Riceman - Thank you for posting your experience. I don't have anything of substance to add, but I really appreciate you detailing your fight with discover through the JAMS process. Even if the outcome is not what you hoped for at the end, everyone here benefits from the information youv'e shared.

I do have a question - in your jurisdiction, would the arb award be confirmed by the court all at once or would each "winner" do so separately? For example, let's say the decision is the same after the appeal. You owe discover $5k and they owe you $1k. Would you have to confirm the $1k award separately on your own?

I does make me wonder how it could play out with a judgment proof person who was in a similar position. Discover would have their judgment but couldn't collect, while you'd get $1k from them.

In addition, does anyone have experience with OC's paying judgments against them? Do they typically pay when awarded or do they make you do the legwork to recover?

You need to get a few consultations with an attorney before your post again. Line up three, go see the attorneys, and report back.

You should be able to get a sense of whether or not the attorney is likely to look out for your best interests or just wants to get you into the door so they can file your case and get you to pay their fees.

There are a lot of variables here. Sure, there are people who get themselves into mountains of debt (even borrowing irresponsibly, including taking vacations on that borrowed money), default, then remain judgment proof for a few years while remaining Chapter 7 eligible. They file for BK and get all their judgments (and other debt) discharged since the lookback period has long since passed. However, this is not the norm and most people don't (or can't) live their lives that way.

This is why an attorney's advice is so important.

Believe it or not, today I'm starting to think that I might as well just go through bankruptcy. The reasons you are saying do make sense to me. I also had to make a decision recently if I am going to put a lien on the car to protect it, but I'm starting to think maybe I should just sell the car and move forward. I'm just opening up more can of worms.

I was also just looking over chapter 13 calculations and it doesn't make sense, then I started thinking about taking a lower paying job 50k vs 80k, just to pay less and keep the car, but that just seems stupid.

One of the big issues is this stupid collector car that I have. My father lent me money for it years ago, over 10 years, and I never paid him back. It has been sitting many years unused in his garage. He still mentions about taking it to car shows and what not, I'm just really not into it anymore but feel bad about selling it.

The other big issue is that I don't want my father knowing I'm a loser, well he already knows that but I don't want him to know just how bad a <Removed> up I am. I don't want him to know I had to sell the car because of bankruptcy. I was hoping to avoid all this by trying to somehow keep the car.

However, I'm starting to think I just don't want to deal with this <Removed> anymore, I am at the point where I would like to just take this car and drive it into the ocean, keeping it is causing me a lot of issues.

If it were not for this car I really don't have any other assets. I had only about 15K cash left when I went bankrupt, but after paying for the class I am taking right now to get my license for my 80K job, taxes for 2017, living expenses, and allowable exemptions, I really have almost no cash and may actually be in the negative.


Then all I have is that stupid car. How much it is worth? Well that really depends on how I sell it. If I was to sell it personally I could get a lot more, if it goes to auction it will be worth a lot less. I estimate at auction its worth 20K if I sell it I could get maybe 40K+. The reason I would get more if I sell it is because I can prove its miles and originality in the collector circle, in an auction after the car was seized I would not bother to do that. Trust me these numbers are about right, 20K at auction maybe less, 40K if I sell it personally.

So please help me out here, what should I do with this stupid car? Should I just let it go to auction and have someone in my family buy it back? Is that possible?

Is there a way I can work out selling it to family as part of the bankruptcy, but of course selling it at 20K as that is what I can prove its worth at auction. I don't think I'll bother buying it back for more than 30K, just don't want the issues.

Or just give up the car and go through bankruptcy as it would be like selling the car for over 100K?

This car is just driving me insane really and I its causing me so  much stress that I just want to get rid of it. Because right now I have basically no cash and just this stupid car.

This is also why I thought I would try and go for a settlement,  because I figure the car was worth enough to where a settlement would make sense. But I would only settle for a little bit over what the car was worth.

One other thing is I'm going to pay back those credit cards I borrowed the money from ASAP. I read there is a 90 day look back for priority payments. I borrowed that money specifically to trade with and haven't done that so I'm going to pay the credit cards back. Hopefully they won't bother to try and claim that money back from the credit cards after 90 days. But I guess that isn't my problem anymore once I claim bankruptcy.

I'm just really losing it at this point. I feel so constrained with all of this. I don't even want to do things to make money because I feel like I'm just going to lose it all anyway.

I also haven't heard one thing back from my creditor. They last sent a letter a few weeks ago saying that it was the final notice and they expected payment around april 10th at the latest or they would seek legal action and or sell my account to a 3rd party. Still haven't heard anything.

Paying the $40K to the broker may be a really stupid move...It's interest rate is less than 1/3rd of the rate that you will get charged if you ever miss a payment to the CC company and about 1/2 at normal rates...Compare 8.25% with the default rate on cards of 29.9%. 

See foot, shoot foot.

The whole reason for getting out from under now is that this whole mess could possible follow you around for decades while filing BK now will essentially follow you, except for mortgage-like transactions, for at most a decade, and functionally only about four or five years.

And if there is even a hint that you obtained the margin credit with the assistance of your father's credit and co-signature, they are going to come after him.

Is that the way you want your father to be treated?

We really don't care if you go to Asia for a "vacation".  We don't even particularly care if you tank your finances for decades to come.

What we really don't like is seeing your self-interest take down someone who has been, and still is, being very kind to you.

Think about that for a while.

I feel worse for your father.  He is most likely going to end up dealing with the mess you leave behind.

^^^^
This.

Not consulting a BK lawyer and doing what is necessary to fix his own finances is bad enough. 
Leaving his father vulnerable due to his own stupidity is horrible.