Bankcrupcy advice needed please help.

[BrokenBananaTantrum]

Sorry for length of this post but I need to make sure I get everything in. A year ago I entered into an IVA but now we are really struggling to make ends meet. In fact we are £208 a month short every month. The company I?ve got the IVA won?t reduce my payments. I am considering filing for bankruptcy but I need some advice about a few things. I?m only working part time.

Our house is solely in my husbands name but because he has been off work for the last 2 years due to mental illness I?m worried that the house might be part of any bankruptcy agreement. The IVA is only in my name. So my first question I would they be able to force us to sell our house even though we have a young daughter (3.8)? We have enough equity in the house to clear the money I owe but we would be unable to get another house because I would not be able to get a mortgage if declared bankrupt and DH couldn?t get one as he is not working. We have switched to paying interest only on our mortgage so our payments are very low and we would not be able to afford rent if we had to sell.

Is this the sort of things the CAB would be able to advise me on? Should I contact the company in charge of my IVA? I have not defaulted on it yet.

Please ? any advice would be greatly appreciated. I can?t sleep at night and the worry is making me ill.

Thanks in advance. Off to put DD to bed now but will be back later.

i would go over to the money saving expert site- there are a lot of people over there who can answer almost every bankruptcy related question- they will give you more info and also i think the CAB and the CCCS are both charity based helplines who can answer questions and help you decide what is best. hth x

Have been through a similar thing, it can be quite time consuming to get all of the info you need, which just adds to the stress of it all.

I found the CAB to be very good, they have volunteers giving out advice, however they also have paid specialists. Some specialise in housing and others in money. If you do go and book an appointment with a volunteer, they should soon realise that you need to see a specialist and book you in for an appointment with one, if you seen anyone half as good as the lady I saw you will get good advice, she was fantastic and went through all the options, and got me an appointment with the housing specialist. It all really depends on how busy you local CAB is (they are all rammed at the moment, but some seem to have more space than others).

The Consumer Credit Counselling service were ok, but didn?t tell me much I didn?t all ready know (e.g my monthly shortfall!) They do send out good info packs though. Shelter were good, they have a mortgage section you can call.

I would definitely book in with the CAB, it?s worth the wait.

The CAB specialist also pointed out that generally the companies that make the worst threats are only making them because they don?t have much power to actually do anything, that made me relax a bit.

If the house is not in your name and you are paying keeping the mortgage payments up then that puts you in a better position too. You can also look on the insolvency.gov website.