Bankruptcy

GreenHills101

Hi, hoping someone can shed some light on this.

My BF went bankrupt this summer, if we decide to live together / get married how would this impact repayments?

As a single person you are allowed living expenses of approximately 1k per month, does that decrease to 500 if we move in together?

GreenHills101

Sorry more questions , the guidelines allow for car but we require 2 cars as we work different locations.

Would I be required to submit details of my income or do they just make the split

Peregrinus

It actually doesn't matter whether the household has one car, two cars or no cars. The calculation of reasonable living expenses looks at whether the household needs a car, not whether it has one (or more than one). In deciding whether a car is needed, they'll look at whether the debtor lives in an urban or rural area, whether there are "adequate public transport links", whether the debtor needs a car to get to work. They will pay no attention to whether the non-debtor needs a car (or a second car, if they accept that one is needed); the non-debtor, not being a bankrupt, can pay for his or her own car.

Assuming there are no kids, if you live together the ISI will make a calculation of the reasonable living expenses for a household of two adults, with or without a car, depending on whether they think the debtor needs a car. That might come to, let's say, €1,500 a month.

If both are earning, this will be split evenly between the couple - €750 each. So, if your partner is taking home, say, €1,200, his net disposable income will be (€1,200 - €750 €450. The Official Assignee will be looking for most or all of that.

You indicate that currently your partner has his reasonable living expenses assessed at about €1,000 a month. If he moves in with you, his circumstances will change and he needs to have his expenses reassessed. Since the assessment is for the household, and a two-person household costs more to run than a one-person household, his assessed reasonable living expenses will probably go up. But, since you're both working, he will be treated has having to pay only half of them, so he can only offset half of the increased amount against his take-home pay, instead of the whole of it.

The likely end result is that, yes, he'll have to pay more each month to the official assignee. But it's not as bad as simply halving his current assessment for reasonable living expenses.