Important Car Question

[chrisandsarah]

I have a car (SUV) that I owe approx. $30,000 and the following are the values from kbb:
Suggested Retail: $22,745
Private Party: $17,995
Trade-In: $15,475

I'm not sure which value car companies go with, and I'm sure that when/if they sell it at auction they will not get anywhere near those amounts.

The loan company (Capital One Auto Finance) is located in Texas. The chapter 7 discharge was on Oct. 9, 2008 and the car is still sitting in my driveway. Originally I said I wanted to reaffirm, but in the end never followed through with the reaffirmation agreement. Also I have not made a payment on this car since March 2008. I've called Cap. 1 and they have "charged off" the account to another company. This company doesn't return my phone calls. I have only received 2 surrender letters from them which I received before discharge. I didn't sign them because I figured they would come and get the car after discharge anyways.

So my question is now what? How long do I have to be responsible for this car? Isn't there a set time frame that they have to come repo the car by? Would they even bother coming and getting it (I'd assume they'd probably not make anything off of it anyways after paying a repo company and legal fees)? Is it possible that they'd abandon it, and it so what do I do?

Finally, I'm moving before the end of the month (out of state). I'm fine with taking the car with me but I don't want to pay all the extras I'll have to if they're going to come pick it up sooner or later? Is there a way to get the title released to me after a certain amount of time?

Sorry it's so long, but thanks for reading...

[chrisandsarah]

btw, I'm in MD right now, moving to PA... Loan company is in TX...

[mrbsf]

The discharge only wipes out your legal liability to pay back the loan. However, the lien on the vehicle remains in place. The BK stay may have temporarily halted the repo, but they'll be coming eventually. It may be best to voluntarily surrender the vehicle prior to your move.

[chrisandsarah]

Well that's the thing... I received a discharge almost 60 days ago (Oct. 9th) so the stay has not been in place for a while...

Also, the company that Cap. 1 referred me to (because they said they "charged off" the account) is not answering my calls or returning my messages, so I kind of can't surrender it because I can't talk to them...

Another thing I'll point out, I did have another car with Cap. 1 and actually within a month of finding out about the bk, they did repo that car without even trying to get the relief from stay. So if they were so anxious to get that car, why now are they not coming for this one?

[Tbornetun]

Because it is an SUV, maybe?? They may not be as eager because they know it will be difficult to sell it, leaving it with you is free storage.

[chrisandsarah]

Yeah that's what I figured, free storage and they don't have to worry about the insurance... I do! I mean wouldn't it make sense that there would be a law or rule or something saying that a creditor has xxx amount of days to pick up whatever collateral they plan to take or else they give up their rights to that property?

I mean, I'm paying the insurance, I'm going to wind up having to transfer the car to another state eventually, and also my tags need to be renewed in Feb. 2009 even if I don't do the transfer by then... I don't get why should I be responsible for that? Especially when I'm trying to get them to take it back and they aren't responding to me...

I understand that a foreclorsure takes months, but for a car or any other property, it takes them 1 day at most to send somebody out to get it... Not months!

I guess I needed to vent a little bit, does anybody agree with me?

[StartingOver08]

Did you have an attorney when you filed BK?
Contact the attorney - or even contact the BK dept of the bank/lender that financed the car and notify them in writing that you are relocating at the end of the month and the car will not be moved with you.
You will want them to provide a location to surrender the vehicle, preferably right now because you will be removing the insurance and the car will not be re-registered when it expires. My attorney told me most of the BK depts have places to surrender the vehicles and it is a drop off point that is usually local to you.

(I don't know if this works or not - but it is worth a try )

[debtmonster]

I understand that a foreclorsure takes months, but for a car or any other property, it takes them 1 day at most to send somebody out to get it... Not months!

The thing is, if the bank has 1,000 cars to be repossessed all over the place and you have to pay a repo man $200-250 for each vehicle... that bank has to come up with:

1,000 x $200 = $200,000 in repo fees alone.

It's just like the guy said above... you're free storage until they can get around to it. And with the way things are going now, I'm sure a lot of big banks have a lot more than 1,000 cars on the repo list right now.

I would just keep the insurance on it and drive it as if it were paid off. I'd keep all of your personal belongings out of it and have nothing more in the glove compartment than the registration.

Sometimes if the repo man is nice, he'll come knock on the door and ask for the keys so then you can go out and remove the license plates. That's what they did for me. I even took a video of my repo and it's on the Internet. All of my friends got a kick out of it. It took 12 seconds flat for the guy to hitch the car and drive off. If I was not around, he's have no problem taking it away from me. I have a garage, so I was nice enough to leave it outside for him. Plus I live WAY out in the middle of nowhere. It's a hassle for a repo man to drive a good 45 minutes out to my house. He wants to make sure I am there. Where I live, most people are nice and don't play games. It's not like the TV shows where people come out all angry. When people here are 3+ months behind on their car note, they know the repo man will cometh and taketh away.

Wells Fargo now wants over $8,000 for the deficiency for that after they auctioned off the car.

[danaf]

Wow - and people are worried about not signing reaffirmations, paying on time, and still getting their cars repossed? They shouldn't be after reading your thread.

Cap 1 although hq'd in Texas must have offices all over. For ex., I have a friend that lives in AZ and she worked for Cap 1 in Phoenix. Why not see where the closest one is to you and try to drop it off there? Or park it on their parking lot, send a ltr with the keys.

[GreenInkOnPaper]

Wow - and people are worried about not signing reaffirmations, paying on time, and still getting their cars repossed? They shouldn't be after reading your thread.

Cap 1 although hq'd in Texas must have offices all over. For ex., I have a friend that lives in AZ and she worked for Cap 1 in Phoenix. Why not see where the closest one is to you and try to drop it off there? Or park it on their parking lot, send a ltr with the keys.

I worked for Cap 1, and as of late, they are HQ'd in Oklahoma. Cheap rent here. They closed offices in CA and TX....

[GreenInkOnPaper]

The thing is, if the bank has 1,000 cars to be repossessed all over the place and you have to pay a repo man $200-250 for each vehicle... that bank has to come up with:

1,000 x $200 = $200,000 in repo fees alone.

It's just like the guy said above... you're free storage until they can get around to it. And with the way things are going now, I'm sure a lot of big banks have a lot more than 1,000 cars on the repo list right now.

I would just keep the insurance on it and drive it as if it were paid off. I'd keep all of your personal belongings out of it and have nothing more in the glove compartment than the registration.

Sometimes if the repo man is nice, he'll come knock on the door and ask for the keys so then you can go out and remove the license plates. That's what they did for me. I even took a video of my repo and it's on the Internet. All of my friends got a kick out of it. It took 12 seconds flat for the guy to hitch the car and drive off. If I was not around, he's have no problem taking it away from me. I have a garage, so I was nice enough to leave it outside for him. Plus I live WAY out in the middle of nowhere. It's a hassle for a repo man to drive a good 45 minutes out to my house. He wants to make sure I am there. Where I live, most people are nice and don't play games. It's not like the TV shows where people come out all angry. When people here are 3+ months behind on their car note, they know the repo man will cometh and taketh away.

Wells Fargo now wants over $8,000 for the deficiency for that after they auctioned off the car.

Yeah, but if they send the cars to auction, they get back a chunk of change.

[carbk]

Because it is an SUV, maybe?? They may not be as eager because they know it will be difficult to sell it, leaving it with you is free storage.

That's interesting, I have a friend who is a sales manager at a dealership. He's the one who goes to auctions to buy cars (Repos, lease returns, etc.) He just bought (from auction) a 05 Nissan Armada (Big V8 SUV) that was repo'd by Capital One Auto Finance. I also saw some other cars on their lot that he said are repos from Cap One. Just thought I would mention that.

On another note, when I filed for BK, I had 3 auto loans, even though my attorney suggested I just wait for the finance companies to come get the cars, I decided to just voluntarily surrender them. I didn't want to deal with the embarassment of our neighbors (we have nosey neighbors) being home when the repo man came and got my cars so I just drove the two cars which I was giving up to their respective lienholders which where my local credit union and my nearest BMW dealership since one car was financed thru BMW financial services. I actually kept my third car though and have continued making my payments on time and I did NOT sign the re-affirmation agreement that my credit union was requesting I sign. Haven't had any problems with them.

[chrisandsarah]

Hey, Thanks for all the advice...

Today I actually received a letter from Capital One (that was a big surprise!). It basically said it's a "Right to Cure" and that I have until Dec. 23 to pay all the past due amount (which is over $5,000) otherwise they will exercise their right to accelerate the debt and repo. It also states that I will be held responsible for the deficiency after it's sold at auction, but that's incorrect isn't it? This debt was discharged, so I'm not going to owe them anything even though they took their sweet time coming to get it? It's just weird to get a letter from them like that when before they told me they charged off the account to another company...

I live with family right now and it's pretty far out from anything, so I'm planning on just leaving the car here and see if they come and get it on the 23rd. The car hasn't been turned on even since about July and I cleared all of my stuff out and took the tags off (but didn't turn them in yet, just in case) at the same time.

And I'm sure Capital One received the letters I sent to them before to the TX office, I called them to make sure. Maybe they have their mail forwarded, who knows?

[Never_Again]

If you did not reaffirm, and the debt was discharged, you will not owe a balance.

You will probably find that it is just a form letter that they use, and say that. Although, most lenders are pretty sensitive in being careful about their language when a person has had a bankruptcy, as they do not want to violate the stay.