HELP! scared in Tennessee

[tiredmimi]

]I am new to this forum, but have been reading over the threads the past couple of days. I feel very confused and don't understand a lot of the bk terminology. I hope someone can help with some of my questions. I have just now started not paying some of my cc companies. We have a lot of cc with high balances, 2 personal loans (unsecured), along with a 1st & 2nd mortgages, which I am sure we owe more on our house than it is worth when you total both mortgages. We also have a 2006 ford truck with payments of 375.00, and we own a 96 HD motorcycle that is paid for. I also have a 2005 nissan quest minivan that we purchased 1 1/2 years ago. We do not have a bank loan on this van but my husband borrowed the money from his 401K plan, which we are now making payments on. I feel sure we are probably not going to qualify for chapter 7 due to the median income and will have to go for 13. Our 2nd mortgage is with BOA, as well as the truck, and 2 cc, and our checking account. Our unsecured cc are about 80,000, 2 loans about 25,000, and owe 13,000 on the truck. We have been sinking, for quite a while, and my daughter and our 2 grandbabies moved in with us in December. We have been almost totally responsible for their all of their financial needs, daycare, clothing,food, transportation ect. Due to the fact that their dad pays no child support, because he doesn't like the work thing, but is now in jail so it doesn't matter anyway, and after forcing our daughter 2 1/2 years ago to go to drug rehab, hiring a lawyer to retain custody of the kids at the time, she now has her life on track, and will graduate with her college degree in December. It has been a long hard road, and I know everyone has their own hardship reason for needing to file bk. This situation and all the stuff we have had to financially assist her with until she finally divorced him and came here to finish her schooling has brought us to the end. I am scared to death. We don't want to lose our home or our vehicles, I don't know what to do next. I made the mistake of taking out some of my 401 K earlier in the year and since I could not get it all it only prolonged this situation. Should we see a lawyer right away? Do we answer these phone call we are beginning to get? I have also read that I should open another checking account somewhere else since I owe a lot of different accounts at
BOA. I have 1 loan that is debited from my checking account that is due on the 8th that I am not going to have money for. How long do these companies go after you default before they Sue or garnish your wages? Can anyone recommend a good bk attorney in the Nashville Tn area? Any help appreciated!

[crashzx]

Well first you need to change bank accounts. Second you need to get a budget worked out to pay your important bills (secured, mortgage, cars you want to keep, ect.) first. Third you need to contact a BK lawyer in your area and get the info pack and start gathering informetion ans paperwork. You will probably loose the bike, cars and everything that is "payed for". Not for sure but you have to come to grips with the possibility. Thats what took a while for me to cope with. Its all just stuff that can be replaced in due time. My situation is nowhere as deep as yours but still there. I am near Nash also (sumner county). The info pack will help but I read this forum for a month everyday and it has helped me by leaps and bounds. The last unsecured payment i made was in Dec last year. I still have not had any suits yet. I will be filing in a week or so so I am almost there. You dont have much to worry about yet as far as suit or judgments are concerned yet. Like I said read and study this forum....LOTS of useful priceless info. Hope this helps some, I am sorry for your situation, It is tough to start.

[frogger]

Welcome. Read, read, and read some more. You'll find a lot of answers to questions here. Best of luck to you.

[lookingforward]

Well, first of all, take a deep breath. Everything will be OK. It is awesome that you are getting your daughter back on track. First, you need that consultation with your lawyer. Lay everything out for them and you won't have the questions anymore. I was convinced we would be stuck in a 13 but our lawyer worked it out for us. If you have any automatic payments, close your account right now. As far as the phone calls, they will continue, and eventually they will start calling anyone they can find that may know about you, your relatives, your neighbors, and even (yes, this happened to me) random people with your same last name. If you can handle that, then don't answer the phone. I answered some, and eventually, they became sort of entertaining in a sick way. Before your cc close access to your accounts, and they will, go in and change your phone numbers. Some posters on here have changed their phone numbers to the cc company's phone number and enjoyed the fall out. I quit paying cc in Aug of 08 and filed in June of 09, and the only papers that were served to me were from a local loan company, and that was in June. We also quit paying on our vehicle in August, and it was not repoed until January. But I really think you need to have that consultation as soon as possible. They are free, and I got alot of peace of mind afterwards. I'm sure you can also count your daughter and grandchildren as dependents if you are supporting them. There is so much good advice here, keep looking around and you will be a bk expert in no time!! Good luck with everything, try not to worry too much (I know, its almost impossible not to) and get that consultation!

[Ifonly]

Close you BofA checking account. They will only allow you to do a "soft" close (meaning they keep it open for 30 days to allow charges to come in ) so you need to open an account at a bank that is completely unrelated to any debt you may have. A smaller, community bank is probably a good bet. Do this before anything else to allow yourself transition away from BofA. Doing this before BK or late payments will help you get a new account more easily (no marks on Chexsystems). You don't want BofA to take money out of your existing checking to pay the late CC's, etc. Also, if they have your land line, consider changing your number. We changed our house phone # to an unlisted, unpublished number (no forwarding on the old #) and never updated our CC's with the new # and I enjoyed much more peace than many other posters here.

[tiredmimi]

Thanks everyone for all the info. I am watching these forums everyday. There is a bank inside of walmart, I think I will open an account at. We will need to redirect our direct deposit paychecks to the new one, I hope it doesn't take long to set that up. I just don't know how to handle the loan payment on the 8th that is an automatic debit at BOA, I know the trouble will start then. The loan is with capital one. If there is no money in the account what will happen? I would think BOA would automatically close the account if you keep a negative balance in there. I would also like to know if most attorney's let you pay in increments, after your initial payment, or how does that work. When will you actually be protected from harassment after seeing an attorney. I am really worried about the vehicles, because we both drive long distance in rush hour traffice both ways to work, and my husband does drive his motorcycle as much as possible, and even rode it in freezing temperatures when the gas was over $4 a gallon. In addition to that we help my daughter by getting her to class across town, and transporting the babies to daycare. My van is paid for but only because we borrowed from my husband's 401k, that we still have lots of payments left probably about 4 years, payments are deducted bi-weekly from his paycheck. I also wanted to know if we file 13 will we have to give up the vehicles that are paid for? I also am afraid of harrassment at work, this cannot happen, I work with very ill chemotherapy patients all day. Is it best just to not answer the phone at home when they call or answer. This is the part that will bother me the most, except being harrassed @ work. I should have done something a lot sooner, but kept borrowing from peter to pay paul, hoping for a miracle in between.

[Ann]

Close the BOA account NOW! I had BOA as my financial institution and also had an unsecured line of credit with them along with a credit card. I took everyones advice here and closed it down. I opened an account with a credit union. Is the loan with Capital One an unsecured loan? Forget about them if it is. I have a line of credit with them and just now was told they might consider sending my account to a collection agency. I last paid them in May. You are so not alone. We are all going through the same thing here. The fine people here will help you greatly. I know they have for me!

[tiredmimi]

I am scared they will tell us we cannot close the checking account. After reading some of the post on here, some people say you cannot close your checking account if you have accounts with them that have balances. I also need to know if it matters what bank you start your new account with? I thought about the one we have here at our walmart center FSNBC. Thank you for your reply, any info I can get really helps.

[nerves]

From previous posts I have read is to take the funds out if they wont close the account so there isn't anything for BOA to take. You will want to make sure you don't have any outstanding checks, etc if you have a low balance that will create overdrafts. It has been recommended to use a bank you do not have any debt with. Hope this helps. Others may chime in.

[LuciluS]

Go to BOA tomorrow with a typed letter with your name, address, city, state, zip code, DATE & in the body of the letter Request they close your account immediately. Take two copies and have the person you spoke to to sign the letter. Pull out every penny unless you have some outstanding checks.
If the above is done, your account will be closed and BOA will not accept the automatic draft & send it back to Loan/Credit Card Company.

Also, Monday, you really should call several BK Attorneys for a Free Consultation as the Attorneys are getting very busy due to the rise in BK filings. Go through your Checkbook for the last 12 months & make a spreadsheet with Titles similar to this: Grocery, Gas, Home Maintenance, Mortgage Pymt., Truck Pymts, Utilities, Personal Hygeine etc.

Here are a few websites you need to look at: I know they say small business, but it's also for Bankruptcy.

http://www.usdoj.gov/ust/eo/bapcpa/20080101/meanstesting.htm

http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=104627,00.html

On the above site, make sure you go all the way down the page as there References/Related Topics you can click on which will be helpful.

Again, it's important to make some free consultations. Also, if you haven't charged on your credit cards in the past 90 days, or the charges were not very much and I was in your shoes, I would stop paying on all Credit Cards & personal loans.

We stopped paying late last September & finally our Chapter 7 will be filed on 9/30/09. The phone calls were not to bad with the Original Creditor. It was when they sold our loan to a Collection Agency is when I quit taking the phone calls on the advise of our Attorney. We haven't been sued or Dh's wages haven't been garnished.

That brings up another point. Ask the Attorneys in your Free Consultation how much of a deposit do you need to give him in order to give out his name and phone # to the Creditors. Our Attorney told us to give them his name & phone number only. If they asked were we filing Chapter 7, he said don't answer....just repeat his name & phone #. He said the longer the Creditor keeps you on the phone, the chance gets greater that you may say something they really didn't need know, at this point in your planning.

Wishing You and Yours Good Luck!


Luci

[tiredmimi]

Worried in Tennessee!

Okay, so I took everyone's advice and opened another checking account and closed the account at BOA. My automatic loan payment tried to go through on the 8th to BOA and was rejected. We are getting nonstop calls at home, but have not answered any phone calls yet I received today at work a call from capital one already, and told her immediately that I work with very sick chemotherapy patients and could not talk to her at work. She told me to call her this afternoon, but of course I haven't because, I really don't know what to say other than I can't pay you. I plan to set up free consultation with a lawyer for the 1st Monday in November, and I know we will probably end up in chapter 13. My question is should we answer any of these phone calls at home, or should I send all of my creditors some kind of letter, saying to contact me through mail only. We are probably up to being 45-60 days late on some of our unsecured cc accounts. I just don't know how much time we have. I am very worried about our vehicle situation, since we use both the truck and van for work, transporting the kids, and helping my daughter get to her classes sometimes. I also don't want to lose our motorcycle, it is paid for in full and has been for several years. The truck is financed through BOA with a balance of about 12,500 & payments of 375.00 monthly, our van was bought with a 401 k loan and probably owe about 12,000 on it. Our 1st mortgage is about 111,000, and the HELOC is about 56,500. Our recent property tax statement shows a value of 152,900. I do not want to lose our house or vehicles. Our 1st mortgage payment is 1409.00 per month, and our heloc is adjustable rate is about 280.00monthly, but I know we can't lien strip or cram down due to the balances and property value. My concern with the heloc is we were told when we got it that we had 5 years to refinance. What happens if it cannot be included in the 13, and 3 years from now it is due for refinance, and our credit is screwed up from the 13? Is there anyway to not mention the motorcycle? How do they know what assets you have if you haven't had payments for several years. I am also worried about christmas, especially since the kids live here. I don't know If we should try and go ahead and file in November or try and hold of till January. If we wait until january I could start paying the lawyer and use the extra money for christmas, but if we file in november will they start taking every extra penny we have right away&

[limage]

I had good luck with telling creditors "I'm sorry, I can't pay. I am filing bankruptcy". They would always ask the attorneys name and number, but I tell them I will provide it once the retainer has been paid for. Most of the creditors were actually nice and wished me luck. It really slowed down the calls. The more you don't answer, the more they call.

I believe your daughter should be able to get assistance from the state since the father is in jail, have you had her look into this?

Good luck to you- I made the decision to stop paying everything last year at this time so I know how you feel. Rearranging the chairs on the deck of the Titanic won't stop it from sinking anymore. When you make a choice for bankruptcy you gain control.

Reading and posting here will really help.

[tiredmimi]

Worried in Tennessee!

Thanks for your advice, my daughter tried to apply for social security on the girls, but was told she could not draw any unless he was receiving benefits before he went to jail. She does get 185.00 through families first, and some food stamps, but she has a very hard time just meeting basic needs, we have provided everything other than the above over the past year. The state pays through the program 400 monthly to the daycare, but that leaves another 400, that we have been paying since they moved in with us in December. My daughter has come a long way, and will be finished with her schooling and receive her associates degree as a radiology tech, in December. We are hoping it won.t take long for her to find a descent job in her field and make a fairly good income after graduation which will help, but as you know with 2 small kids, it is hard for any single parent to make it, because at that time she will not qualify for any more help with families first. I guess i am scared if I tell these people we cannot pay, they will garnish our wages or sue us before we get the bankruptcy filed. Do you know how much upfront money we will have to come up with on a 13. I did us some of my credit card for living expenses over the past couple of months, but not any luxury items, that is why I am wondering if we will be eligible to even file right now.

[JimKutkowski]

Depending on where you are in Tennessee I know a good bankruptcy lawyer who could help you out. I'm an Ole Miss Rebel and if you need a referral, I can give him your contact info.

[tiredmimi]

Worried in Tennessee!

I am about 35 north of Nashville. Any help or referrel would be appreciated. I just want to make sure I have an attorney who will really work for me, and not one that doesn't care.