Phew! Survived!

Teen_the_Drama_Queen

Hi all

Right, we are now officially bankrupt, it feels strange....

Arrived at Court well in time this morning. Had handbag searched and had to walk through scanner, all ok. DH had to empty his pockets and put everything in box before going through scanner. He told the official its easier to get on a flight!! He had loads of rubbish (old receipts and sweet wrappers!) in his pockets which then ended up in my handbag!! Cheers - thanks for that. We get through, DH nips off to the toilets and I check with receptionist where to go. Apparently back out the building, down the slope and across the road! We were in the Law Court and not the County Court - D'oh :rotfl:

Get to CC and take a seat. Clerk checks our paperwork - just points out where I had not totalled DH's debts and all seems ok. She keeps hold of our paperwork and we go off to bailiff's desk to pay over fees.

Then have to go upstairs to judges waiting room to wait for judge to read our paperwork. A couple of other bods who looked like they were bankruptcy cases (ie looked as worried as we did) and a few solicitor/client people.

Judge wanted to see us (yikes, I have already chewed by nails!). She queried about us giving keys of the property back to mortgage company and we said we had been advised by Nat Debtline to go down that route and that we hadn't paid mortgage since January this year. She asked if we had had property valued and we said we had had estate agent round and even had a buyer and the sale was going through, but that the second charge company (Firstplus) would not accept our offer of two-thirds of the settlement figure. I thought for one horrible moment she was going to say we couldn't go bankrupt.

Then she queried the amount of debt in my name - I had not totalled up my debts properly (despite reading and re-reading and re-reading the forms beforehand) and was therefore showing £2K in debt, not the true £9K. (The clerk hadn't picked up on this either). I thought OMG she's going to say DH can become BR but not me.

She looked at forms again and then declared us BR. She explained that we would probably have to make a payment to the creditors each month, buy we said we understood that that would happen for 3 years. Huge sigh of relief from me, I can tell you.

Went back downstairs to wait for paperwork to be processed. Another chap came down to wait and we all sort of sat there kind of stunned. He said 'you had to see the Judge too'? We said 'yes'. He then said "the nightmare continues" - the judge had declined his BR!!!! I would hate to think how life would pan out now if we could not have gone BR.

OR will be in touch in around 7 days - we went home and started making a couple of phone calls to creditors. Went home and rang Firstplus, DH told her we had both been declared BR and woman on phone said 'it doesn't matter - you still have to pay'. We signed no shortfall agreement before today and have no intention of doing so now. DH said to me 'do we'? I said woman was talking tosh, it is included in BR, debt is unsecured now as we have handed keys back, we own no property for debt to be secured to!

Have now had a cuppa and a chocolate fix (yum - still got some mother's day Toblerone left :j) - off to work soon.

Think this will take a while to sink in - will be glad to go to work to be able to take my mind off it.

Thanks all for your kind words and advice :A

dojoman

Well done :T:T:T Glad it went OK for you

Ineedaname

Teehee, I went in via the underground car park so avoided the scanner. But when I went out front for a ciggie break I had to go through the scanner on the way back in! Great security, lol.

Really glad you got through it all OK, though it sounds like your heart was bouncing all around the court room.

But it's done now so ever onwards. :T:T:T

iquit

Glad the day went ok, welcome to the club.

debtinfo

Hi TEDQ, the judge probably just looked at your forms quickly and saw £2,000 debt and a property where valuations can vary depending on where you get them from, which is probably why the judge asked a few questions, sounds like you have good answers that the judge was happy with though, 1 reason why its better to do your own forms rather than get a company is that you are much better prepared if the judge asks you questions

Dazi

only way is up now hon, ((hugs)) for you both, you got over the worse day x

tigerfeet2006

Teen_the_Drama_Queen wrote: »

Hi all

Right, we are now officially bankrupt, it feels strange....

Arrived at Court well in time this morning. Had handbag searched and had to walk through scanner, all ok. DH had to empty his pockets and put everything in box before going through scanner. He told the official its easier to get on a flight!! He had loads of rubbish (old receipts and sweet wrappers!) in his pockets which then ended up in my handbag!! Cheers - thanks for that. We get through, DH nips off to the toilets and I check with receptionist where to go. Apparently back out the building, down the slope and across the road! We were in the Law Court and not the County Court - D'oh :rotfl:

Get to CC and take a seat. Clerk checks our paperwork - just points out where I had not totalled DH's debts and all seems ok. She keeps hold of our paperwork and we go off to bailiff's desk to pay over fees.

Then have to go upstairs to judges waiting room to wait for judge to read our paperwork. A couple of other bods who looked like they were bankruptcy cases (ie looked as worried as we did) and a few solicitor/client people.

Judge wanted to see us (yikes, I have already chewed by nails!). She queried about us giving keys of the property back to mortgage company and we said we had been advised by Nat Debtline to go down that route and that we hadn't paid mortgage since January this year. She asked if we had had property valued and we said we had had estate agent round and even had a buyer and the sale was going through, but that the second charge company (Firstplus) would not accept our offer of two-thirds of the settlement figure. I thought for one horrible moment she was going to say we couldn't go bankrupt.

Then she queried the amount of debt in my name - I had not totalled up my debts properly (despite reading and re-reading and re-reading the forms beforehand) and was therefore showing £2K in debt, not the true £9K. (The clerk hadn't picked up on this either). I thought OMG she's going to say DH can become BR but not me.

She looked at forms again and then declared us BR. She explained that we would probably have to make a payment to the creditors each month, buy we said we understood that that would happen for 3 years. Huge sigh of relief from me, I can tell you.

Went back downstairs to wait for paperwork to be processed. Another chap came down to wait and we all sort of sat there kind of stunned. He said 'you had to see the Judge too'? We said 'yes'. He then said "the nightmare continues" - the judge had declined his BR!!!! I would hate to think how life would pan out now if we could not have gone BR.

OR will be in touch in around 7 days - we went home and started making a couple of phone calls to creditors. Went home and rang Firstplus, DH told her we had both been declared BR and woman on phone said 'it doesn't matter - you still have to pay'. We signed no shortfall agreement before today and have no intention of doing so now. DH said to me 'do we'? I said woman was talking tosh, it is included in BR, debt is unsecured now as we have handed keys back, we own no property for debt to be secured to!

Have now had a cuppa and a chocolate fix (yum - still got some mother's day Toblerone left :j) - off to work soon.

Think this will take a while to sink in - will be glad to go to work to be able to take my mind off it.

Thanks all for your kind words and advice :A

Technically she is right. You do still owe the money until the house is sold and the debt becomes unsecured at which point it falls into the BR as long as you don't sign anything. Until that point they can stil chase you for the money but hey! you are BR what are they gonna do . You just have to ignore them hassling and know that they can't really do much to you.

Well done on getting through the day.

Angiepange

TDQ well done, glad court day is over for you both :j, hope you both can relax a little now