In 1995, I had a lot of credit cards and no money to pay them. In fact, I had one with a $10,000 line, and I couldn't afford the minimum monthly payment. In all, I had $52,000 in debt. I was living way beyond means. Using credit cards was an addiction for me like being on cocaine. I had collection agencies calling me all the time. Morning until night. It created a bad case of anxiety for me. I was afraid to answer the phone. This was before cellphones, so I got these calls only when I was home. My answering machine took care of a lot of them, but I got to the point that I would roll up into a ball when the phone rang. I had to stop it, so I decided to go the bankruptcy route.
The first thing I had to do was get a lawyer. One was recommended to me. She was supposed to be the best. I went to see her and set up a payment plan for her fees. We then got to work. She gave me some forms to list everything I owned, including furniture, pictures, records, memorabilia, and more. I brought the list back to her, and we began assigning a value for each item. I came up with a figure, and then she told me to not do what something is worth but rather what something could be sold for. Then, I came up with that figure. She then asked what I could get for it, if I sold it at a flea market. I came up with that figure. It was considerably less than the first amount I had done. It was that amount that we used to access my "wealth".
It was then time to go before a bankruptcy judge. A paralegal went with me to court. This was in the Spring of 1996. There were others there to plead their cases before the judge. One man lost his truck. I was sure I was going to lose my assets, the majority of which were my records. There was an auctioneer in the courtroom who determined how much they could get for selling the stuff that people had. When my case was heard, the judge asked me one question. He asked if my records were worth anything. I said that they were worth something to me. I had not planned on saying that. It just came out. The judge looked at the auctioneer who shook his head no. The judge declared my case to be a "no-assets" case, and my debt was cleared. It meant I could keep my stuff. I was relieved.
All of my debts were wiped out except one. Sears refused to accept the judge's decision. They said they would set up a payment plan with me to pay them $15/month. I agreed to that. The first bill I got from them was more than the $15/month that we agreed to. I called them and told them they had made a mistake on the bill. They apologized and said they would send another bill. I never got another bill from them. I was afraid to go into Sears for several months after that, but slowly I returned there. No one said anything about my debt.
The only real downside to it was that the bankruptcy was on my credit report for several years, but I could answer the phone again.
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