Why Are/Have You Filed BK?

[Shalynn]

I'm filing because I cannot keep doing this juggling act. I fought it for so long. I suppose I've always carried some credit card debt, probably more than I should have too. But, we were always able to pay the bills. Then, I got sick and was unable to work. I never thought what I made accounted for a whole lot, but it's obvious now that it did.

My DH has a good job, and makes a decent wage. But, with three teen aged kids (the older two are working, and pay for their own clothes, gas, etc.) kids, and mounting medical bills, plus helping out some family members...well, we just can't do it anymore.

It has been very hard for me to accept that this is the only way out for us now. I've talked with a therapist, lawyer, and a financial counseor, and they all agree this is the only solution that makes sense.

I keep hoping I'll be approved for disability, or our house will sell. We've had it on the market for two years. We've dropped the price 15k. The most recent drop should finally get some action. It's really one of the best deals around. We've had several interested people, but their houses have to sell before they can do anything.

I'm glad that I found this place. I have learned so much. There are so many different stories. People from so many walks of life, people with many different things that brought them to this point. Somehow, I don't feel as bad about myself as I did before I decided to file. I know a lot of that is due to what I've learned here. Thanks everyone.

I've always been the kind of person who tries to find the good in what they are going through. My DH and I have had a good marriage, but it is even better now because we are talking more about finances. That is one of the good things, I guess.

Sorry for the ramblings.

[Dirk Squarejaw]

Mine is two-fold. I had acquired quite a bit of cc debt, but had take out a couple of loans to consolidate that. I was actually starting to pay it down when my wife took a new job, got a new boyfriend, and we divorced. Had we stayed together I would have had it payed off in 2010 w/o filing BK. Now after taking on the entire mortgage payment, utilities, etc. I'm up the creek.

[Bandit]

This is an interesting thread. I read through the entire topic. I thought that medical bills or divorce would be a higher reason due to that instant unexpected huge bill(s) [lightening bolt jolt] that comes right afterward. I was a little suprized that more people file for credit card debt than any of the other possible reasons.
I am guessing that is because the lenders offer more credit to people than what they can pay back then top the interest rates & take minimum payments to get your bill interest up. (?) & CC debt kind of creeps up on people in a slow way where the other possibilities are instant and unexpected.

I have not filed any bankruptcy. It has never crossed my mind before. I hope that some way I wont have to. If I should need to in the next year or so, it will be due to an accident with large unexpected medical bills.

This really is a neat thread. It was kind of relaxing & very informative.

[Giapis]

Did I do that???

Have not filed yet but at this point it seems to be the only option.
4 years ago I had perfect credit, always had extra money at the end of the month, etc. And....then I got married (I still love the wife, don't get me wrong.) We financed our wedding, planing to pay it back from the "procceeds." Yeah right, not even enough to cover 30% of the wedding's cost. We religiously paid on time for years but then after Christmas of 2006 CC started charging interests of 25%-29.99% NEVER MISSED A PAYMENT. I tried to reason with them, but they said that I carried too much unsecured debt and this is why they raised my %. And.... then we had a baby. In addition, my job is in Real Estate which as you know took a dumb in 2007. Worst year since 2000. I had to make a choice between paying Chase (=evil) and the rest of them or feeding my kid and wife. So after not paying for almost 3 months Chase is offering to reduce my % and all others want to cut a deal/settle for +/-60% of what is owed. If you are curious, it is about $40,000!!! I told them to kiss off. I'd rather be sane and happy than misserable and dead from a stroke before reaching 40. Yeah, I am happy although bankrupt. LIFE IS TOO SHORT. The way I see it, I messed up and for the next couple of years I will have to pay up front for everything I really NEED.
Thanks for listening. It felt really good to vent. Good luck to you all.

[novemberrain]

I am filing bankruptcy because i think that is the only way out of the mess i am in. My dh and i went to go purchase a car in feb 2005 because we needed more car space for the baby #2 on the way. Going along with my dh and not going with my instinct we bought a car and the day we took it home it started having problems. We then tried taking it back and the dealership said no. We then found out that the dealership lied to the finance co which is wells fargo about the value of the car. The car was worth $30,000 and the dealership said $47,000. We then proceeded to try to return the car and tell the dealership we had proof that they lied and the falsified our loan application by stating we made $8,000 a month. When in reality it is like $4,000. Anyways the dealership threatened us to not take the car back or to contact them in any way.

I then went to the better business bureau and nothing came of that. June 2005 the car got repossesed and wells fargo sold it for $20,000. January of 06 i got a lawyer to take my case because wells fargo was threatening me to garnish wages and such. my lawyer did nothing at all. Even though wells fargo did not serve me legally. as of sept of 06 my paycheck started to be garnished to pay back wells fargo. I did the math and it will take 5 years to pay them back. They were getting $400 a month. Wells fargo said they would take a settlement of like $5000 to $7000. Yeah how am i going to come up with that money. So as months went by it got harder and harder with the garnishment.
In january of 07 household finance said they were going to sue my dh. I then started looking into bankruptcy and how it works and if it is the right thing to do. It is the only way to stop garnishemnt.
I then looked for a bk attorney in febuary 07 and retained him in march. I filed in May and the bk trustee wants to dismiss for presumption of abuse.
Soooo i thought this whole bk thing would be easy and now Im finding out it is not.
it has cause problems with about everything but i see it as a lessoned learned on how to manage my money and that you just have to have hope.

by the way i am very glad i found this site because i have been a nervous wreck since i decided to file. it feels good to talk to other people that are going through the same thing and knowing your not alone out there in this crazy bk world.

thanks everybody

[kjb1969]

[QUOTE=danacollins;5888]Divorce would be the easiest answer, however, it came with a bigger price. My ex-husband is now serving a life sentence for child molestation, rape, sodamy, and incest. He tormented and sexually tortured our daughter for over six years and spent another year trying to find judicial forgiveness for it. He was tried and convicted in two counties; leaving my children and I to find our way through to recovery, living, and making a new way for the three of us. The financial strain was just too much. I did everything I could to sell, pay, borrow-against, eliminate through repossession, and eventually walk away from. I lost a house in another county when I lost a life-long friend and renter. I finally abandoned our country home when it became painfully obvious that my daughter was not going to find anything good about herself in a place that had held so many dark and dirty secrets for so long. We literally left with the clothes on backs and just a few personal items that we thought would meld in our new lives. I was persued, harrassed and eventually convinced that bankruptcy was the ultimate answer for me; especially, if I was to ever find life after death; so to speak.
I files Ch7 last May, 2004 and recieved notice in August from the court that my bankruptcy had been granted and all debts listed were discharged. It was almost as good a feeling as the day my daughter stood on stage at her high school and announced that she is a lovely child of God, brought forth to earth on heaven's wings and granted to a good and loving mother, who happens to be a personal hero for her. I feel exactly the same way about her! ;)[/QU

Speachless, I will say a prayer for you and your daughter!!! I have a daughter, my first, and just couldent even begin to imangine what you went through, and will always have to deal with.
You should list your pay-pal account, i'll be the first to throw you a twenty to take her out for ice cream just to put a smile on that poor girls face. When that piece of crap faces GOD on judgement day he will get his and then some!!!

[ARO96]

My hubby and I are filing due to reduced income. He works for a major airline and 4 yrs ago he took a massive paycut. We've done everything we could in the last four years to keep up with the bills we had before the paycuts, unfortunately we just can't anymore. The stress level we are under is beginning to affect our lives. We have no money for anything. Can't even take the kids anywhere, even a cheap dinner to McDonalds is out of the question. I feel terrible we are at this point, but I really don't think it is our fault. We had a good life before the paycuts, maybe we should've been more careful, but who would have thought after him working there for 15 yrs they'd cut his salary the way they did. We've learned our lesson. I'm dreading this BK filing. It goes against everything I believe in, but we are out of options. We've borrowed from family and just can't keep up. It's sad when we can't even buy the kids new shoes at Payless and have to take a several weeks to save $50 for shoes.
This forum has been great and informative. Thanks for starting it. I appreciate all the advice in here. Nice to know we are not alone and many others have gone through bk as well and have survived.

[Erfoster]

I thought I could make it on my own with a nice house and car, ended up covering all my "bills", but putting everything else on a credit card!

That, and a stupid decision to co-sign a loan for a friend who stopped paying.

[PaKettle]

I put "excessive credit" but I would have also checked "less income" and "medical bills" if I could have checked 3 topics instead of just one.

But the bottom line is we took out too many balance transfers, we gambled some of it, we spent some of it on vacations or trips to visit family, and then, as a final straw, we had $18k of medical and dental bills last year.

[mermaid3202000]

well i was diagnosed with schizophrenia. then later i developed a gambling problem. i tell ya one thing though i will never get a credit card ever again. ill pay cash thank you very much. and if i dont have the cash i just wont get it

im in the process of filing chapter 7 and have had my credit counseling certification so now i just have to send the paper work in. ive been super nervous over all this and asked my doctors for some tranquilizers

[Boscoe]

My reason is simple. I bet on real estate in Florida, and lost big. The thing with RE is that it is "the gift that keeps on taking." At least with credit card bills, you have the principal and the interest. With real estate, you have P&I, plus taxes, insurance, utilities and other maintenance like condo fees or lawn mowing, etc.

My chapter 7 will eliminate these debts so hopefully I can go back to my prior life - paying all bills on time and live a bit below my means so I can save some for later but enjoy today a bit too.

[kl030505]

For us it was long term unemployment that lead to excessive credit card debt.

[cetiya]

I had a couple of things happen that doomed me. I lost a good job in 2004 and it took me 7 months to find another one that paid well. I had gotten a bunch of loans in 1999 and the year 2000, knowing that I would soon recieve my inheritance. but little did our family know the trustee stole every fricken penny and my mom was flat broke 4 months after my dad died. 300 thousand dollars forever gone. so was my future, my retirement money, my hopes of owning a home, any kind of security gone. and he got away with it which haunts me and has made me bitter. oh well! after losing my job, I got so behind, so very behind I could only pay the minimum, only pay the interest and penalties. so I gave up. I would need at least 400 dollars extra a month to continue to pay, and I dont have that kind of money.

[Carlysmom]

DH and I got married in June 2004, financed a lot of it no credit cards, like someone else said, didn't get that much in "gifts" back to pay for it. We were doing OK, bought a house Feb 2005, needed a few upgrades put in new kitchen cabinets (my dad did all the work) so we only paid for the materials. That went on credit card, the appliances, credit card. We were doing good though because my DH got over 10k raise that same month. So we figured we were doing good. We never missed a payment, paid off the appliances, and the like. We took out a HELOC in Dec 2005 to pay off the other credit card, we figured we would get the tax write off and less interest rate. OK...February 2006 our gas oven catches on fire. We were out of the house for 3 months living in a hotel eating out every night. (Mind you we had 2 dogs) My dad took one dog and we had the other living in the hotel with us, so since he couldn't stay there all day, while we were at work he had to go to "daycare". Insurance paid for that stuff. Insurance though made us pay $100 a week for food and they covered the rest. We never spent that much on food a week! So we were always eating out and the "extra" got put on the credit card. It took months for us to get the final checks to pay back the credit cards for the furniture and everything that we had charged, what happened was they gave us the "actual value" of things and then after we submitted the receipts we got the rest. June 2006 my one dog died (the one that stayed with my dad during the fire) in my grief we purchased another dog from the petstore. Only $45 a month, OK! (I became very attached to this little guy VERY quickly) July 2006 I found out I was pregnant, yay! Things were still going ok. Had I known I was pregnant we probably wouldn't have gotten the 2nd dog. October 2006 my DH was laid off due to downsizing, final check from insurance comes, we end up paying our mortgages, cars and what have you. DH didn't get a job until May 2007, when unemployment ran out he took the first retail job he could get, since he needed something and we had to pay the day care starting that week or we'd lose her spot. He is now a manager, but doesn't make anywhere near what he was making, I am taking home less pay with the insurance coming from my pay (you gotta have it though, esp with a baby). End of May 2007 we decided to trade in his 2005 Ford Explorer, after alot of searching, we ended up getting a 2007 Impala Lease, it got us out of the negative equity of the Ford, payments were less (we were going to get something used, but with the neg eq we would have been in the same boat in a couple years). So, we reduced his car payment (luckily I have an uncle that works for GM so I got his discount). As months went by, we were charging the daycare (that's really bad) just to pay them and charge it to keep current. We ended up having to charge alot of things, and we figured out we just couldn't keep up. end of June I said we can't do this anymore. We met w/our attorney July 13, and made pymts to her and finally got filed on Oct 9th. We had to do what we had to for our family...we ended up with $56k unsecured debt

Thanks for "listening" to my vent.

[alwaysmordrbils]

Never Ending Medical Bills

I've been plagued with high medical bills for the last 8+ years. Some for myself, a few for my oldest son, and a bunch for my youngest son. Our medications alone run us about 400/month. Then the dr visits, the hospitals stays my youngest has had, and the numerous test which haven't gotten us any confirmation of what is wrong with him (potential Cystic Fibrosis with some test showing positive, others showing negative...one test done twice showed both results!!!)

Then you have the "loser" dad who wants to take years to pay off his 60% share medical bills that he needs to pay, and pays his CS constantly late, so I can never plan to pay things off, cause just when you do...Wham he's late and the rent get's another 100 tacked on for a late fee!! Must be nice to have the $$ to take those long vacations he takes!!!!

Alwaysmordrbils