I need help quickly. I was involved in an accident in Missouri where at a light I stopped suddenly but did not hit the car in front of me, about four seconds later I was hit from behind and pushed into the car in front of me. Although the car in front sustained the least damage the driver was histerical and said her neck was hurting and she had been in a prior accident and went off in an ambulance. Now she is sueing both me and the driver who hit me saying that I hit her first and then the third driver pushed me back into her again. I looked at the police report and it doesn't give any analysis of the accident it just stated who said what. Now she has demanded a jury trial and I am worried she may win because it will just be a he said she said. She tried to get a settlement from me a couple years ago for $55,000.00. Her medical bills are $17,000.00 and my insurance only covered $25,000.00at the time (this accident happend when I was 17) . My husband and I are very driven as we came from hardworking families who couldn't afford to just hand us anything so we have worked hard for every penny we have. We are in our early twentys and have a couple years left in our five year plan so we do have about a lot of assets to lose ranging from real estate to 401k. I need to know how to protect my assets so we wont have to start from nothing again. Can our joint bank accounts be levied if they are in both our names and the judgment is only against me? Can I just close the bank accounts in only my name and do something else with the cash. What about our houses or future houses we will purchase if they are taken in joint title? My 401k is only in my name. Is there any way to protect these assets? I asked the lawyer my insurance appointed but he couldn't legally advise me on that.

CaptainRich

I'd do some research into either a standard LLC or a Residential LLC.
I've been told they offer some protection from this kind of thing.

On the other hand, just because you hold assets doesn't change the facts. (And listing them may be ill-advised, too.)

Your next course should be a legal counselor to analyze the situation.

Fr_Chuck

But at this point it is too late, you would have to have set things up or move property before. All they have to do is show where you moved money, or took a name off of an account to hide the money and they can then see about having you charged with fraud for hiding the money.

ScottGem

I find it odd that you have a 5 year plan to build up your assets yet didn't provide adequate proptection for those assets with insurance.

Anyway, aqs Chiuck said its too late to protect most of those assets. The 401K is protected, but real estate and investment assets probably aren't.

Frankly, I think you should be taking the tack of fighting this woman. You should also be suing the driver of the car that hit you to cover you in case she does win. Your insurance company should be handling this for you. Your position is that you stopped for a light and were rear ended. In a rear end collision the last person in line is usually considered at fault.

If its a she said/he said situation, then you have just as much chance of swaying a jury as she has.

ScottGem

PMs shpuld be used only for personal correspondence, please post any followup in the thread.

jamivdb

Are my joint accounts protected and what should I do with my individual accounts? They don't even know about any of the accounts yet, we are still in the discovery process. We flip houses so is it safe for my name to be on the title in the future? Does anyone know a free website where I could lookup how this works in Missouri.

ScottGem

If a judgement is entered against you any account that you have either full or joint ownership is atttachable. If you own property, they could place a lien on it.

Are you telling us you don't have your own atty at this point?

Fr_Chuck

Ok, anything with your name on it, can be at risk. This includes joint bank accounts, houses with your name ( and anyone elses name), and so on.

If you merely at this point take your name off, or move properties in a LLC, they will or could hire private investigators to find that you hid these things, Then the court will take it anyway, and most likely charge you in criminal court ( or at least hold you in contempt of court)

If you flip houses ( even with other partners) if your name is on it, your part is subject to the court.

That is why people keep business in LLC or corporations to protect it.

There is no legal way NOW, to move anything to protect it from a past accident,

If you have a large holdings, why in the world did you only have a max of 25,000 liability for a car accident.
Even 100,000 is not enough any more with some single cars being worth 50,000. I would not drive out of my driveway with less than 300,000

ScottGem

Also if you are flipping houses you should be doing under an LLC or corp. You should have been doing it that way from the beginning

jamivdb

I was only 17 at the time of the accident so at that time I didn't have any assets. I do have a lawyer that my insurance company appointed but when I tried to ask him about what I should do with my accounts he acted like he couldn't legally advise me on what do do with my accounts. I don't have an LLC for flipping because it is just on the side. We have done three so far and didn't make the kind of money they show on tv but it still beats a job. My husband did get him to knod his head that joint accounts should be ok. But from what you all are saying I need to close all my accounts or maybe use all our money to buy a house with just my husbands name on it but in Missouri even if he bought the house I still really own 50% of it. If all else fails could I just give it all to my father? This is a nightmare! I know I have a lot of questions and I really appreciate your help.