Checking out my 1st rental tomorrow night...

[Panacea]

before filing chapter 7 and letting my home go into foreclosure. Just now over 2months late and my credit report shows my heloc late, one cc, and my mortgage late.

How do I handle this? Do I let them know all about it right now? What if they ask questions? Should I be honest right off the bat? I will have my daughter with me so talking honestly about the situation will be hard.

What should I expect? Should I just look and take paperwork with me if I'm and their interested?

[greg2169]

just be honest, if they require a credit check you are screwed either way since they will find out

[Panacea]

Geez, I'm so scared! When I pulled my report today, I was shocked to see the YEARS of paying on time, then the lates on some this past two months. This is killing me.

If I'm honest about the BK and foreclosure coming, I just don't feel like I stand a chance. I guess my question is, I'm in so deep w/the looming BK/Foreclosure, and theres no advantage to looking now, whats the sense of running out of my house now? Why don't I wait of few more months and save more money will waiting to be foreclosed upon? I thought securing a rental now would be a little more safe for me.

[tcreegan]

Hi Panacea,

Good plan to stay and save as long as you can!
But it would not hurt to scout out rental properties, meet with the manager and be honest, "I am filing BK and will need a place to rent when it is all over." Find out who is willing to work with you so you know where to go when the time comes.

Hang in there, it will all work out for you!

Tom in Colo

[mrskal]

It helps if you are going through a private landlord instead of a management company I think. That is what we did, and they only wanted background check, did not pull credit even though I was up front about it all.

[strummerfan]

Is the rent less than your mortgage payment? I know MD is far from MI but you are far better off telling your prospective landlord the situation but give them some circumstances that outweigh the negative, if the house payment is much more than the rent its easy for the landlord to see that it is affordable. In my own landlord experience people in or recently out of BK were far better tenants than others...because they did not have any bills I reckon. lol

good luck!

[DebtEnder]

Where I am renting now all that was done was a basic background check. They wanted to charge for a credit pull but I told him why bother it has a BK7 on it a whole 6 months discharged. I tossed him first, last rent and 1 months for security and he handed me the keys. I did not move out of my foreclosed home until I got the demand letter, which took a good month after they completed foreclosure. All in all got 8 months of payments to save up for all that upfront cost for the rental, and still have savings left in the bank.

Landlords are looking for people that have the means to pay, past credit has proven to be a useless indicator. Job history and type of job is what they care about. Hell I had an near 800 credit score a mere months before I filed, not that it meant I could afford any more debt.

[Freddy03]

Don't feel bad. I'm sure most landlords know what's going on. I would just be honest with them. Explain the situation and that you have plenty of years of on time payment history.

Good Luck! I also agree w/ tcreegan - try to stay as long as you can in your home. If you are only 2 months behind you might have another 10 months before you have to leave.

[Panacea]

I'm going to try to stay as long as possible now. I'm worried that I might miss something about the foreclosure, stay too long, and get kicked to the curb!

The only thing in the mail I've received from Wells Fargo (dated Oct 10th) was the need to bring this mortgage current by Oct 15th. Well, its not. I actually just tried to call the number on the paper, and it was just a regular line to press one to make a payment, two to check account balances, etc. So I didn't wait to talk to someone.

I've read about foreclosures in MD, but its just so confusing to me.....45 NOI, 90 NOD, then the race is on? I'm thinking I will have to leave in January anyway.....but how would I know? Sorry if I don't sound too intelligent here, I'm on my own now and never had to deal with kind of legal stuff in my life.

[DebtEnder]

In my case I had 3 houses, 2 rentals and then my primary. Since I kept the primary paid up till I decided I was going to just walk the rentals, as I had not paid on them for 5 months before I filed they were the 1st to get the NOD. Georgia is a non-judicial, I don't know about your, but in my case I got paperwork stating when it would be up for auction. For one of them I got that paperwork for 14 months straight almost. As such I stopped waiting for the paperwork and just started checking online a week after the 1st Tuesday of each month. In my county all foreclosures occur on the 1st Tuesday of the month. From what I had seen the county title records would update a week after the title changed. As such it was the only to be sure if the house was out of my name at last. The banks never knew, said I had to call the lawyer and that was just a waste of time.

Since I had such fun with my rentals, they were unoccupied if curious, when I got the paperwork on the primary I did not even start looking for a rental to live until I saw the title change online. I did not get the demand for possession letter for a good month after I already knew it was coming. All in all I moved out in Jan of 10 and had not made a payment since April/May 09. I got my NOD in September.

[NowImDownInIt]

First things first.. You WILL find a rental. It just might take a little more legwork.

Are you allowing the house to foreclose either way? I would look into apartments now and get out while the getting's good if that's the case. Right now you show a few lates but nothing that will get you denied over. A foreclosure, once in progress, is going to be a much larger hurdle to jump.

If you wait, you will find that some private landlords will work with you. I moved into a privately managed apartment complex that rents to people with negative rental/home ownership marks on their credit report ONLY if they have filed bankruptcy.

[free2breathe]

After our foreclosure, I was petrified that an apartment would not approve our rental application. We applied at a complex that is managed by a large national property management company. They have a point system for approval. I was told that a foreclosure actually counted in our favor and raised our point level. What a relief. Not only that, but they were running a rental special where we moved in and didn't have to pay rent for 2 months, and we had a discounted deposit. I am firm believer that when a door closes, a window will open.