Can i declaire bankruptcy myself?

babypeg

my husband and i both had good salaried jobs and he got laid off then i changed jobs and bacame pregnant.
We entered an IVA and couldn't make the monthly payments, we were contacted by a Bankruptcy company who informed us we could register bankruptand still keep our house as it is in negative equity and that an IVA was not our best option as we were led to believe, however their fees are £1200, plus we have to pay the court fees which will also total nearly £1200 when we actually register the bankruptcy.
They have agreed for us to pay £150 per month and when the fees are paid they will register it for us.
We will struggle to pay out this £150 per month with a new baby, do we have any other options???
Can i register myself and just pay the court fees??

Help!!! I am sure all this stress is not doing me or baby any good!!:(

cuddlymarm

Hi

I'm sorry that you are struggling at the moment. Bankrupsy is a scary business but you don't need a professional company to do it for you (who I take it are charging you money)
Probably the best thing to do is to get in touch with Citizens advice who will point you in the right direction. They have wonderful people who will help you.
It takes a while to sort out but you will be OK ( I'm speaking as someone coming out the other end of BR)
Try to relax and not worry. It's hard I know (and if you need to talk to anyone there will be lots of people happy to talk to you on here)

I'm off to work in a mo but there will be others on the board all day.
Look after yourself
Cuddles

confused76

hi there
as cuddles says you don't need to pay a company to help you petition for bankruptcy. you can fill the forms out yourself with the help of the CAB or do them yourself with the help of the people on here. i did my own forms and it was fine

please take advice from one of the free debt charities such as the national debtline, cccs or the cab

take care and pop back with any other questions x

fermi

I would talk to one of the non-biased advice services in my signature.

They will help you work out whether bankruptcy is really the best option.

If it is, then there is absolutely no need to pay anyone £1200 to help you with it.

You have to fill in some lengthy forms, which is a pain, but there is all the help you need here to do that yourself for free.

immoral_angeluk

You'll need to have sought proper advice before going bankrupt, as there may be other options open to you. Certaintly don't pay a company over a grand for the priviledge of something you can easily do yourself for free apart from the court costs!

Call CCCS, National Debtline, or nip along to your local CAB, who will advise and help you with everything for free!

babypeg

Thanks for replying.
I have spoken to CAB who put me onto the National Debt Helpline, they just took my details and didn't really tell me anything i didn't already know.
Do you know of any other org i could check with?
Basically i want to know if i do the forms myself, as our house is in negative equity of around £30k, can we keep the house and we owe £3k on our car which we have managed to keep up repayments on, we have 2 years left on the loan and need the car so my husband can get to work.

Hope you have some ideas. Thanks

confused76

you could also try the cccs....

http://www.cccs.co.uk/

this another free debt charity

dojoman

babypeg wrote: »

Thanks for replying.
I have spoken to CAB who put me onto the National Debt Helpline, they just took my details and didn't really tell me anything i didn't already know.
Do you know of any other org i could check with?
Basically i want to know if i do the forms myself, as our house is in negative equity of around £30k, can we keep the house and we owe £3k on our car which we have managed to keep up repayments on, we have 2 years left on the loan and need the car so my husband can get to work.

Hope you have some ideas. Thanks

Yes you can do the forms yourself, most of us on here who is BR did them themselves.
If the house is in negative equity there is a good chance you will get to keep it as long as you can afford the mortgage payments.
As for the car you would have to check your loan details to see if it has BR clause in it, also if the car is worth more than you owe, the OR may have an interest in it. Also any payments for the car would not be allowed in your SOA and would have to come out of your surplus.

babypeg

Thanks Dojoman,
The car is only worth around £2500 but we owe around £3500 to the loan company, and as with the mortgage we have managed to keep up repayments on both of these, all the debt is on unsecured loan and c/c's.
After reading the things on here i think i'm going to do the forms myself as i used to work in banking so fillling in forms doesn't phase me too much.
I'm just really worried about making a mistake and loosing the house!!!!!
;0(

ontheroad_2

Please give the BR forms a try yourself - you can get them from the court. I've just completed mine, its really not that bad. You just need to set aside a little time for them, and if there are any questions at all that you're not sure how to answer, just post them up here, and you'll get lots of great advice . I have a home we don't want to lose, and a banger for a car.

babypeg

Right thats it!!!!!

I'm down the Courthouse on Monday and i'm filling in the forms myself!

I only had a baby 3 months ago and all this is causing me to get help for depression as well.

I really can't cope with this black hole looming over us, we need to get sorted for our babys sake!!

Thanks to everyone who has been helping me with this and hopefully it will be sorted soon.

Just need to save £1200 for the court fees now!!!!!!!!