Consumer credit counseling: Very bad idea. See http://www.bayhouse.com/credit-counseling.shtml for info.
I would avoid BK like the plague, but ONLY in your case. DO, DO, DO by all means avoid CCCS or other 'credit counselors' like the plague. It would definitely raise a red flag with your creditors and yes, they could pull the plug on your situation if they feared BK. Trust me, stay away, far, far away from credit counselors and the worst of all, CCCS. Now, your situation is difficult. Have you used an accounting program to wring just about every penny you can out of your salary? Cut cable...there's $40-$80/mo right there. Cut out unnecessary bills, be more frugal in your spending, car pool/take the bus, etc, etc. Don't take away from your kids though, as it could cause many problems. As the saying goes, if you rob from Peter, who is related to Paul, you might just stir up more trouble than it's worth. If you were creative in your accounting, you COULD transfer all the debts to your husband or vice versa. Set yourself up for a chapter 7 and leave his credit intact or vice versa. I have read many times where the debt was in both names jointly or both held separate (and staggering) debt. They worked out a plan to transfer all the debts to the other spouse and declare chp7 BK, therefore keeping one of the individual's credit scores intact. Great idea. Not good if you don't trust your spouse though. Unless you can swing the above, the only BK option would be chp13. That will run you $3,000 in attorney's fees besides your actual debt. It could also lengthen the amount of time this drama plays out, much longer than if you simply paid off the debt. Something to consider though. Just hang tough, cut expenses, and DO NOT under any circumstances alert your creditors of your situation. I did....and they closed my account and I was more or less forced in chp7. There was no way I was going to have my accounts closed/frozen and pay penalty fees for jacked up interest rates (THANK YOU mbna....love your tactics!) Read the boards....and good luck.
Thanks for the advice not to close the zero balance credit cards. I don't know why that mortgage lady told us to do that to up our score. I don't have anything against public school. I went to public grade school and H.S. The school they are going to is the same that their father went to as well as their grandparents, we really wanted to carry on that tradition and have the kids in the same school as their close cousins. Also with the p.s. both my kids would be at different schools, not so with theirs now. I really don't want to pull them out of the school, they are very happy there. I would gladly sell both cars and get pos to keep them there. That doesn't seem like sense to me though because with the way cars depreciate I can't see how I would get the price for the cars that we owe on it still. Our house is not a big huge house in this upscale neighborhood. We live in a middle class neighborhood in an 1100sq.ft. 3 bedroom 1 bath house. I didn't say I wanted the "good things" in life. What I said was that I didn't want to give up everything we enjoy. Life is too unpredictable to not enjoy it while you are here. We don't do extravagant things like cruises, and expensive trips. We try once or twice a year to take the kids to a hotel for the weekend an hour or so away and they swim all weekend. We're not out eating steak and lobster when we get out food. We get pizza on Sundays and if I'm way busy with work we do normal cheap fast food. And when I made that statement, actually I was talking things like cable. Right now we have the max plan, I'd hope to not have to get rid of it completely. So we went down to basic cable. I thought that was a decent step towards cutting something out that we really don't need. Another example is the kids lunch, we pay for the hot lunch when I could just make it. We've gotten into the habit of paying for convenience and time saving items. In the last few days we have made some quick changes to eliminating those expenses. Judy, we are still considering at least talking to a BK attorney for the consult and see what he has to say. Thank you for your understanding post. Xhardcore, did you mean in our case because of the debt compared to our income we will only qualify for chap.13? If that was our only option, I'm guessing we would definitely choose to stay away from BK. It wouldn't seem as terrible if only one of us could file chap7. I only have one of the cards in my name everything else is in hubbys with me as an AU. Something to think about I guess, or if we do consult with a BK atty. ask about as well. Thanks again for all the thoughts, I'm spending lots of time here reading.
The problem with seeing an attorney, as judyputy advised, is that YOU'VE TRIED THIS WITH THE REFINANCE. And you've gotten back in again. If you file BK and keep doing what you're doing, you'll be back in over your head again before you can turn around. You have to change your lifestyle or get more income. Mongrol's advice was good--not all credit counseling firms are bad. Check them out. Those that charge a lot of fees, especially up front, are the ones to stay away from. Many are fronts for debt consolidators with high fees, the debt consolidation company is not a non-profit. As for the schools, maybe it would be better if they didn't go to the same school. If you tried taking them out for one year, you could pay off your debts and put some savings away. Then re-evaluate and see if you want to go back to the private school. You may be surprised. While tradition is great, there are many things more important to your children. Better for them to be raised in a more frugal, loving home than to have the "good schools" and "things." Trust me, I've been there. When they're standing by your death bed, they're probably not going to think "I wish I'd had more things (or private school, or whatever)." They're more likely to think "I wish they'd found a way to not worry about money and working so much, and more time doing things with us, even if it was just going to the park."
