No solid income, have to file pro se

[Suz]

hello---it's me again.

I was wondering if I could get some thoughts here.

I just spoke to a legal aid center here in my area (Massachusetts)--and the intake person said I should consider whether the timing of my filing for bankruptcy is ideal right now.

She cautioned me against going this route since my financial situation is dire and I won't be able to file again for many years if I find myself in a similar or worse situation.

However, I'm concerned if I do nothing...I will have these creditors after me forever. AND there is the small risk they'll take my car (it's valued at $400-$900 so probably not...but I won't be complacent about that).

Anyway...I have not incurred any additional debt (aside from interest on existing debt) and I fully understand the consequences of incurring more debt (frankly, I'm not even in a financial postion to incur more debt)...


I'm flat broke, practically no income and I need these sobs off my case.

so why wouldn't I file for chapter 7?

[ApresMoi]

What is your level of debt? Did he/she not feel it was high enough to warrant a filing? Please elaborate on the reasons given for cautioning you against filing at this time.

[mtbc]

If your onerous debts are dischargeable and you really won't be getting into trouble again, it might be easier to file while you are in such dire straits and clearly a chapter 7 case.

There may not be much you can do about legal actions now there's a judgment against you, but, if it would help you a lot to stop telephone calls from them and the like, you can do that with a clearly-written letter to them. It might also be worth double-checking what's counted as "exempt" against debt collection -- I don't understand much of that, but there might be materials in the "Collections" category here about that.

[Suz]

My debt is $11,000.

The only reason she said I might think twice about filing is if I get into worse dire straits--I won't be able to file again.

She's looking at it from the point of view that if I got myself into this mess once--it will happen again.

Whereas I beg to differ. :-)

This is a first time sitch for me and I don't plan to repeat it.

I have learned to live without credit for the last 3 years and frankly--it's a healthier life style. So while I can't say with 100% accuracy that I'll never get into another debt situation...I'm committed to extricating myself from the sick creditor/consumer relationship.

[zingabot]

In our state you need to be making less than a percentage of the official poverty numbers to qualify to waive the fee. If you google it, maybe "qualify waive filing fee chapter 7 [your state]" you should find the info.

I was going to go with installments instead but Nolo advises paying the whole thing upfront to make everything go as smoothly as possible so that's what we're doing. That'll pinch us pretty tight this month but then at least it'll be over and done.

We're a fairly straightforward case and have no money to pay an attorney so are filing pro se. If you read a lot, and make sure you understand what you're reading, you'll be okay. What I've done is print off all the forms (then again, if you bought the Nolo book they include the forms as well) and went through them step by step with the Nolo book as a guide. It helps to read everything in the book, even if you think it doesn't apply to you. There are a couple of things I think they might have been more clear on (such as how to handle an apartment lease), but otherwise they're a huge help. I've been working with the 2009 Nolo book from the library; both 2010 copies are being borrowed by other patrons (it's been a rough year, huh?)

Remember to see things from the trustee's and the court's viewpoint: the main things they're looking for are signs of fraud (so be honest to a fault) and whether you have any assets that can be sold off to pay creditors and/or disposable income that can pay creditors. The trustee's job is to get whatever he legally can to pay the creditors. So far I've found the process really is quite fair - if you can pay, you should; if you can't, you can't. It's easy to get a little paranoid about them coming after you, but I keep reminding myself they're not going to take the time and effort to get $20 from us when they can get $500 from someone else who has it (we've been surviving on unemployment and a part-time job for 9 months; paid our debts the whole time until there just wasn't money any more to do so, in November).

And each bankruptcy court has a help desk for pro se filers, so if you get completely stuck on something there should be someone to ask.