Head Of Household Affidavit And Wage Garnishment
Creditors cannot garnish wages of a debtor who is head of household in Florida. I am occasionally asked, as I was this week, whether someone who is facing a possible judgment from a court proceeding needs to file in the same court an affidavit that he his head of household in order to claim the exemption. The answer is "no." The law does not require such affidavit, and moreover, filing a affidavit will not suffice to protect wages from attempted garnishment.
Head of household status is usually asserted after a judgment creditor has served a writ of wage garnishment on your employer. When a debtor receives notice of a garnishment the debtor can assert on the garnishment form his head of household exemption and file the claim of exemption with the court. The law directs courts to hold immediate hearings on the exemption claim so that protected debtors are not unreasonably inconvenienced.
Rather than file an affidavit in advance of garnishment I sometimes advise debtors who have had a judgment entered against them to take affirmative steps to notify the judgment creditor of the debtor's garnishment exemptions before the creditor obtains and serves a writ. The debtor should provide the creditor supporting evidence of his exemption. In the case of head of household, the debtor could provide pay stubs of the debtor and his dependants. Most debtors will not attempt garnishment if they believe the debtor's wages are exempt for fear of a wrongful garnishment action by the debtor.
posted by Jonathan Alper, asset protection and bankruptcy attorney, Orlando, Florida
hi i am head of household i payed a bill collector for six years ou t of my bank account and he stop taken it out and after a couple of phone calls to see why they stop they never answer the phone the next thing i knew another collection was calling me as well
and finally i got the one that was taking my money and i hooked them up on the phone together and the first told me they will close my case for good and the second one started
calling and cursing me and my family and i told them that i was recording them because then i knew it was a scam and i never heard from them any more. and know the one i was paying all those years are starting back over and want to collect from the beginning all over and tried to garnish my wages but i have a child and i make less than 500.00 a week and i am head of household so i filed for a motion of exemption of the fla law waiting for the judge to dissolved the case i do have faith will this close my case against those scamers
My husband is filing chapter 7 and has a judgement from a creditor. I own my own business and my husband is just a signer on my account in case something should happen to me the bills for the business can be paid. My husband is not in any way part of my business. The creditor froze my business account and now I can't pay bills or pay my sub contractors. How do I get the money back. Do I need to file papers with the court stating that this is my company and my corporate account? And could this creditor have known this was my account?
I have been served with a "Plaintiff's Motion For Final Judgement in Garnishment and Order directing Garnishee to Disburse Funds on Confession of Garnishee" notice.
This is on a 11-year debt that I had tried and tried to pay off by providing the creditor with pre-issued checks to be presented each month as payment of the debt. After the third set of checks, each set at 6 month periods, the creditor did not notify me that a new set of checks were due. To this day, I still don't know what the original debt amount was, only that I've paid $60.00 per month for a year and a half. I lost my job on Feb. 26th of this year and am struggling to even make ends come close. My car note is 2 months behind and I'm probably going to have to surrender that back to the bank, and my rent is a month past due. I've lost my phone and, at my age (well over 50) can not find a job... not even part time. I downloaded a "claim of exemption" but none of the questions really apply to my situation. I am not getting unemployment because of the nature of the work I'd been doing (for 15 years!). I am single with no dependants and no job. HOw do I file for a Claim of Exemption? The debtor already took the last $700.00 dollars out of my account which is being held in this case. Can you please tell me, am I able to have them put this back? I'm exhausted and hopeless. If you can help me, I'd really appreciate it. Thank you.
I am a divorced and have full custody over my two children. My ex wife claims them as dependents until they reach the ages of 5 and 6. She lives in Ny, also pays child support and allimony to me. I live in the state of Florida and my question is> Am I considered Head of Household even that me and my children live on the money that is given by my ex wife? I am the only adult in my household and are unable to work becuase my children are so young.
Florida debtors need to be aware that for those who have employers with a presence in another state, if that other state allows garnishment then creditors are known to take a judgment from a state where garnishment is difficult or impossible (like Florida) and record it under the UEFJA in a state where it is freely available, then garnish through that distant state's courts, thereby circumventing the debtor's state's protections. It is known to be a very difficult problem for a debtor to resolve.
I received a garnishment and my check is being garnished. I live in the state of Florida. I filed a Head of Household Exemption. I just received in the mail an Affidavit in Opposition to Head of Household Affidavit by the Plaintiff. The document states Plaintiff has no knowledge that the Defendant is Head of Household and that it is necessary for Plaintiff to depose the Defendant. What does this mean exactly and what can I expect after this?
how and where can i get the claim of exemption form
Ok, so I won my claim of exemption, now what? My bank account is still frozen. Do I need to file anything else? After there was no more comments from the plaintiff side and it was declared that I won the exemption the judge stated ok get the papers going on that. He directed his comment to the plaintiff or so I thought.
How do you go about filing an affidavit?
i won my hearing and my exemption affidavit stands. how long does it take to get back my money? Is there more papers i habe to file? thanks carole kennedy
I am head of household, married with custody of my 17 year old son. My wife is not his legal guardian. She is his setp-mother.I have been served with a writ of garnishment. I get paid bi-weekly, a little over $500 a week. What must I do to avoid wage garnishment under the head of household exemption?
I live in the state of Florida and wanted to know how I would be able to get out of a car loan. I was a co-signer 4 years ago on it and a guy quit making payments last january. So now there is 37k dollar credit debt and the collectors want there money. What steps do I take to wipe this loan amount off of my credit report?
My bank acct was garnished $3500 from a debt collector. I no longer live in florida, and i didnt receive any notificaton that my wages were being garnished. I am head of household, and i make more than $500/wk, so im wondering if i qualify for exemption, and how do i go about getting my money back.
I lost my job two years ago, out of work for 5 months and found a job making approx. half of what I made from my previous job. I have several credit accounts that I just could not pay, with one getting a final judgment against me last summer, and yesterday I was served with deposition papers. Why would they do this, I responded to the court in a letter on the judgment my story and that I am a single mother, head of household, so what purpose does this depo serve? They are asking for my bank accounts, pay stubs, tax returns, etc.
I am a singel mom raising 2 teenagers...I was recently served with a student loan garnishment. I had been out of work for a year and returned to the job market 16 months ago. Since then I have been working on saving my home from foreclosure. Now I get served with this garnishment and could cost me my job. I know the law protects me from my employer taking any adverse action. However my employer sees it as a disfunctional characteristic since my position is in management What can I do? I can not risk the embarrassment and loss of job. I would like the creditor to work with me instead.
my husgand and i live in the state of fla. he had a wage garnishment on him from a creditor that bought our credit card from the bank, after bank wrote off. we filed a head of household exm. showing his paystub which is less than 500 week and also that he has two children under 18, they cam back with we did not show head of household justification , they need proof of children ages, and other income provided in household. my question is do we have to show that i his wife works and my income it is also under 500 a week. does fla statue state that my income must be shown in filing head of household? i can not find the answer in statues
thank you bonnie bass
John - March 15th. 2010
I'm the plaintiff and just received judgment in my favor on my "opposition to the claim of exemption" filed on the defendants bank account being levied . She was claiming that the full amount is from SSI. Can someone tell me what happens next? And do I have to file anything.
my wages are been garnished and I was not served with a writ I am below poverty level my annual salary is 15.000 a year can they do that what can I do to stop this since sometimes my weekly check is only 200.00
My husband and I recently received a Complaint from Ford Motor Credit for a deficiency balance on a vechicle we had to return last year due to my husband's loss of job. If the Judgment is entered and they are awarded any amount of money we will lose our home. We have spoken to an attorney who asked me to type up a Motion to Dismiss and send it to him and he would contact me back. I sent an Answer and Motion to Dismiss back to him over a week ago and have not heard from him yet. Our 20 days are up next week.
We have also been told that we do not qualify for Chapter 7 because of our income. Does that mean we wouldn't qualify for the Head of Household exemption? My husband is the primary income for our family but he makes more than $500 a week which is what I have been reading in the posts. Any suggestions?
If we had the money, we would not have voluntarily surrendered the vehicle!
my husband is self-employed making a month 1800 after tax ( we have a cleaning business together) and I work as rental agent I make 7.96 a hour plus bonus so I make a month between 3000 to 6000 a month ( depend on the month), I have a law suit against me, they are trying to garnish my paycheck, but I provide more them my husband for our family(one 3 years old child), my question is who is the head of the house hold? if the business is our and I work at a rental car company fulltime making commission?
Can I go against them, saying I am the head for my house hold ?
do I qualify ? I don't know if I make more them 500 a week or not now? because is base on commission too, but the business is in my name and my husband do the cleaning on my tax I send him a 1099 form
I desperate need help advise
thanks
Lilian