Spouses need to be joint debtors from start of case
“ It’s safer for the late filing spouse to file her own case so both cases will succeed. But with two cases, you will pay attorney and filing fees twice. So spouses should decide early on whether they will file a joint case or not.”
Client No. 1
CLIENT is 63. His older car is fully paid. The problem is that client has been living like there’s no tomorrow. Sometimes, when men get to this age, the thought of mortality becomes a primary concern. They see their contemporaries kicking the bucket one by one, slowly but surely. One friend’s kidneys don’t work anymore so he goes on dialysis. The other friend has a stroke that disables him, and he goes on disability. Yet another friend starts to get Parkinson’s. So the slow deterioration of the human body becomes a reality that a person in his sixties is faced with. You don’t really feel old. In fact, you feel the same as you did in your thirties and forties. There is no difference. But you know you’re going over the hill sooner or later. Some seniors take life with a grain of salt and have a healthy attitude. These are the ones, like myself, who age gracefully and we think we become wiser from experience. But some people are just like client and they get a wild streak going. They want to live like they’re twenty again and single. They forget they have families who care for them and throw caution to the wind. I guess they think that if they can live like they were twenty, they can’t be sixty. You know what I mean here. They become irresponsible and believe that if they hook up with young girls, they are able to cheat the aging process. Get reborn, as it were. Like discovering the fountain of youth. They want to sow their wild oats again.
To finance his newfound young lifestyle, client racks up his charges on his credit cards. To impress the young ladies, he carries a big wad of cash around. Since he actually doesn’t have a big wad of cash in his savings account, and his credit cards have maxed out. He is left with only two choices. Get payday loans, which is limited by his gross monthly income, or to get a title loan against his fully, paid car. He is able to get two title loans with one car for a total of $5K. He probably gambled this money away or blew through it quickly with his new girlfriends half his age. The catch with car title loans is high interest. Eventually, client defaults on the loans. And what happens with default on a car title loan? The repo man comes knocking on your door, your garage door.
Late at night, client hears some activity on his driveway. Half awake, he goes out to see what’s going on. When he sees that a tow truck is about to tow his car from his driveway, he hurriedly goes to the passenger side of the tow truck to try to talk to the driver. No one knows what happens next, but client is laying flat on driveway unconscious. He must have slipped on the pavement as he came rushing towards the truck. He hit his head on the pavement and is hospitalized for a month in ICU where he goes in and out of consciousness. It’s probably correct to say that but for his debt, he would still be perfectly healthy today, would it not? If he did not owe the car title loan, there would be no repo man, and he would have slept soundly that night and awoke perfectly healthy the next morning. In this case, client’s debts literally got the better of him, and literally almost got him killed. You can avoid this situation by getting rid of all your debts now with a Chapter 7 or Chapter 13. These will give you a much-needed fresh start in life without debt!
Client No. 2
Husband owes $40K of credit card debt and is currently facing a wage garnishment arising from a collection lawsuit. Husband wants to get a fresh start with a Chapter 7 bankruptcy to wipe out the wage garnishment and his $40K of credit cards. Wife owes $20K but is unsure if she should join husband in filing for Chapter 7. Let’s say that husband cannot wait any longer and decides to file his Chapter 7 right away without including wife since she can’t decide. Two months after husband’s case is filed, wife is served with a collection lawsuit for $7K. She then decides to join her husband’s Chapter 7 case. Can this be done by amending husband’s petition to include wife? Filing a joint husband and wife case with one spouse filing first then subsequently amending the petition to include the other spouse later on can be messy. Section 302(a) seems to require that both spouses sign a single petition at the beginning of the case. In addition, it would create havoc on the court’s administration of the case because of the deadline requirements. So even if it can be legally argued that debtor has the right to amend his petition to include his wife because the law allows amendments as a matter of right, you will face very strong headwinds in implementing a subsequent inclusion of your spouse post-filing. In all likelihood, judges in the Central District of California will not allow it.
It’s safer for the late filing spouse to file her own case so both cases will succeed. But with two cases, you will pay attorney and filing fees twice. So spouses should decide early on whether they will file a joint case or not.
“You guide me with Your counsel, and afterward You will receive me in glory.” Psalm 73:24.
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Lawrence Bautista Yang specializes in bankruptcy, business, real estate and civil litigation and has successfully represented more than five thousand clients in California. Please call Angie, Barbara or Jess at (626) 284-1142 for an appointment at 1000 S. Fremont Ave, Mailstop 58, Building A-1 Suite 1125, Alhambra, CA 91803.