What personal property do I need to include on my chapter 7 bankruptcy petition?

Schedule B of the bankruptcy petition is where you will list all "non-real" personal property. That is, all of your personal property that is not real estate, which should be listed on schedule A of your petition.

Technically, you are required to list ALL personal property that has any monetary value. Now, that is a rather ambiguous statement, because any personal property could have some material value. However, the rule of thumb is to list any property that may have any cash value. Generally, you should list all your cars and trucks, furniture, jewelry, card or coin collections, computers, tv's and other electronics, movie collections, decorations, home appliances and anything else that may be sold by the trustee to repay some of your debts.

What Will Really be Sold?

The reality is, for the vast majority of chapter 7 cases, you will wind up keeping ALL of your personal property. This happens for one of three reasons:

1. It's too Difficult to Sell. The trustee will not go out of his/her way to sell something unless it's easy. Finding someone to buy your used furniture is probably to time consuming to bother, and will not generate much cash anyway. In bankruptcy law terms, the property will be "abandoned" by the trustee.
2. It's Exempt. Most of the valuable property you do have will be listed as exempt on schedule C of your petition.
3. No Equity. This is often the case in automobiles which are being financed. If you owe more on your car than it is worth, the trustee will not bother selling it because you do not have any equity to pull out of it in order to repay a creditor.

That being said, you need to be 100% honest and forthcoming on your bankruptcy petition. You should list everything that might be worth something. You will end up claiming it as exempt on schedule C anyway, and will end up keeping it.

If you are trying to file for bankruptcy without a lawyer, go out and buy a book on chapter 7 and spend a few days learning about the basics of bankruptcy law. These cases can get complicated and a mistake on your part can end up costing you your case. If you would like to talk to a bankruptcy lawyer for a free consultation, click here to be connected with a local bankruptcy attorney now.

Also, check out the link below for a step by step guide to filing a chapter 7 bankruptcy petition.

Good luck.