What should I do and expect to happen if my fiance filed for bankruptcy before the wedding? 26 Answers as of January 17, 2012

If your fiance files bankruptcy before the wedding, you do not need to delay the wedding until after discharge. Have a nice wedding and a happy marriage!

Your fiance's case could be discharged by the time your wedding comes around. If it is not, it will still not affect you. So long as your are not married at the time of his 3411 meeting of creditors - if you get married before that his schedules and petition must be changed so that he is married but filing individually and your income would have to be included as household income. If he has an attorney I would suggest you contact the attorney to see how quickly his case will be filed with the courts and when his meeting of creditors will be.

If it is Chapter 7 then everything will be decided on the basis of the situation as of filing date so you can get married after the filing date although it would be more prudent to wait until after the meeting of creditors in case there are complications that might arise before the meeting of creditors. By May her case will be over unless there are complications.

No. Since you are getting married after he files his bankruptcy, you (your income and assets) do not become part of the equation. The only other way you can be affected would be that you are a joint-debtor on any of the debts he is including in his bankruptcy. Assuming he is filing a Chapter 7, the creditor could seek to have you (or any other joint-debtor) pay the debt. Otherwise, congratulations.

Unless you have co-signed for some of his debts, you should not need to be too concerned about his bankruptcy filing. You are not involved in the filing or in any of the debts. Of course, Wisconsin is a community property state so you will be responsible for debts he incurs after you are married. This includes medical debt. He should disclose on his papers that he intends to marry within the next year and his household size will increase. The trustee may ask him how much you make and whether you benefited from any of his debts. He will need to be truthful. It is theoretically possible that if he marries you and you make a lot of money that his household income would be considered too high for a Chapter 7. This would be extremely unusual and your income would need to be quite high for this to be a concern. To eliminate any doubt on this score, he should discuss the matter with this bankruptcy attorney.

Unless you have joint debts with him, it generally should not affect you (other than if you were planning on buying a house and need his credit to get it or something like that). He may, depending on where he is filing, be discharged by the time the wedding takes place. Actually, assuming you don't have joint debts, it is better for him to file before you are married, so your income and information do not have to be reported as part of his bankruptcy filing.

The filing should only effect your fiance's credit, and not effect you. And he is better off filing prior to the marriage rather than after. If after the marriage, your combined income might prevent him from filing a chapter 7.

There should be no reason to postpone the wedding unless your income is so high that the trustee would say it is fundamentally unfair for your spouse to get a discharge. But this is rare.

If he paid any part of it using credit cards which are subjects of his current bankruptcy, that part of the debt will not be discharged if the credit card companies or the trustee object. Other than that there shouldn't be a problem.

First, all assets and income are usually determined at the date that the case is filed, so it would have no affect on any assets you have. Second, it also depends on whether it is a Chapter 7 or a Chapter 13. If it is a Chapter 13, payments will have to be made on the Chapter 13 plan for 3 to 5 years, so part of the household income will have to be used for that purpose. If it is a Chapter 7, your fiance will have no credit for two to five years, so buying a house will be almost impossible if you need to rely on their credit to purchase, and buying a car or household things on time will be either very difficult or the interest rates will be in the 20 percent plus range. You should also know what the reasons are for why a bankruptcy is being filed to make sure you are satisfied the actions which caused this filing will not be repeated in the future.

Your fiance's bankruptcy filing will have no affect on you unless you are a co-signor on any of those debts. You will have difficulty in obtaining credit in both of your names going forward (i.e. mortgage or car loan) but depending on the status of your fiance's credit before the filing, it may not take very long to re-establish a favorable credit rating.

This will not affect you. It is good that filing occurred before the wedding. If she had waited, she would have to file married, not filing jointly, but include your income toward household expenses. This will not affect you or your credit at all.

It will have no affect on you if you do not have debts that are together. Just by virtue of getting married will not affect your finances.

The bankruptcy filing will not affect you. If you are not married, you have no obligations to those debts nor will the bankruptcy filing affect you.

You should expect to wait to get married until the case is concluded. Your fiance's bankruptcy will not affect your credit and is a responsible way to deal with unmanageable debts before getting married. Congratulations on marrying a debt free person.