cash purchases immediately prior to filing...

[Grumpy2]

OK, so my wife and I use prepaid cellular and have no landline. Our kids broke her phone over the weekend and the cost to repair is likely to be over 50% of the price to replace. Here I am just a few weeks from filing and we need to go out replace the phone. We are huge fans of the moto g in our house because they are about 180 bucks and are quite tough without being crappy like sub $100 stuff. Note that this is off contract. With prepaid, I can buy a $400 phone every year and still save over the "free" phones with at&t...but we try to make that $300 every two. (It is about $500 a year less than our equivalent at&t plan).
So, how will a trustee view this potential purchase with tax refund cash that would be exempt anyway? Is a phone for a stay at home mom with no land line that cost more than the junk go phones but a whole ton less than an iPhone considered a luxury?

[keepmine]

Nobody is going to care about a basic cell phone. Go head and buy it.

[LadyInTheRed]

If you pay for it with cash, it shouldn't be an issue. Technically, you should make sure you have an exemption to cover it because it will be an asset on the day you file. If you are in California and can exempt the cash, you are probably using the wild card exemption which you can use on the phone too. But, even if you don't exempt it, I doubt the trustee would want a used cell phone.

[bcohen]

Cellphones, like laptops, TV's, and almost any other household appliance lose most of their value as soon as the box is opened. Unless you buy a super high-end model, no trustee is going to waste their time trying to collect your used electronics.