redeem the property bankruptcy

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Is a Chapter 7 debtor’s home mortgage limited to reaffirmation, redemption or surrender, after exempt?

I am waiting for my attorney to get back to me next week. In the meantime if anyone knows the answer to this, I would really appreciate it. I have already filed and had my court date for my Chapter 7 bankruptcy. My Chapter 7 bankruptcy will be finalized on January 30 2007, and I will be released of all unsecured debt.
On my “Debtors Statement of Intention” document, we put “Surrender” for my car, and that’s exactly what I’m doing with it.
For my house we put “Exempt” which made the equity exempt and allowed me to keep the home without a forced sale. The problem and question is with my home. The mortgage company’s lawyer is pressuring me to “Reaffirm” by January 30. She says of I don’t sign the reaffirm agreement then it will default to “Redeem” “Redeem” seems to mean pay a lump sum or surrender the property? The question is; Is a Chapter 7 debtor’s home mortgage limited to reaffirmation, redemption or surrender, after Exempt? My attorney says there is a 5th choice, do nothing.

Really your only options are:
1. Surrender the property
2. Redeem the property pursuant
3. Reaffirm the debt
4. Claim the property exempt (avoid the lien)

Another option you may have
5. Retain the property and continue to make payments

http://www1.ncmb.uscourts.gov/opinions/docs/05-54201.pdf

The reaffirmation agreement is mainly to protect the creditor. If you default on the loan in the future the mortgage company can still collect the debt from you because you reobligated yourself to the debt. You may want to look at the amount of equity that is in your house to decide whether you want to reaffirm or not, once a mortgage loan go into default, their fees would take a great deal of equity out of the house.

If you do not sign a reaffirmation agreement and you do fall behind on your payments, the mortgage company will most likely send your loan to their attorney to start foreclosing without giving you any notice to cure the default with them. Most mortgage companies will not send you a billing statement or contact you if you are late, because they would technically be violating the discharge injunction.

If you have the discipline to send a payment each month and keep a track of every payment that you send, you would not have to sign a reaffirmation agreement.

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