New Schedule J..please look and give opinions

[Tbornetun]

As bkmaggster pointed out. You can include the cell phone contract in the bankruptcy. You are out of the contract, it is as simple as that.

[mom2three09]

The IRS website states...these are the allowable expenses..without being questioned...then why are we questioned about them? Legally I could claim $300 per month in medical expenses..and it says..not to be questioned...but I'm sure this tt wold question it...it just does not seem right...we are $1000 per month UNDER THE MEDIAN..and I can't believe we are having to go through this!!!!!!

I did cut down food to 1,000 per month....
I also cut cheer to 80
I upped school unches to 60
I upped office supplies to 75
And about taxes...we did have $290 per month...which included my self employment taxes and the tt was all over it...I'm not sure if she realized it included my self employment taxes...even though they just take it out in the way of whatever return we would have...I'm still paying it....our returns used to be $5,000 per year...then I started working for myslef and our last return was 1,800...seems my taxes were around 3,000 which would be 300 per month! I'm just afraid to put that on there

I totally see your dilemma... it really does stink that your expenses are being scrutinized the way they are I take it that if you lowered your amounts at all in schedule J then you would have $$ left to fund a chpt 13, correct? What is your attorney saying you should do to change your expenses to meet the trustees approval? He/she should really be helping you here.

I am just really afraid that you're going to be put into a chpt 13 because the trustee isn't going to allow the amounts you have listed

[backtoschool]

I feel for you berrymom35, and I don't want to scare you. The trustees are human beings and they don't want to make your kids suffer.

But.... they DO want to get you into a chapter 13 if there is any way possible. That is what they are paid to do. It's their job to try to get you into a chapter 13. If you have ANY expenses that they consider discretionary, they will take that money to fund a chapter 13 plan.

Here is what the trustee most likely would see as discretionary:

premium cable channels.
unlimited cell phone plan, versus pooled minutes plan where the kids cell phone numbers are 9.99 a month
expensive hobbies for you and your kids.
eating out as part of your food budget
a high entertainment budget
Internet bandwidth above the minimum (some service providers charge more per month for more bandwidth)

If those above discretionary items add up to over 100 month, presto you are in a chapter 13.

There are categories of expenses that can easily be backed with receipts and that are not discretionary that you do NOT have on your schedule right now but probably should.

car licenses, pet licenses, registration fees, etc.
all expenses related to your stay-at-home business, just like you claim it on your income taxes.
All insurance expenses including home, health, life, auto, disability, etc.
All expenses for doctors, dentists, optometrists, therapists, and all expenses for over the counter medicines such as advil, allergy medicine, antacids (for all of the stress lol), cough medicine etc. (break this out of your food bill and put it in your medical category).

Just some ideas....

[bkmaggster]

it's just not fair.

I'm going to say this in the hope that it will help you and eventually give you some peace of mind.

You have got to stop this line of thinking. I'm sure your creditors don't think it's "fair" that your kids get to do expensive activities while you have your debt discharged. None of this has anything to do with "fair". This is business and law, and as JustBroke always says, this is the trustee's game.

All of us here have had to give up many things to get bankruptcy relief. The quicker you can get "over it" the happier you will be, I promise.

I don't think anyone here wants to see you or your children treated unfairly, I think we all want to see you succeed!

[OhioFiler]

The only things that should be on your schedule J are ACTUAL necessary expenses that you can justify if needed. Putting together a pro forma Schedule J and asking bkforum'ers to scrutinize it will not help you. You need to go over every dime you spent in the last year or two and determine what your real expenses are.

[hereforinfo]

Would they really be heartless and expect me to take my kids out of their activities? I know "technically" they could...but that is not right. It's not their fault that we screwed up and got into trouble with debt...it's just not fair.

No one is going to make you take your kids out of activities. They may decide that some of your expenses are unnecessary and that you could use that money to pay some of your debts. Then the choice is yours to either cut back on activities, cut back on something else, or find another way to pay for those things - like getting a second job.

I would hardly call it heartless for a kid to not have unlimited text messaging and cell phone usage. And we wonder why kids feel such a sense of entitlement nowadays? There are families out there who can't afford to put food on the table for their children. THAT's not fair.

[ForumReader]

I feel for you berrymom35, and I don't want to scare you. The trustees are human beings and they don't want to make your kids suffer.

But.... they DO want to get you into a chapter 13 if there is any way possible. That is what they are paid to do. It's their job to try to get you into a chapter 13. If you have ANY expenses that they consider discretionary, they will take that money to fund a chapter 13 plan.

Here is what the trustee most likely would see as discretionary:

premium cable channels.
unlimited cell phone plan, versus pooled minutes plan where the kids cell phone numbers are 9.99 a month
expensive hobbies for you and your kids.
eating out as part of your food budget
a high entertainment budget
Internet bandwidth above the minimum (some service providers charge more per month for more bandwidth)

If those above discretionary items add up to over 100 month, presto you are in a chapter 13.

There are categories of expenses that can easily be backed with receipts and that are not discretionary that you do NOT have on your schedule right now but probably should.

car licenses, pet licenses, registration fees, etc.
all expenses related to your stay-at-home business, just like you claim it on your income taxes.
All insurance expenses including home, health, life, auto, disability, etc.
All expenses for doctors, dentists, optometrists, therapists, and all expenses for over the counter medicines such as advil, allergy medicine, antacids (for all of the stress lol), cough medicine etc. (break this out of your food bill and put it in your medical category).

Just some ideas....

Just out of curiousity, depending on the amount of debt involved, let's say a person makes $40K a year and the unsecured cc debt is let's say over $80K, the trustee will still try to see if the petitioner has to do CH 13 when he or she originally filed for CH 7? How is the petitioner going to be able to make payments through a CH 13 if his or her debt is much higher than what he or she earns? Especially if he or she does not have any assets to pay down the cc? Even if the trustee finds an extra "100.00" from the expense schedule that can go toward the CC, how is the $100.00 going to pay down the $80K in 5 years? I understand it is the trustee's job to represent the creditors, but there are just some things the petitioner would have no way of being able to pay the debt with very little money to work with. Any thoughts on that?

[Tbornetun]

The amount of debt does not determine whether or not it should be a Chapter 13. It is the disposable income. Even if the creditors get $5 a piece, it is more than they will receive in the creditors would receive in a Chapter 7. She could have $150,000 in debt and it still wouldn't make a difference. If the disposable income is there, the trustee is going to push for a 13 or dismiss.

[backtoschool]

There are 10% chapter 13 plans. In your example, 10% of the 80,000 debt payed back over 5 years would equal $133.00 a month, which would be an acceptable chap 13 plan.

The OP has a LOT of discretionary expenses that could go into that plan if the trustee chooses to go the chap 13 route. If those expenses are not changed on the schedules it is possible that the trustee would put several hundred dollars a month towards a plan in the OP's case.

Of course I am not the trustee so I have no idea what would really happen.

But your scenario could lead to a chap 13 plan in some cases.

[ForumReader]

Thanks. That helps to understand better. My lawyer said I qualified for Ch 7 and did not go into details how a CH 13 would work if the trustee tried to wiggle for a CH 13 so I gave a scenario to see if I can understand this better why the trustee would go for a CH 13 when the petitioner has very little money to work with. So at a typical 341 meeting, the trustee will look over the expense schedule and will ask questions about this item and that item. If the trustee is not satisfied with the expense schedule, a 341 meeting is rescheduled or extended?

[bkmaggster]

So at a typical 341 meeting, the trustee will look over the expense schedule and will ask questions about this item and that item.

Nope. Typically this will only happen if the expenses are discretionary or fall outside of the IRS guidelines.

Do a board search on "required trustee questions" to see the required questions the trustee usually asks.

[jribe]

to the OP:
Please remember that the trustee's job is to find assets and get money for the creditors. They honestly don't care if you have money left over for entertainment or your kids' activities. They actually get a percentage (as a fee) of the amount recovered and partial from ch 13 payments.

I know you don't think this is "fair" but it's not about what's "fair" and what's not.

You need to look at this from the creditors standpoint as well. The trustee is on their side; and if he/she feels that your expenses have too much for discretionary they will cut them out.

If you have more than $125 disposable (per the trustee) you can go into a ch 13.

[LSUTiger32]

Very little of what my attorney did on my schedule veered away from the IRS allowances. We did the $1,370 for food, clothing, etc., the $489 for two vehicles in Louisiana, the standard allowance for utilites which was just under $500. I mean I have a 2700 square foot house so if that covers me it should cover you. I have $400 energy bills in the summer but the gas bill is next to nothing. In the winter I might have a $150 gas bill but the energy bill is about the same. I never spend more than $450-500 a month on utilities including water.

We are all just trying to help. I would stick to the IRS deductions as much as possible unless you can seriously and strongly document something different. I never included anything my kids do as expenses because that is way to easy to hit me on.

[berrymom35]

I have stuck to the IRS guidelines...vehicle expenses, food/clothes/personals, utilities, mortgate, medical...everything is within guidelines......so I'm not sure what all the posts about sticking to the guidelines are about. The only thing I have that is above and beyond is my children's activities..and it's not "texting" it's football and dance classes...and my husband already works two jobs..and I do as much work as I can being self employed..if were pushed into a 13 anyway....I could get four jobs and all that extra money won't go to my family it would end up going to the creditors once the tt found out we were making even a dollar more per day....

I've seen people on here try and justify being thousands over the median...and get by with a 7..I'd like to know what kind of expenses those people had that were considered "legal", if they were making that much money. We gave up our house, car, everything to do a seven and we are way under the median. What if this month we have no medical expenses but next mont we have a lot? That extra money should be in our budget in case we need it...that is why the allowances are there...you should not necessarily use that 300 for medical each month, but it should be there in case you need it. If the tt takes every extra dime from us what happens if the alternator goes out on my van? or the transmission out on my husbands truck? Well, thats when the extra vehicle expenses should come in handy. My dh broke his arm in March..had to pay 200 at the ER...would not have had that if all our money was being paid out in a 13 plan...this is what is not fair..


and as for the creditors...they got everything they were owed in the thousands and thousands we paid to them and because of inflated interest our balances never went down...in fact, they were paid twice what they ever loaned us and I don't feel bad about it one single bit.........................................

[backtoschool]

I have stuck to the IRS guidelines...vehicle expenses, food/clothes/personals, utilities, mortgate, medical...everything is within guidelines......so I'm not sure what all the posts about sticking to the guidelines are about. The only thing I have that is above and beyond is my children's activities..and it's not "texting" it's football and dance classes...and my husband already works two jobs..and I do as much work as I can being self employed..if were pushed into a 13 anyway....I could get four jobs and all that extra money won't go to my family it would end up going to the creditors once the tt found out we were making even a dollar more per day....

I've seen people on here try and justify being thousands over the median...and get by with a 7..I'd like to know what kind of expenses those people had that were considered "legal", if they were making that much money. We gave up our house, car, everything to do a seven and we are way under the median. What if this month we have no medical expenses but next mont we have a lot? That extra money should be in our budget in case we need it...that is why the allowances are there...you should not necessarily use that 300 for medical each month, but it should be there in case you need it. If the tt takes every extra dime from us what happens if the alternator goes out on my van? or the transmission out on my husbands truck? Well, thats when the extra vehicle expenses should come in handy. My dh broke his arm in March..had to pay 200 at the ER...would not have had that if all our money was being paid out in a 13 plan...this is what is not fair..


and as for the creditors...they got everything they were owed in the thousands and thousands we paid to them and because of inflated interest our balances never went down...in fact, they were paid twice what they ever loaned us and I don't feel bad about it one single bit.........................................