Ask a CCCS counsellor a bankruptcy question

kazza1000

Hi guys,

wondering if anyone can give me some advice pls?

My Oh and i are just beginning to see the light at the end of a very long tunnel re mortgage arrears.

We are now pretty much debt free other than a rates bill of £7000. This morning we rec'd a letter from them that one of their people will be coming on Monday to serve a statutory demand.

A couple of questions.

1. Would they accept an agreement to pay by installments? (We have previously offered £200/month but this was rejected and we will be hard pushed to be able to give them any more than this for the next few months)

2. Is it likely they would accept a voluntary charge on the house?

3. How likely is it they will push for bankruptcy? (a couple of years ago we may have welcomed this but we have worked really hard to get out of our financial pickle and this is the last hurdle. Would be a real shame to be made bankrupt now over £7000!)

Many thanks for any advice.

CCCS_Sue

Scarlet_Pimpernel wrote: »

My Husband and I have a business together. It is not limited. The business supplies to the building trade. We have 4 members of staff, plus us 2. We have limped along for the last year but the bad winter in December has just about finished us off. I am about to see our accountant to stop being a director of the company, and just be an employee, so that hopefully if it goes bust (which it may very well do within the next 6 months) then only my husband will be made BR and we can start again. I feel terrible about the 4 staff as they all have mortgages and families and I should have laid 2 off by now to save money but I just feel so responsible for them.
We have a joint mortgage, paid up to date with no arrears, with 10 years left to go and a total outstanding debt on it of £115k. In the current market it is worth about £250K. There is a bank charge on the house for £55K which is the loan we used to set up the business. We did get 5 months behind but managed to claw it back with family help. On top of this our business has debts of £88K, with the main creditors being VAT, Tax and NI, (both of whom are getting very snippy) a Loan for a Van, loan for tools and machinery, 6 months premises rent overdue, and 3 months behind with business rates. We live entirely on our child tax credit. Our last self assessments declared a profit last year of £5k between the two of us. We have one school aged child.
A friend who went bankrupt last year told us we should change our house deeds so that we are tenants in common with me owning 90% and my husband 10%. He told us this would mean that any debtors we have will not be able to make us sell the house.
This sounds a bit fishy to me. But I am naive, terrified, and do not know where to start. I have no idea where to go to for professional advice,we tried Business Link but they came out to see us, mentioned some grants that it turned out we were not eligible for, and suggested we swap energy suppliers and that was about it.
If anyone has any words of wisdom for me, or can point me in the direction of some sensible help I will be forever grateful. Sorry for rambling...

Hi Scarlet Pimpernel and thank you for your message

As you are trading and have business debts, then I would recommend that you contact Business Debtline. They offer free confidential advice and may be able to advise you further.

http://www.bdl.org.uk/

For further information on changing the house deeds to tenants in common, you would need legal advice

You could contact Community Legal Advice for free legal help regarding this.
http://www.communitylegaladvice.org.uk/

If you did change the deeds just before going bankrupt though, the Official Receiver may investigate why you have done this.

Kind Regards
Sue

StepChange_Pavan

Stayathomemom wrote: »

Hi just a quick query, I am on A DMP, and have been for 2 years, but it is a continual struggle. At the moment the DMP will take approx 22years to repay, as long as no more interest/charges are added, we also have a 6.5k tax bill to be added, taking this into consideration, would the recommendation be bankruptcy or continue with DMP. I will be ringing CCCS but I hate asking about br as I feel we are cheating by looking for a way out, I know this isnt the case and I know you cant comment on individual cases but taking into the length of DMP, what would you advice

Hi stayathomemom and thanks for your post.

You’re right that it’s difficult to say what your options are without knowing the details of your situation.

I’d recommend that you give us a call. It’s likely that if your DMP is expected to last 22 years and you have debt to add that this is no longer going to be your best option (unless you expect your circumstances to change for the better).

Bankruptcy isn’t cheating, as this could be your only option – however it’s best to speak to one of our counsellors so that we can look at your situation in more detail and advise you fully.

Hope this helps


Kind regards,
Pavan

CCCS_Sue

kazza1000 wrote: »

Hi guys,

wondering if anyone can give me some advice pls?

My Oh and i are just beginning to see the light at the end of a very long tunnel re mortgage arrears.

We are now pretty much debt free other than a rates bill of £7000. This morning we rec'd a letter from them that one of their people will be coming on Monday to serve a statutory demand.

A couple of questions.

1. Would they accept an agreement to pay by installments? (We have previously offered £200/month but this was rejected and we will be hard pushed to be able to give them any more than this for the next few months)

2. Is it likely they would accept a voluntary charge on the house?

3. How likely is it they will push for bankruptcy? (a couple of years ago we may have welcomed this but we have worked really hard to get out of our financial pickle and this is the last hurdle. Would be a real shame to be made bankrupt now over £7000!)

Many thanks for any advice.

Hi kazza1000 and thank you for your message

First of all, it’s great to hear that you have managed to clear the arrears on your mortgage and are at last seeing light at the end of the tunnel.
Statutory demands need to be taken very seriously. The creditors could push for bankruptcy if you have assets.

There are options you could consider. For example, you might be able to come to a mutual payment agreement as an alternative to bankruptcy, or if you have a lump sum or an increase in income pending, the creditor may be happy to wait for an increased offer of payment to clear the debt.

Before offering a voluntary charge on the house, you do need further advice

Without knowing your full financial situation, it’s difficult to give you detailed advice via the forums.
I would recommend that you call us free on 0800 138 1111 to discuss your situation with one of our debt counsellors. The counsellor will discuss all your options
Lines are open from 08.00 until 20.00 Monday to Friday

Kind Regards
Sue

kazza1000

CCCS_Sue wrote: »

Hi kazza1000 and thank you for your message

First of all, it’s great to hear that you have managed to clear the arrears on your mortgage and are at last seeing light at the end of the tunnel.
Statutory demands need to be taken very seriously. The creditors could push for bankruptcy if you have assets.

There are options you could consider. For example, you might be able to come to a mutual payment agreement as an alternative to bankruptcy, or if you have a lump sum or an increase in income pending, the creditor may be happy to wait for an increased offer of payment to clear the debt.

Before offering a voluntary charge on the house, you do need further advice

Without knowing your full financial situation, it’s difficult to give you detailed advice via the forums.
I would recommend that you call us free on 0800 138 1111 to discuss your situation with one of our debt counsellors. The counsellor will discuss all your options
Lines are open from 08.00 until 20.00 Monday to Friday

Kind Regards


Sue

Thanks Sue,

I am just off the phone with cccs and have an appointment to speak to a s/e counsellor on Monday.

Cheers

gatostar

Dear Sir or Madam,

I would like to know if depths,which are now as a result of a civil court judgement turned into a executory title are secured or unsecured depths ?

Regards
Andreas

mma83

CCCS_Pavan wrote: »

Hi Mike and thanks for your post.

Has your dad considered renting out the property to help pay for the mortgage?

Unfortunately the OR is likely to look at his assets in the UK to help pay towards the mortgage shortfall if he goes bankrupt

We only specialise in UK debts but if he is struggling, he can contact us for further debt advice by calling

Hi, thanks for reply. He has considered rental and sale of property.....but unfortunately in this climate there isn't much demand and if there were, it would more than likely be just summer months. Any idea of potential consequences if he just handed keys back over and walked away?? they haven't fore filled all contractual obligations( was bought off plan) but probably not serious enough to call breach of contract. He will lose deposit and fees etc, but the bank he owes mortgage to will presumably take over the property and sell at auction??

charley1

Hi I have a few questions and was wondering if you could help,me and my husband have around 17k worth of debt (credit cards overdraft and a loan, we have a mortgage with northern rock as well of £120,000 the problem we have is he is self employed (in the building trade) and he is earning less than half what he was 2 yrs ago and we just don't have enough money to pay it all we are having to borrow money on our credit card just to scrape by every month and just don't want to do this anymore as our debt is getting higher and higher.The other problem we have is the inland revenue have been in touch and it turns out he done his tax return wrong last year (he must have lost one of his monthly income sheets so his income was over £3000 higher last year than we thought so I am guessing tax credits are going to want it back so we will have even less money coming in soon.Our house has a few thousand at most equity we are on the standard variable rate atm but cant fix with anyone as we dont have enough equity and our income isnt high enough anymore for anyone else to lend to us we can't afford the £706 payments each month we don't want the house anymore its too expensive and not big enough for us so my questions are


1..does bankruptcy sound like an option for us (our monthly outgoings are about £350 more than we have coming in and its set to get worse with tax credits )

2..privately renting in our area is about the same as what we pay on the mortgage so not an option we were hoping our council would house us but would they help if we do a voluntary repo or would we have to be reposessed (with 2 small children I would like to have housing sorted before we started br)

hope you can help I have lots of questions but these are the main ones


p.s we have no other assets other than a car worth about £1000

backward7

I am just about to declare myself bankrupt, I have 45000 ish in debt, mainly due to the ending of my marraige and losing the house.
I am in the middle of a court case for gaining custody of my sons (who currently reside with me) and I can no longer afford a solicitor.
If I am bankrupt will I qualify for Legal Aid?
Not sure If I am in the right section but new to this and asking for some help???

StepChange_Pavan

gatostar wrote: »

Dear Sir or Madam,

I would like to know if depths,which are now as a result of a civil court judgement turned into a executory title are secured or unsecured depths ?

Regards
Andreas

Hello Andreas and thank you for your post.

I’m sorry, I don’t fully understand - please could you clarify your question?

Kind regards,
Pavan