Vehicles/Assets question

MingVase

Son has minimal assets. Rented fully furnished house etc. His pride & joy is his bike, currently worth around £5000 although he paid less for it. He's currently unemployed and when working was a security guard on shifts. Would they maybe be flexible and allow him to keep the bike as his only means of transport to work? There is nothing at all in his house that he owns, the bike- the helmet- and the leathers are all he has, so I'm hoping like hell he might be able to hang onto it. Any idea please people?

luvchocolate

With a car it's £2000 if can be proved it's a need for transport not a want 

Brie

luvchocolate said:

With a car it's £2000 if can be proved it's a need for transport not a want 

Is it £2k?  I know that DRO car value has gone up to £4k as of today so maybe that's happened for bankruptcy as well??  And to determine value it's generally accepted that if you go on to Parkers and see what the value is for that make, model, year that's the price irrespective of add ones, detailing etc.  

MingVase

That's a good idea Brie thanks, I was on ebay and bike trader and the prices are all over the place, Parkers would be more standard. He's been told today by the CAB that under sequestration he is allowed a car or bike up to the value of £3000. But nobody seems to know how flexible that is.

EDIT - sadly Parkers is just cars. not bikes.

sourcrates

What debts does he have, how much?

Are they been chased, is there an urgent need to go bankrupt?

If he`s unemployed a simple letter to the creditors will put all his credit debts on hold until he, either finds work, or can sort out a way forward.

No need to go bankrupt unless its absolutely urgent.

MingVase

sourcrates said:

What debts does he have, how much?

Are they been chased, is there an urgent need to go bankrupt?

If he`s unemployed a simple letter to the creditors will put all his credit debts on hold until he, either finds work, or can sort out a way forward.

No need to go bankrupt unless its absolutely urgent.

Thanks sourcrates. CAB lady who is helping him sort out the mess  is saying it's the only way out. He has £20,000 in debt to 13 creditors. No assets at all apart from the bike. He has been ignoring all letters for many months now, CAB got some put on hold but they are now running out of patience.

sourcrates

That may be so, but look at this realistically, taking legal action against him is pointless if he doesn't have the money.

No amount of court judgements can actually make someone pay who doesn't have the money to do so.

CAB are just ticking boxes, and following guidance, in reality being unemployed with no real assets, no cash etc, there is nothing the creditors can do to him.

His bike is neither here nor there, even if they all took legal action against him, the court will take one look at his budget and say you can`t afford to pay anything, and judgement payment will be set as zero.

Bankruptcy is unnecessary here. See what @fatbelly thinks.

fatbelly

MingVase said:

Son has minimal assets. Rented fully furnished house etc. His pride & joy is his bike, currently worth around £5000 although he paid less for it. He's currently unemployed and when working was a security guard on shifts. Would they maybe be flexible and allow him to keep the bike as his only means of transport to work? There is nothing at all in his house that he owns, the bike- the helmet- and the leathers are all he has, so I'm hoping like hell he might be able to hang onto it. Any idea please people?

Only just noticed this one.

So they are recommending bankruptcy (£680 fee) because he is blocked from a DRO (free) by a 5k bike.

I wouldn't recommend any formal insolvency atm. As the rules stand, in bankruptcy he would lose the bike.

It's going to depreciate. Also, hopefully he will get steady employment at some point. That would be the time to do the sums and see if he either qualified for a DRO or had enough surplus to make realistic payments under a debt management plan.

The question is whether to inform the creditors of the situation and on balance (can see pros and cons) I would. After all there is no point taking action against someone with no property and no earnings. I wouldn't tell them about the bike though.

Sorry, is he in Scotland? I don't advise on Scottish law as it's very different. But I'll let this post stay up despite the specifics not applying because there's a general principle that you only need a debt relief strategy if you genuinely need relief from your debts

RAS

MingVase and son are in Scotland. She had another username long before the revamp before last, so know a bit of background.

MingVase

Sorry my fault fatbelly, I should have said I'm up here - thanks RAS! I've been digging around and think MAP is the best way to go, He doesn't pay any fee and it's all over in 6 months. But the bike was worrying me, I can see we'll need to lose it somehow. Having to do most of this myself as son just isn't up to it at all, hence all the questions - sorry