“Dear Steve,
I am self employed, and my husband is a partner in his own business, both of which were majorly affected by the recession; our incomes fell almost 80%.
I spent way too much time and money trying to keep my employees and office before shutting it all down and now work by myself from home.
My husbands business is still not doing well and he is still not consistently bring in a paycheck. I am over $100,000 in debt, mostly credit cards. There is just no way I can ever repay that amount and have any future of retiring.
I want to declare bankruptcy on my own, separately from my husband, to allow me to start fresh.
However, when times were good, I signed as a party to a line of credit along with my husband for his stores inventory.
That line of credit plainly says if any party on it declares bankruptcy they can , and will, call it due. If they do, that would bankrupt my husbands store, which he adamantly refuses to do.
I feel like I am drowning, going deeper in debt every month with no hope. I can accept my failures and get past the pride to declare bankruptcy and move on…but I am handcuffed to my commitment to his business.
I have made clear when the line of credit is renewed I have to come off, but it has been years and there seems to be no sign of the stores credit company asking for an updated line of credit. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
Carolyn”
Dear Carolyn,
The logical solution would be to click here to find a local bankruptcy attorney and talk to them for free about your situation.
The attorney could then advise you about their experience in dealing with similar situations. But there are some ways to deal with this. You might be able to negotiate a release or even reaffirm the liability. That could be dangerous though.
Do You Have a Question You'd Like Help With? Contact Debt Coach Damon Day. Click here to reach Damon.
The bottom line is that you are now stepping up to deal with your financial situation. Your current financial situation is troubling and if your husband defaulted and the lender went after you, you are already so deep in debt they’d most likely not be able to get anything anyway.
But the line of credit binds the two of you together with your apparently independently addressed financial situations. Maybe it would be helpful for you and your husband to instead look at your overall situation as one joint situation with this line of credit union.
While your husband refuses to deal with the reality of your joint financial situation, that does not changes the way it adds up.
Money problems are typically math wrapped in emotion and I thinks that’s what we’ve got going on here for the most part.
It’s time for both of you to face the reality of your current financial situation for what it is and not what it might be.
Please post your responses and follow-up messages to me on this in the comments section below.
