Plan of Attack

Sorry it has taken so long to update about what happened on Saturday. I have been trying to digest it and make sure I do the right thing. Basically the lawyer said we make too much money to declare chapter 7. She said we can do Chapter 13 because if we do Chapter 7 then we will have enough money left over to make some sort of payment. She said if we do 13 then we will make about a 300 a month payment for 3 years and then be done. We will have to give up our house but we were already planning on that since our house is worth less then half of what we owe on it and we are already out growing it and we do not have any kids. She said if we find another place where we are paying about 900 a month or I lose my unemployment then we can switch to chapter 7 at that time.

It is frustrating because I am too poor to pay anything and do anything but I am not poor enough. They go by the median income for your family size in your state. Well that is hardly fair. Michigan is a very poor state right now do to everyone losing their jobs. We made 2000 too much to do chapter 7. 2000 measley dollars. That is frustrating!

I got a call from my mortgage company saying they decided we can not do a workout program anymore because we can not afford it. Which I think makes total sense. HAHA! This is a direct quote from my mortgage company..." You either need to increase the money you make per month OR you need to decrease your monthly expenses in order for us to help you out." Um DUH!!! You should be a financial advisor. All I have to do is increase the money I make or decrease the money I spend. I would have never thought of that. I was cracking up and I said..."If I could do that then I would not be calling you because I would not need your help." Anyway, they are looking into getting us a loan that would pay off our past due balance and place it on the end of our mortgage. I do not really care at this point because I know we are going to give up the house but I am just trying to delay as long as possible. We probably have a good year before we will have to be out and I would hope that I would have a job by then. I looked in the paper and there are A LOT of houses that are rent with an option to buy so that is what will probably do. We are going to save money during the next year so that we can give them a good payment up front which I hope would increase our chances of getting a place.

I am going to get a second opinion from another lawyer not because I think it will change but because I just want to make sure we are doing the best thing and have a good lawyer. Plus I have done a lot of research since are meeting last Saturday and I feel much more educated. So that is what we are going to do. It is overwhelming and depressing but I just keep trying to tell myself that in a year from now we will be in a much better place...I hope! With the little extra money that we might have I am planning on paying my RE the 300 I owe him and hopefully get to go in and talk to him again. I at least would like to get a laparoscopy done now while I am out of work and get any other tests and such done. Then work on how we are going to do IVF with our current non existent coverage. Who knows maybe when we give up this house maybe we will move to a state the mandates coverage.

So that is our plan to attack this mountain of crap we have come across. It is not the dream plan but it will have to do. At least I am moving forward and not backwards. Hopefully it will continue.

Thank you all for you kind words and support. You all made me feel so much better!
T