benefits to husband and wife to filing separate chapter 7 petitions

I am very sorry to hear about all of the troubles that you have been having. You can't stop your husband from filing Chapter 13, and in fact if he succeeds in curing the real estate default, you and the kids stand to benefit. His Chapter 13 does not invalidate your Chapter 7, so don't worry about your Chapter 7 relief being vacated.

I hope things get better for you real soon.

You can real all about Chapter 13 by hitting the link below to my Guide.

Yes, couples can file different chapters. If he wants to file a chapter 13 he can, but obviously there could be issues if the household income stated on his bankruptcy were different from yours, but the purpose is to save the house, so I can't imagine why the info would be different. There is no way the house can be saved under a chapter 7, but if you have a limited income as a couple, then I'm not sure that the chapter 13 will help very much either because you need the money to pay into the plan on top of current mortgage payments. But yes, it is possible to file separate chapters. If your husband doesn't live there, I'm not sure what benefit it is for him to file a chapter 13, unless he can afford to make the mortgage payments. If you are in the process of getting divorced, you probably should contact your divorce attorney (if you don't have one you should consult with one IF you are planning to get divorced) about this as well as your bankruptcy attorney.