Discharged Bankruptsy 4 years ago Need advice on problems

[stephanieh1967]

What is the name of your state? Indiana
Hi I am hoping someone can give me advice. My husband and I filed bankruptsy 4 years ago and it was discharged on 7-31-03 I thought everything would be better but we have had nothing but problems, we have fallen behind on our mortgage and second mortgage a few times since and when it reached 60 days past due they tried to forclose well we were able to recoupe and keep the house out of forclosure. Now the problem is we are trying to purchase a new home with a mortgage well our credit is less than perfect of course but our mortgage and 2nd mortgage have not been reporting and we have a car loan that has been paid off by us but still shows a balance because they say it was discharged. In researching this we found that our attorney did not file but one reaffirmation, when questioned about this he informed me that we only returned one of 4 reaffirmations and that was our problem and he has no control over our credit,I don't remember filing any reaffirmations and this was his job to make sure that the papers were returned and filed not mine, he also told me he could not give me copies of my bankruptsy that I had to go to the bankruptsy court, well they told me I could get them there at the attorney so while he was out I convinced his secretary to give me copies. I now have the delcaration that said we were going to reaffirm the items. Now my question is do I have any recourse against this attorney for not filing these and if he never got them back from us should he not have questioned why we had not returned the ones for the house or the other car, did he not think why we would only want to reaffirm a car which could easily replace, we have chose to pay on these items and have paid both of the cars off and are continuing to pay the house payments but if we miss or are late on the payments we have the problem of possibly having forclosure started which leads and has lead to large attorney fees from the mortage company hiring attorneys for the forclosure proceedings that they have made us pay to recover.The one company will not send us statements that is why it gets behind because it is a discharged account and they say they can't leagaly send us one. Any suggestions of how to fix this problem or repair our credit from this mess? Can I make the attorney pay for this mess up, can this be reopened and reaffirmed now? Please help
Thanks in advance
StephanieWhat is the name of your state?

[Ladynred]

Wow.. next time try some paragraphs and proper punctuation, your post is VERY hard to read.

we have a car loan that has been paid off by us but still shows a balance because they say it was discharged

There should be NO BALANCE listed on your reports for a discharged debt, regardless of whether or not you paid it off later. Dispute this with the credit bureaus, discharged debts MUST be reported with a ZERO balance and must say 'included in bankruptcy' or other similar language.

Now my question is do I have any recourse against this attorney for not filing these and if he never got them back from us should he not have questioned why we had not returned the ones for the house or the other car,

You want to go after him after FOUR YEARS ?? Everything was not up to your lawyer, YOU were a party to the bankruptcy and you should have paid some attention. The fact that the debts were discharged w/o the reaffirmation means it was allowed in your state. It's not that big a deal, he actually did you more of a favor that you realize.

The problems with your credit are many - not the least of which is your falling behind on debts post-discharge. In order to recover from bankruptcy, it takes EFFORT to actively dispute anything that is not reported properly - zero balance, NO lates or charge-offs after the date of your BK filing, and listed as 'included in bankruptcy'. You make your disputes with the credit bureaus directly, in writing. The 2nd part of clean-up is to keep your credit clean and slowly rebuild your credit by opening new accounts, paying on time, and not over-using credit. It would appear you did none of these things, so don't blame your lawyer. BK lawyers know very little about post-bankruptcy credit repair/rebuilding.

but if we miss or are late on the payments we have the problem of possibly having forclosure started

That has NOTHING to do with a reaffirmation. Because the mortgage is a secured debt, if you don't pay, the creditor has the right to forclose, regardless of whether or not the debt was reaffirmed. You can't keep secured property w/o paying. The good thing about NOT reaffirming is if you had NOT been able to 'save' the house, you could have walked away and the creditor would not have been able to make you pay a penny because the un-reaffirmed mortgage debt was discharged.

The one company will not send us statements that is why it gets behind because it is a discharged account and they say they can't leagaly send us one.

Not entirely accurate. They cannot send you a BILL that demands payment, but they CAN send you an 'informational' statement. Many mortgage lenders do this. Do you not know when your mortgage payments are due ? Can you not get it paid w/o being dunned every month ???

Can I make the attorney pay for this mess up, can this be reopened and reaffirmed now?

No. Reaffirmations must be filed BEFORE discharge and it's very unlikely a bankruptcy judge would agree to re-open your case as this late date to file a reaffirmation agreement.

If you want help repairing your credit, try here: [url]http://www.creditinfocenter.com[/url]