American living overseas needing to file BK

[pengyou]

My situation: A number of years ago I moved overseas to teach. A few years ago I tried to open a business there with a local friend and ended up loosing a few thousand dollars, most of which was on my credit card. The debt cascaded and along with a couple of other setbacks i had soon almost maxed out 2 credit cards. A returned home and studied for a year on a student loan, while looking for a job, but could not find anything better than minimum wage I went abroad again to make sure that I had enough food to eat and a safe occupation. I have been jockeying around for better pay and work and have been somewhat successful. Still I cannot pay my bills. I make enough to pay my student loan but not enough to pay the credit card bill, and certainly not enough for both. My annual income is about US$ 17K. I have to pay for my own medical insurance out of that and am contributing to a retirement account that I started 12 years ago, but have not put much into since that time. I am 50 years old and have about $10K set aside for retirement and will have retirement income of about $800 per month when I am 65. The additional money I am adding to my account now is not optional, in my opinion.

My questions: If I file for BK what living standards will be applied to my situation? Those of my hometown? Or is there a schedule set up for people living abroad? How will this work for me?

I have read in places that there might be an exception made to the rule that I must attend the hearing in person. Does anyone know what the exceptions are? The cost of going home for a week for me is about one months salary, very steep. I have not been home in two years in order to save money. I have no significant assets here.

Is there anything else I should know? I know that I am in a very bad position financially. I owe about $25K more on my student loans and about $20K on my credit cards

[newbie2]

My 2 cents? If you are not coming back to the US then don't file. Your student loans are not going to be discharged, so that leaves just the credit card debt. Since you are living in another country it is doubtful you would be sued. If your banking is done in the country you reside then I wouldn't even worry about it.

[dman]

Do you work for a US company? Are your checks deposited in an account in the US? Even if you work overseas, if your employer is based in the US, it's not hard for a creditor to garnish your wages (no harder than if you were physically located here).

Assuming you don't have a US bank account and aren't working for a US employer, here's what I might suggest you run by your lawyer:

Hopefully you still technically reside in the US, and are just overseas on a temporary basis. Perhaps you're using a relative's address, that's where you'd live when you're not overseas, and have mail sent there. Bonus points if it's in a state with a short SOL for debts. Keep your ties to this area (renew your driver's license online if it's about to expire, stuff like this). If your relatives (or whoever) don't mind, have your mail sent here so creditors know this is the state you live in (perhaps it'd be better to have a P.O. box that your relatives can check once every few months, I dunno). If anyone tries to serve you...they can't, as you're temporarily out of the country. They may not even bother, as a quick check will show no employment, bank accounts, etc. Even if they DID get a judgement against you, what are they going to take? If you did happen to come into some money later (relative leaves an inheritance to you), I'd get a lawyer to try to get the judgement vacated if it was an issue (maybe they can prove the service was not proper, as you were in another country at the time; at worst you might not be able to use SOL as a defense?).

Now, stop paying all your US-based bills. Eventually they'll be past the SOL (note, if you permanently move out of state, the SOL clock freezes...this is why you want to technically remain a resident). Even the student loans will sort of go past the SOL (can no longer be reported on your credit report; but they can still try to collect, take any irs refund you might get, etc.). If you plan on coming back to the US at some point in time and want to pay off the student loans (since they will pretty much haunt you forever), just save all the money you WERE paying to the credit cards and student loans. Once the student loan goes to collections, see if you can settle for a lower amount. Or heck, maybe our government will forgive all the student loans (I doubt this would happen; but if it did I'd hate to be the one who just paid mine off).

Just some thoughts. I'm definitely no expert in this.