What Can You Put in Bankruptcy? Discharge Rules and Exceptions

Every debt you owe has to go into a bankruptcy filing — credit cards, medical bills, mortgages, car loans, tax debts, student loans, court judgments, even debts you intend to keep paying. That’s the answer to what debts you can include in bankruptcy: all of them, without exception. The real question is which of those debts the court will discharge (permanently eliminate) and which will survive your case. Most unsecured consumer debts get wiped out. A specific set of obligations — child support, recent taxes, most student loans, and a handful of others — will still be there when your case closes.

Listing Every Debt Is Required

Federal law requires a complete accounting of your financial obligations as of your filing date. Unsecured debts like credit cards, medical bills, and personal loans go on Schedule E/F.¹ Secured debts like mortgages and auto loans go on Schedule D, along with the value of the property backing each loan.² You sign these schedules under penalty of perjury.

Leaving a debt off can mean it doesn’t get discharged, so you still owe the full balance after the case closes. Omissions can also raise questions about whether you’re filing in good faith, which puts your entire case at risk.

Unsecured Consumer Debts Get Wiped Out

Unsecured debts — those not tied to any property — are what bankruptcy is best at eliminating. In a Chapter 7 case, they’re discharged entirely when the case ends. In a Chapter 13 case, you pay part of them through a three-to-five-year plan, and whatever’s left is discharged at the end.³ The common categories:

Credit card balances, which are the single most common debt in consumer filings.
Medical bills, treated as general unsecured claims no matter the amount.
Personal loans and payday loans, dischargeable regardless of rate or terms.
Past-due utility bills, so you can restore or keep service after filing.
Old service contracts like gym memberships and cell phone agreements.

Once these debts are discharged, the creditor is permanently barred from trying to collect. Contacting you, billing you, or suing on a discharged debt exposes the creditor to contempt sanctions.⁴ These claims sit at a lower priority than obligations like taxes and child support, so they’re the first to be eliminated when your assets can’t cover everything.⁵

Secured Debts: Mortgages and Car Loans

Debts backed by property need a different approach. You list the creditor on Schedule D with the property’s market value and the balance owed.² Within 30 days of filing a Chapter 7 case, you also file a Statement of Intention telling the court what you plan to do with each secured asset.⁶ Three options exist:

Reaffirm the debt by signing a new agreement that keeps the loan alive. You keep the property but stay personally liable. You can cancel a reaffirmation within 60 days of filing it, and if you weren’t represented by an attorney, the court must approve it.⁴
Surrender the property to the creditor. If it sells for less than what you owed, the shortfall becomes unsecured and gets discharged.
Redeem the property by paying the creditor its current market value in a single lump sum, which may be less than the loan balance.

Modifying Secured Debts in Chapter 13

Chapter 13 gives you more room to work with secured loans. A repayment plan can modify the terms of most secured debts, including reducing a car loan balance to the vehicle’s current market value (a “cramdown”) and stretching payments over the plan.⁷ The big exception is a mortgage secured only by your primary residence, which can’t be modified. You can still cure missed mortgage payments through the plan to stop a foreclosure.

One catch on vehicles: if you bought the car within 910 days (roughly two and a half years) before filing Chapter 13, you can’t cram down the loan to the car’s current value. You have to pay the full loan through the plan. Cars owned longer than 910 days, and loans not used to purchase the vehicle (like a title loan), aren’t subject to the restriction.

When Tax Debts Can Be Discharged

Income tax debts get listed like any other debt, and they can be discharged, but only if they clear a set of timing rules. All three of these have to be satisfied:⁸⁵

Three-year rule: the return was originally due at least three years before you filed, counting any extensions.
Two-year rule: you actually filed the return at least two years before your bankruptcy. A late return starts the clock from when you filed, not when it was due.
240-day rule: the tax was officially assessed at least 240 days before you filed.

Miss any one of those windows and the tax survives the bankruptcy. Taxes tied to a fraudulent return or willful evasion are never dischargeable regardless of timing.⁸

Trust fund taxes are a separate category. If you ran a business and didn’t turn over payroll taxes withheld from employees, the IRS can pursue you personally through the Trust Fund Recovery Penalty, and bankruptcy doesn’t touch it.⁹ Sales taxes you collected from customers but didn’t remit work the same way.

Student Loans Are Listed but Rarely Discharged

Federal and private student loans both go into your schedules, but both are presumed non-dischargeable. To eliminate one, you have to file a separate adversary proceeding inside your bankruptcy case and prove that repayment would cause undue hardship on you and your dependents.⁸

Most courts apply the Brunner test, which asks you to show all three of the following:

You can’t maintain a minimal standard of living for yourself and your dependents while repaying the loan.
Your financial situation is likely to persist for a significant portion of the repayment period.
You’ve made good-faith efforts to repay the loan.

Some courts use a broader “totality of the circumstances” approach that considers your whole financial picture without demanding all three prongs. For federal loans, a 2022 Department of Justice framework lets government attorneys agree to discharge based on a borrower attestation form, which can shortcut the process when the facts support it.¹⁰ It applies only to federal loans where the DOJ represents the lender.

Lawsuits and Court Judgments

Active lawsuits and existing judgments against you have to be listed. Filing triggers the automatic stay, which pauses litigation and stops enforcement while your case is open.¹¹

Whether the judgment itself gets discharged depends on what it was for. Breach of contract, ordinary negligence, and unpaid-bill judgments are unsecured claims and can be wiped out.³ Judgments tied to certain conduct survive:

Fraud, embezzlement, or theft, where the debt came from your dishonesty or taking someone else’s property.⁸
Willful and malicious injury to a person or their property.⁸

For fraud and intentional-injury debts, the creditor has to actively ask the bankruptcy court to declare the debt non-dischargeable. If no timely objection is filed, the debt can be discharged by default.³

Debts That Survive No Matter What

Some categories can’t be discharged in any bankruptcy chapter. You still list them, and the automatic stay still pauses collection while your case is open, but they’ll be waiting for you when it closes.³ The main ones:

Child support and alimony. Domestic support obligations get the highest priority in bankruptcy and are never dischargeable, including support assigned to a government agency.⁸
DUI-related injury debts. Any debt from causing death or personal injury while driving intoxicated (alcohol, drugs, or other substances) survives.⁸
Government fines and penalties. Criminal fines, traffic tickets, and similar penalties for conduct within three years before filing generally survive.⁸
Retirement plan loans. Amounts owed to a tax-advantaged retirement plan, such as a loan against your 401(k), aren’t dischargeable.
HOA fees that come due after filing. In Chapter 7 these are generally not dischargeable if you keep the property; a completed Chapter 13 case may reach them more broadly.

Property settlement debts from a divorce or separation are non-dischargeable in Chapter 7 but may be dischargeable in Chapter 13, which is one reason some filers choose Chapter 13.³

Recent Luxury Purchases and Cash Advances

Recent credit card activity still gets listed, but the law presumes certain last-minute charges were fraudulent, and fraud debts don’t get discharged. For cases filed in 2026, two lookback windows apply:⁸

Charges to a single creditor totaling more than $900 for luxury goods or services within 90 days before filing are presumed non-dischargeable. Luxury goods are anything not reasonably necessary to support you or your dependents, such as vacations, jewelry, and sporting equipment.
Cash advances from a single creditor totaling more than $1,250 within 70 days before filing are also presumed non-dischargeable.

These are rebuttable presumptions. The creditor has to object, and the court decides, but the burden is on you to show the spending was legitimate. Running up balances or taking cash advances in the months before filing is a risk worth avoiding.

Co-Signers Aren’t Protected by Your Discharge

Your discharge only eliminates your personal obligation. If someone co-signed a loan for you, the creditor can still go after the co-signer for the full balance. That matters most for co-signed car loans, student loans, and personal loans.

Chapter 7 gives co-signers no protection. As soon as your debt is discharged, the creditor can demand full payment from the other signer. Chapter 13 works differently: a co-debtor stay automatically shields your co-signers from collection as long as the co-signed debt is included in your plan and you stay current on plan payments.¹² If the plan doesn’t pay the debt in full or you default, the creditor can ask the court to lift the stay and pursue your co-signer for whatever remains.

1
U.S. Courts. Schedule E/F – Creditors Who Have Unsecured Claims
2
U.S. Courts. Schedule D – Creditors Who Hold Claims Secured by Property
3
United States Courts. Discharge in Bankruptcy – Bankruptcy Basics
4
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 U.S.C. 524 – Effect of Discharge
5
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 U.S.C. 507 – Priorities
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Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 U.S.C. 521 – Debtor’s Duties
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Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 U.S.C. 1322 – Contents of Plan
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Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 U.S.C. 523 – Exceptions to Discharge
9
Internal Revenue Service. Trust Fund Recovery Penalty Overview and Authority
10
U.S. Department of Justice. Student Loan Discharge Guidance
11
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 U.S.C. 362 – Automatic Stay
12
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 U.S.C. 1301 – Stay of Action Against Codebtor