getting vehicle title after chp 7 discharge

[smokedurhonda]

Hello i live in ohio and filed chapter 7. my case was discharged last year. i had taken out a personal loan and used my car title for collatoral and now am trying to figure out how to get the title for my car. it was through citifinancial and no one there seems to be able to help me one bit. they never threatened to come and take the car. i guess my question here is has antone ever run into this problem? and how would i go about getting the title for this car?

[AngelinaCat]

I would go to wherever you get your license plates and stickers and file for a 'lost title'. You may have to pay a fee. I think it is $10.00 here in Florida.

Good luck! Congrats on your discharge.

[justbroke]

i guess my question here is has antone ever run into this problem? and how would i go about getting the title for this car?

The real question is, do they actually still have an enforceable lien on the vehicle?

Rule #1, Liens survive bankruptcy.
Rule #2, When you think a lien is gone after bankruptcy, see Rule #1.

Liens are generally only extinguished by fulfilling the terms (making all payments) under non-bankruptcy law.

The only liens which are quashed by a bankruptcy are those that have been stripped through a lien avoidance process. Generally speaking, you can't avoid a lien on your vehicle, or at least to the extent that you had an exemption, where the lien impairs your exemption.. and that's usually on for certain types of items. (Fancy speak for unless you had a lot of equity in it, and exempted it, it's still not yours.)

If you have, in fact, either successfully avoided the lien as a contested matter during your bankruptcy, or satisfied the terms of the agreement under non-bankruptcy law, then you only need to file for a duplicate title from your department of motor vehicles or tax collector.

Now if CitiFinancial wants to record a lien release, without you having paid or having a court order stating that the lien is avoided... great! Just ask CitiFinancial for a statement of lien release. Then bring that to the department of motor vehicles and have it retitled without the lien.

[smokedurhonda]

thank you very much justbroke i feel like you have summed that up very well, i was unaware that a lein could survive bankruptcy thats news to me. it turns out they want $800 to get the title in a settlement, unfortunatlly im just broke too.

[StartingOver08]

Wait - did you say that you were discharged in CH 7?

Did you reaffirm the vehicle note or did you do a ride through?

If you did a ride through - why couldn't you negotiate the $800 with Citi?

[smokedurhonda]

i did a ride through, and am in the proccess of negotiating with them as we speak