ShellyHunter
New Member
My husband and I filed for bankruptcy on 10/01/04. My husband is self employed. When I filled out our paperwork for our attorney there was a section to list accounts receivable. I called the paralegal and asked her if I needed to list people that owed us money for work we had already done but hadn't been paid for. She said no because that was like our "paycheck" if we had a regular job. We went through the hearing and thought everything was ok. The trustee requested copies of our accounts receivable and payable up to the date we filed. I turned them in to him. He then said we were trying to withhold money & didn't fill out our paperwork right. He wants us to give him all the money we were owed for work done prior to 10/01/04. It amounted to a little over $6000.00. This is our income, our "paycheck". We had to pay self employment taxes on this plus we still had to pay all the expenses to do the work he was taking the money from. I talked to our attorney and he said the trustee could basically due anything he wants to do. He or his paralegal would not accept responsibility for telling me I didn't need to list accounts receivable. The trustee could have attached back child support of around $4500. He also let our house go back to the bank. We owed $76,000 on it and it appraised for $90-$92,000. The bank then sold it for the appraisal amount and got to keep the balance over what we owed. We signed an agreement to pay the trustee $200 a month plus 2005 & 2006 tax refunds until we have paid $5600. We only signed because our lawyer told us we didn't really have a choice. We made several payments last summer. I haven't made a payment since 9/05 because I can't afford to. We need our tax refund to live on to pay rent, utilities and insurance. It will probably be between $4000 and $5000. We have been receiving foodstamps since 10/04. My kids have been on Medicaid for 7 years. My husband and I have been on temporary medicaid for 1 year (it will end 3/06). I have lots of medical problems. My husband has also had a lot of medical problems the past year. We are doing the best we can to provide for our family. I am in the process of appealing disability and I have a workers comp claim in progress. Do we have any recourse? Is there anyway we can legally keep our tax refund? We have 3 kids living at home. Do we have to become homeless and lose what little we have left? How can he take money from us when we need it to care for our kids? Any advice would be appreciated.
