Advice: Don't be afraid to let go.

[debtprison]

I went from being in my junior year of college making almost $50,000 a year while living in a dorm room to making under $12,000 a year. I've been through a bankruptcy. I've had liens, multiple levies. I've seen a lot. I've lived in a van for instance.

My advice to people who will listen and are going from a time of having a lot to having nothing is to not be afraid to let go.

Sometimes you need to just let it all go instead of throwing everything you got into trying to save things and stay afloat. Let it go and save your energy & resources for when you can rebuild again without having all this against you.

I see people here afraid to lose their $30,000 cars for instance. Hey, you don't need a $30,000 car! You can get one for $500 that will probably last you at least a year. You have a nice house worth $300,000 and you don't want to lose it? Well you know what? There are places in this country where you can rent a home in a decent neighborhood for $600 a month. Why are you doing this to yourself?

Sometimes it's better just to let it go as opposed to fighting it all and losing it all anyway. If you let it go sure you lose that house and that car. But if you sit there and fight when it is near hopeless not only will you eventually lose that house and car all the same but you will also lose everything you put into it to try to save it (and probably putting yourself in deeper). And all those resources could have easily helped to make life a lot easier for you had you just let go.

Don't be afraid to let go when it is the smartest thing to do. You're better off living below your means...

[AngelinaCatHub]

My compliments to your wonderful post. I concur 100%.

This will help others very much. 'Hub

[AngelinaCat]

We had a lesson in letting go. We had a house fire.

This was not the house we're living in, thank goodness, but the 1871 farmhouse about a 100 yards away that my great-grandparents built. It was gradually coming down because we could not afford to stabilize it, much less bring it up to codes.

We were using it for storage and had a lot of antiques and collectibles that we could have made a little money with. We were also taking measurements and taking parts of it that we could use in our own home.

But some pranksters in the neighborhood decided they wanted to play 'haunted house'. We were both at work at the time. We live out in the country in the woods. We had a riding mower and a 5 gallon can of gasoline nearby. When all was said and done, we could account for the mower, but not the gasoline can. This was an old cypress and unbled heart pine house. As you can imagine when the fire was set, the house exploded.

In an hour the house was gone, and the fire chiefs (four agencies responded) told us that the temperature on our porch was at least 500 degrees--probably more as a nearby palm tree was on fire when 'Hub got home. The clawfoot cast iron bathtub melted into a pan.

Thankfully our house had a galvanized roof and Hardie Plank siding, or it would have caught fire too.

It was a huge and horrible loss, but after all was said and done, no one was hurt. 'Hub and I still had each other, 9/10s of the family archival papers were stored elsewhere, and our three cats were okay.

We learned that THINGS don't matter. It is your lives, family and pets that are important.

[keepmine]

I concur. A post that all should read.
Bk is about getting a fresh start in life and, there is nothing fresh about dragging expensive cars that depreciate or a house that's signficantly under water through your bk and jeopardizing that fresh start.

[bluemartini]

Good post.

I would give anything to get back the three or so years that I wasted trying to hang onto my rental property.... during that time I drained my 401k and IRA, and racked up home equity loans in a losing battle. The lost sleep, the stress, the anxiety, that gnawing feeling in my stomach all the time... it was a waste of life.

Now I'm living on a cash only basis, saving up for the lawyer, renting a really cool apartment that I love, and moving toward the light at the end of the tunnel.

Although it hurts to have lost so much, I try not to dwell on that and instead focus on how much more free I am now that I'm not fighting to hang onto that d@mned property.

[Annie4]

Agreed! ty for posting this

[frogger]

Very good post. Once you understand what is important, you'll find that it's not the cars, houses or boats.

For me, it's family. That's all that matters...

[Iwantmyname]

Changing your additude about material belongings will free you in many ways. I agree 100% I tried hard to save my house, and in the end, I still lost it, but also lost all the money I used to try to save those things-- For instance, I cashed out my retirement, now i am out my retirement money and the house. It is not worth trying to keep anything material. Nothing really has any value.

[banca rotta]

Great post! The only thing I hate letting go is actual money itself

[backtoschool]

Excellent and very inspiring post!

When I was in nyc, I was literally a prisoner to my possessions. I was working 70-80 hours a week in a job I hated and to numb the pain I bought things. Well, over the ten years that I did this, my credit card balances slowly crept up and before I knew it, I now HAD to work at a high paying, high stress job just to meet my credit card payments.

When I got laid off the first time (2006), I lived off my credit cards while I looked for work, so when I started a new job, I was even more in debt and more a prisoner to a way of life that was making me miserable.

I didn't know how to let go, because I had worked so hard to get where I was. But where I was was making me miserable. So when I got laid off AGAIN in Jan, something snapped. I just couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't run on the treadmill any more, I was exhausted. So I let go....

I let go of the stuff that I was working 80 hours a week to try to pay for. I let go of nyc and my so called "career", and I moved back home where the cost of living is much cheaper, and I will really have a chance to start over.

It was such a huge feeling of relief to realize that I didn't have to be a prisoner to my things, that I was imprisoning myself, and that the lock on the cage had always been unlocked, and all as I had to do was let go of the things and the lifestyle and truly commit to positive change.

I am very grateful for this chance to turn my life around, and I will use this chance to help others and to make a positive contribution in the world instead of doing meaningless work in order to buy meaningless things.

[curmudgeon]

This post was exactly what the doctor ordered for us right now. We are filing on Wednesday and my husband is planning on talking to him about whether we can keep the house. In our relationship, he is the sentimental one and when he looks at our house, he sees the treehouse he built for the kids, the time he has put into remodeling, and the memories we have made here. When I look at it, I see a treehouse that no one ever uses anyway, a tiny, cramped house with no storage space that we are popping out of, and a remodeling job that is nowhere near finished after almost five years. Oh, and also a house worth considerably less than we owe on it. As far as I am concerned, it is a simple decision to let it go and move on to a rental where life is easier and there are no problems hanging over our heads. I am going to ask my husband to read your post because I think it just makes really good sense. In a BK, you have to be willing to think logically about what is best for you, not about what feels good and I think your post makes that really clear. Thank you.

[DGranny]

Advice: Don't be afraid to let go.

Wow, did I need to hear all of these threads about letting go.

After 30 yrs. as a stenographer I am disabled and can't do that (or any) job anymore; however, I'm in limbo financially 'cause workers comp hasn't settled, disability retirement hasn't been settled due to a tiny loophole that favors the retirement board and I am pending an appeal on my SSD application. Thus, I have NO income at all right now.

I put $250,000 cash down on a $500,000 home in Dec. 2005 I thought I'd retire in that is now worth ONLY $225,000 (yeah, $25,000 less than what I put down on it).

Needless to say, I am filing Chapter 7 in pro per tomorrow. I have used a copy of the Nolo book that is awesome. But I don't know whether I should 'surrender' my home now or say that I want to redeem it, in hopes of a ruling in my favor re the SSD appeal, which would give me a pretty good sum of money in retro payments.

I also don't know whether on the Statement of Intention I should claim or not claim the exemption for the real property. BTW, I also have a $97,000 HELOC secured by the real property and Thank God I have no credit card debt whatsoever.

I'm hoping to be able to keep my home mainly because I put so much cash money into it, but if I have to walk away, I will. Does anyone know how long after 'surrendering' real property in BK 7 the lender starts to foreclose; e.g., does surrendering the property automatically lift the 'automatic stay'? One last question I hope someone here can help me with:

Do I list my past due HOA dues (8 mos.) on the Statement of Intention as 'personal property subject to unexpired lease'?

Sorry, this so long, but seems once I get started, I can't stop. ANY advice will be greatly appreciated. DGranny

[AngelinaCat]

Hi DGranny:

Welcome to the Forum. I edited your post into paragraphs for readability. I copied your post into it's own thread in the Ch7 or Pro Se filer boards, so that it will get more attention and responses.

Normally I would have moved it w/o copying, but this time I left it where you posted it because it referred to the previous posts in that thread.

When responding to posts about your questions, please keep your responses to one thread, or else it become very confusing.

Good luck to you and again , Welcome!

[killinstinct]

Thanks Debtprison. This post really made my day!