Mortgage not paid through Chapter 13 - Will HAMP cause increase in Chapter 13 Payment

[apple5963]

Okay - I'm going to bite the bullet & ask a question. Our Chapter 13 was confirmed in June 2020. We've been making payments since February. (The Pandemic delayed confirmation hearing) We recently completed a HAMP modification trial period & are awaiting final docs to finalize the modification. Our mortgage payments are not included eith our Chapter 13 payments. We were current & it was agreed we would continue making payments as agreed. My question then is: since the HAMP will lower our mortgage payment, will the court/trustee increase our Chapter 13 payment? Our attorney sent a consent to Wells Fargo allowing the to speak with us directly, & even though I'd been thinking the HAMP agreement had to be approved b for the court before we could finalize, I was just informed by Wells Fargo that they were not required to send the final agreement to our Attorney since he gave consent for them to speak with us directly?? This sounds like the court/trustee is not required to approve the HAMP? Anyone have any experience/knowledge to share relative to this situation?

[justbroke]

Technically yes, the Chapter 13 Trustee could seek to modify your confirmed plan to account for the lowered mortgage payments. Just because the bank worked directly with you doesn't mean that your plan doesn't require surrender of all disposable monthly income (DMI). Unless you're in a 100% plan, it is possible that the Chapter 13 Trustee may be interested in some or all of the difference.

You would need to speak to your attorney and ask whether or not this must be disclosed to the Chapter 13 Trustee. With any luck your attorney will say that the modification does not require any disclosure and you should just keep making your plan and mortgage payments on-time.

[apple5963]

Oops - I hit POST before finishing editing, so no surprise there are some typos. I think the post still can be comprehended. Of course, if anyone wants clarification, let me know.

[apple5963]

When we began the process, I contacted our attorney & his response was something to the effect that it would be like "getting a judge's advice/opinion of the agreement for free" {not sure I'd call the Chapter 13 free...} But I got the impression he wasn't expecting anything to change... I'll definitely call him, again, to be sure we follow the rules.

[apple5963]

Our adult son who had recently graduated from college & moved home, was living with us unemployed when we filed. He finally got that "big boy" job in November, and is currently only living here part-time. He's kind of couch surfing in another city where most of his friends live. I contacted the Attorney's office to inform them, and was told nothing would change. I'd thought a "number in household" change would have effected the payment but apparently not. As far as I'm aware they're no informing the court or filing any sort of revision. Hopefully this HAMP thing will be similar. Fingers crossed.

[justbroke]

It depends on your district and your particular chapter 13 Trustee. Many C13 Trustees are more hands-off after confirmation. They don't really care what happens so long as you stick to the original plan. In other districts, and depending on a debtor's specific circumstances, the C13 Trustee could care about any extra single dollar that a particular debtor made. Most people have a C13 Trustee somewhere in the middle. So long as it is nothing significant -- and I can't define significant -- most C13 Trustees just don't care about the small changes.

It reads as though your attorney is of the opinion that you don't need to notify the C13 Trustee.