If you have questions about whether you will be able to keep your home when you file for bankruptcy, this is a very important concern, and should be addressed on an individual basis. Generally, the bankruptcy trustee will not take your primary residence if the equity you have in the home falls below the state's exemptions. The amount of exemption varies for individuals couples, elderly, or disabled debtors.
If you want to save your home, it is probably more effective to file Chapter 13 bankruptcy, allowing you to continue to pay the mortgage, and with late payments paid off in the repayment plan. When you file for bankruptcy, you still owe your mortgage payments, unless you own your home outright, which is rare. If you continue to make the payments on time, and you propose a plan to catch up on the back payments, you can avoid foreclosure.
If you propose a well-drafted chapter 13 plan, the late fees and penalties will stop while you are in the chapter 13 bankruptcy.
You deserve to have a personal discussion about your situation so that you make the right decision, and our firm, The Fuller Law Firm, PC, is here to assist you.
Filing for bankruptcy puts an immediate halt on the foreclosure proceedings, allowing you the time to sort out the problem, or even to seek a modification. There are some cases in which a lender or other party committed fraud in some aspect of the mortgage transaction, or in the foreclosure filing. If there has been any violation of your rights under federal or state law, it may be possible to challenge the debt and achieve a significant advantage.
If you have a second mortgage, and the value of your home has fallen so radically that the second mortgage is no longer collateralized by the value of the home, it may be possible to "strip" that mortgage as part of a bankruptcy filing.
Every case is different, but you can count on our legal team at The Fuller Law Firm, PC. We represent people in financial trouble throughout the communities of San Jose, Salinas and Oakland. Will bankruptcy solve your financial problems? Let us look over your situation, including any worries about keeping your home, and advise you of the strategy and form of bankruptcy that will work best for you.
Call our firm for more information about keeping your house in bankruptcy.