Filing Chapter 7 Bankruptcy With Real Estate Outside of California
You can file Chapter 7 Bankruptcy in California after residing in California for over 180 days. However, to use the California Exemptions you must have resided in California for at least two years. This means when you file your Chapter 7 Bankruptcy here in California you will be residing here.
Most Homestead Exemptions that protect real estate require that the debtor resides at the property to be protected. So, if you reside in California that means you do not reside at the out of state property you are trying to protect. So, no Homestead Exemption.
You may still be able to file Chapter 7 Bankruptcy in California and protect your out of state real estate but you will have to do it with the Wildcard Exemption. The Wildcard Exemption located at California Code of Civil Procedure §703.140(b)(1) and (b)(5) allows a debtor to exempt $33,650 (through March 31, 2025, as it will be adjusted) worth of property as the debtor sees fit. If your out of state real estate has equity less than the Wildcard Exemption, then you can use that to protect it. The trouble will be that you will likely not have any of the Wildcard Exemption left to protect other property.
So, if you are filing Chapter 7 bankruptcy in California and you have real estate located outside of California you will need to utilize the Wildcard Exemption and any other property that you have that's not protected by another exemption will be liquidated.