the clinic were prepaid at $79 a night and they were one of the last charges I put on credit. We made the actual trip and recovered the broken vehicle using nothing but cash and luck.
Weighing my options, I decided it was best to replace the engine and keep the truck running because I could do it myself for a bit more than what it would cost to repair the old one, and a bunch less than the cost of replacing the vehicle. I spend just less than $2,000 and bought a new engine on eBay.
The problem comes when I paid for the engine because I intended to use my last dollars of remaining credit to buy it and take my chances on the other end to see if it would get discharged or not. Either way I needed the engine because replacing the truck isn't an option at this point.
I accidentally made the payment in a way that debits my checking account and let it slide because I was supposed to fail over to my credit card. To my surprise and dismay, the check cleared the bank! The bad news is that the bank cleaned out my checking account and loaned me $1,000 from my formerly paid-off line of credit before they caused my account go nearly $500 negative.
I know the next payday deposit will bring the account back above zero but I'm agonizing over what to do with the line of credit. I'd like to pay it back before I file but I think that'll cause some problems all its own. Will this whole event be seen as a luxury purchase? Will it cause troubles because it's greater than $600? Was this a technically a cash advance? Blah...
This account is with a credit union -- the same one that holds the loan on the broken truck. I also have a credit card with them with a $5,000 balance or so plus the now maxed-out $1,000 line of credit. Because the accounts are supposedly all cross-collateralized, I probably can't get the title to the truck until everything is paid. Despite all of this, I'd actually like to maintain my membership and make good on all of the accounts. It'll probably cost me $12,000 to keep my $6,000 truck.
The alternative is to buy something else after bankruptcy (with no credit) and struggle to take care of a family of five with only one good vehicle until then.
Sorry for balthering on-and-on but I needed to get it off of my chest. Any advice or comments are welcome.
Among the reasons the 90 days is important to me is because the months leading up to the bankruptcy decision consisted of charging living expenses and using my paycheck to make credit card payments. I didn't realize at the time, but now I know that there's more than $3,000 a month worth of charges on my credit -- approximately $10,000 in the 90 days before I started living on cash only. Even though virtually everything I charged is non-luxury, I'm not sure it's a good idea to file without puting some time between me and those charges because they add up to a bunch of money.
To make matters more difficult, my wife and I visited a world-renowned clinic 400 miles away so my wife could be seen for some ongoing medical problems and we stayed out there for a week. On the way home I had a connecting rod fail in my engine and got stuck with the wife and three kids 150 miles away from home. The hotel reservations for the week we spent at the clinic were prepaid at $79 a night and they were one of the last charges I put on credit. We made the actual trip and recovered the broken vehicle using nothing but cash and luck.
Weighing my options, I decided it was best to replace the engine and keep the truck running because I could do it myself for a bit more than what it would cost to repair the old one, and a bunch less than the cost of replacing the vehicle. I spend just less than $2,000 and bought a new engine on eBay.
The problem comes when I paid for the engine because I intended to use my last dollars of remaining credit to buy it and take my chances on the other end to see if it would get discharged or not. Either way I needed the engine because replacing the truck isn't an option at this point.
I accidentally made the payment in a way that debits my checking account and let it slide because I was supposed to fail over to my credit card. To my surprise and dismay, the check cleared the bank! The bad news is that the bank cleaned out my checking account and loaned me $1,000 from my formerly paid-off line of credit before they caused my account go nearly $500 negative.
I know the next payday deposit will bring the account back above zero but I'm agonizing over what to do with the line of credit. I'd like to pay it back before I file but I think that'll cause some problems all its own. Will this whole event be seen as a luxury purchase? Will it cause troubles because it's greater than $600? Was this a technically a cash advance? Blah...
This account is with a credit union -- the same one that holds the loan on the broken truck. I also have a credit card with them with a $5,000 balance or so plus the now maxed-out $1,000 line of credit. Because the accounts are supposedly all cross-collateralized, I probably can't get the title to the truck until everything is paid. Despite all of this, I'd actually like to maintain my membership and make good on all of the accounts. It'll probably cost me $12,000 to keep my $6,000 truck.
The alternative is to buy something else after bankruptcy (with no credit) and struggle to take care of a family of five with only one good vehicle until then.
Sorry for balthering on-and-on but I needed to get it off of my chest. Any advice or comments are welcome.
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