Reaffirmation Hearing?

[nfreeze]

I had my 341 hearing on 9/08. I signed a reaffirmation agreement on my vehicle loan with the local credit union. The hearing is scheduled for 09/27. Do I have to be at that hearing since I filed pro se?

Thanks-

[ccsjoe]

Yes, you have to be at the reaff hearing since you filed pro se.

[nfreeze]

Ok- that is kind of what I thought. I do not see a whole lot on these hearings posted around here. Do you know what is involved with them?

Thanks ccsjoe.

[ccsjoe]

No I don't. I'm doing a reaff, but have attorney so he's signing it for me. From what I understand, the judge will attempt to determine whether the reaff will be a hardship burden on you or if you can handle it. If a hardship, judge will not sign off on it.

[justbroke]

I had my 341 hearing on 9/08. I signed a reaffirmation agreement on my vehicle loan with the local credit union. The hearing is scheduled for 09/27. Do I have to be at that hearing since I filed pro se?

Yes, you have to attend. The judge will review your reaffirmation agreement and make sure that it's not a hardship. Please know that many judges won't even sign one and even gloat that they are doing you a favor. I agree. Almost all reaffirmation agreements are not worth it. Unless you are near the end of the term of your loan, and have a low interest rate, there is no reason to reaffirm.

If the judge does grant the reaffirmation, the judge will drill into your head that you're making an important financial decision. That the creditor will have full recourse and can sue you later should you not meet the original terms (and/or modified terms in the reaffirmation agreement).

Why did you reaffirm? What rate are you reaffirming at? How many payments left? What's the VALUE of the car versus your BALANCE? These are things the judge will be looking at.

[nfreeze]

justbroke- I reaffirmed an auto loan with the credit union. The reason I did it was I want to keep a positive relationship with them. I have a vehicle which has 16 months remaining of 60, all of which were paid on time. It is my only vehicle and I owe $4900 with payments at $320 per month. I am at the point in my loan in which a good portion of my payment is now going to principal. The KBB value is $8700 and I baby this vehicle. Always had regular maint etc. I could not afford to buy another in such shape for what I owe.

I did NOT reaffirm my home which is underwater. I will just keep making payments until I see how the housing market goes over the next couple years.

Would you have reaffirmed as well with this information?

[Alumofuf]

I will let you know how my hearing goes. It is today at 4:30pm. There is a lot of info on this forum about reaffirming ....or not. I wanted to keep both the house and car and so I selected that we were going to reaffirm on both. Our mortgage which is held by Metlife has not come forward for anything. I live in TX and judge does not have to approve a reaffirm on a mortgage....I was going to call Metlife to see how they will handle it but after reading all the posts decided to just let it ride, meaning if they don't do anything well so be it. I am getting 'informational' statements and paying on time as usual. We just bought the house 3 1/2 years ago and like it here, we owe about the same we bought it for, not upside down,plan on staying here atleast 10 more years. Now the car is another story. Chrysler was aggressive with the reaffirmation. I received a bunch of reaff documents about 2 weeks after we filed. I saw that their lawyer was going to be present in the 341 so I took my reaffirmation papers with us but he was not there. Then about a week after, I sent the papers back and waited. I got a call last week from the Judge's clerk to schedule a reaffirm. hearing and she mentioned that since our discharge date was the 17th (YEAH!) needed to be done before....so we scheduled it for today. Our van is our only vehicle and is worth about 8000 (they think is more but it has over 100 k miles plus it needs a few minor fixes but otherwise it has a few good years left) we owe about 2 k on it so yes soon around january it will be paid off. I will let you know how it goes. I expect the judge to want to talk us out of it but oh well.

[justbroke]

Given the status of your loan and the value of the vehicle, the reaffirmation may have been the best thing for you. Since you have positive equity, and are just over a year of payments left... it's not the type of reaffirmation that I would personally say "no no no no no way!".

[Alumofuf]

It all went well with the hearing. We walked in the court
while another case (chapter 11 with a ton of lawyers
around) was concluding. The chrysler lawyer walked
up to us and introduced himself. After everyone else
left it was just the judge, auto lawyer, 2 clerks and
us. We walked up to the podium, gave oath and his
first question was why were we filing. I said health
reasons and just got in over our heads with too much
debt. He asked how long we had had that debt. Asked
what health issues we had. Asked if we had children
and their ages and how were they health wise.
I answered they were good medically and he was
curious to know if they were not fine in other ways...
I said dentally they were now getting caught up
on some treatments. He asked around this point
to see the reaffirm papers that the lawyer had.
Asked about how long we had it and the mileage.
Lawyer then volunteered some info about us saying
he had checked that day and we were current in
our payments and that the vehicle had significant
equity. Judge then asked if we lived still at such and
such address and if the property was in foreclosure.
We said we lived there, no foreclosure, all current.
Asked where each of us worked, full time or part time
and what we did there. I can't recall much more but
you can get a gist of what might be like. I had
expected him to try to talk us out of it bu he did not.
He said he had no problem signing the papers and
then he and the lawyer just talked about how to
file the paperwork. Oh he also asked previously how
much the monthly pmt was and if it was a hardship.
He must have not had his papers because he asked
if we had already had our 341. He wished us well and
good luck. End of hearing. Maybe 5 minutes or so?
I hope this helps some