Help! I have a contract after Filing for BK

[scs30885]

Hello all,

I filed for chapter 7 on 3/3/10 in florida and my 341 is scheduled for 5/6/10

I am a realtor and had 3 real estate listings for sale.

I just went under contract on one of them on 4/13/10

My question is, if the trustee is going to try get her hands on my the commission ?

Is income after filing but before the 341 suseptible to be taken by the trustee?

I really need this income to survive and don't know what to do.

HELP NEED UR ADVICE!!!

thanks

[newbie2]

Hello all,

I filed for chapter 7 on 3/3/10 in florida and my 341 is scheduled for 5/6/10

I am a realtor and had 3 real estate listings for sale.

I just went under contract on one of them on 4/13/10

My question is, if the trustee is going to try get her hands on my the commission ?

Is income after filing but before the 341 suseptible to be taken by the trustee?

I really need this income to survive and don't know what to do.

HELP NEED UR ADVICE!!!

thanks

The date of your filing is a snapshot of what your financial picture looked like at the time. We are allowed to make money and live after we file.

Also, just because a house went "pending" doesn't mean it has sold. You don't really earn the income until the home sale closes and you get paid.

[justbroke]

While the date of filing is a snapshot, the "listing" contracts were in the snapshot. Whether the Trustee is entitled to unearned income from a pre-petition contract is a great question. As newbie2 writes, you haven't been paid yet, and it isn't even an "A/R" at this point. You'd have to complete the closing to get paid, so it's all contingent.

Having wrote all that, the 9th Circuit (CA, AZ) had previously found that since the contracts were signed pre-petition, the interests in those contracts are property of the Estate. In re Jess, 169 F.3d 1204, 1208 (9th Cir. 1999).

My answer is that, the pre-petition (listing) contract is contingent yet it is property of the Estate. I think parsing whether a listing constitutes a right to be paid versus an actual contract for sale... is questionable, but I don't think it matters. The listing agent does have a contractual right to a share in commission, or all of the commission.

More on point is the case In Re: Janet Lynn Parsons, 280 F.3d 1185 (8th Circuit 2001) which specifically went to real estate commissions.

For Florida, you have In re Brandon, 184 B.R.. 157 (Bankr. N.D. Fla. 1995), where the court found that a real estate commission paid post-petition was property of the estate because it was traceable to a pre-petition sale contract. The distinction in Brandon, I think, is that it was a pre-petition "sale" contract.

[liz417]

There was another poster here (can't remember name) that was a realtor too and she said she was asked by the Trustee at her 341 if she had any sales pending...:/