Court Is In Chicago If you live in Chicago or any part of Cook County, Illinois and file bankruptcy, then your court date is going to be in downtown Chicago. The court will take place at the Dirksen Federal building which is located at 219 South Dearborn Street in Chicago. The court date is in reality a 341 meeting of creditors. The meeting of creditors is the opportunity for a chapter 7 panel trustee to examine you under oath with regard to the petition and schedules that you filed. The role of the chapter 7 bankruptcy trustee is to make sure that you do not have any assets that can be administered for the benefit of creditors. You are able to protect a certain amount of personal property + Click Here For Read More

Rebuilding after bankruptcy is a process. It starts with not incurring any negative credit after such time you file for bankruptcy. For example, after your bankruptcy case is over, you want to make sure that you do not incur any negative credit items on your credit Bureau. This would include not falling behind on any installment obligations, not incurring any medical debt that goes unpaid, and not incurring any utility bills that do not get paid timely. If you can start paying everything on time, then you will begin to see your credit score increase. Another important thing that you can do once you're bankruptcy case is over, is to obtain a secured credit card. A secured credit card is + Click Here For Read More

This is the case of David Hammons who comes from Skokie, Illinois which is Cook County, Illinois.  He is married to Christine but Christine is going to be a non-filing spouse in this case.  Right off the bat, we are not sure whether this is going to be a Chapter 7 or Chapter 13 so let’s investigate it. David has never filed for bankruptcy before.  He has a single-family home with approximately $380,000.  He is on the first mortgage $320,000 and he is up to date.  So there is approximately $60,000 worth of equity although he is behind on the property tax of approximately $12,000-$15,000 total between the series of several years.  He is not renting from anybody and nobody is renting from + Click Here For Read More

You most certainly can stop bill collectors from calling you once you hire an attorney to handle your debt situation.  Under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, creditors are prohibited from contacting you once they are made aware of the fact that you have representation.  If creditors violate this Act, they can be sued in Federal or State court with attorney’s fees, actual damages and sometimes punitive damages awarded to the Plaintiff.  Two Basic Ways To Notify Creditors There are two ways to notify creditors about the fact that you have representation.  First, you can simply advise them when they call you on the phone that you are filing for bankruptcy, give them your attorney’s + Click Here For Read More

There are several things that you should not do if you are considering filing for bankruptcy under either Chapter 7 or Chapter 13.  One of the things that people do which is a prohibited act is repaying a family member or a friend within a year of filing for bankruptcy.  This is known as a preferential payment and the court can undo that type of payment or repayment. The other thing people do is they borrow from their 401(k) in an effort to repay their creditors only to find that they did not have enough money in their 401(k) to repay all of their creditors and now they have exhausted all of their retirement.  The retirement accounts would have been protected in either a Chapter 13 or a + Click Here For Read More

A Chapter13 bankruptcy can be filed by an individual or a joint case husband and wife.  Chapter13 cannot be filed by a corporation.  In order to file for Chapter 13, an individual must complete several prefiling requirements.  The most important requirement is the taking of a credit counseling session.  The credit counseling session is a one hour session on the computer or over the telephone whereby you talk with a credit counselor in order to receive a certificate enabling you to file for bankruptcy. In addition to the credit counseling requirement, you will have a personal financial management instruction course which must be completed after your cases filed but before it goes to a + Click Here For Read More

Chapter 13 bankruptcy is reorganization through a Chapter 13 trustee.  The reason why many people will file Chapter 13 is to save a home that has gone into foreclosure.  Now, the reason why the home fell into foreclosure could be several; in many cases, someone has lost their job, fallen behind on their bills and now they are back employed.  In other cases, someone has had an illness which caused them to lose work and now they have recovered from illness and are back gainfully employed.  There are other situations such as divorce or straight job loss that can lead someone to fall behind on their bills and be in need of a Chapter 13. The most common form of Chapter 13 or reason for a + Click Here For Read More

You do not have to hire an attorney to file for bankruptcy; however, I would strongly recommend that you do so.  You do have the ability to fill out forms online or from an office supply company, go down to the clerk’s office and attempt to handle a Chapter 7 or Chapter 13 bankruptcy case on your own. The problem with doing so is that the law has gotten very complex, especially since the law changed October 17, 2005.  It used to be that someone with a simple Chapter 7 case could technically do the case themselves with very little in the way of error except for possibly losing property.  Under the current law, there are all kinds of pre-filing requirements that must be satisfied before a + Click Here For Read More

Chapter 13 bankruptcy is one form of bankruptcy under the United States Bankruptcy Code whereby someone reorganizes their debt and pays back either all or a portion of the debt over a 3 to 5 year period.  Chapter 13 is most commonly used to save a home that’s in foreclosure.  In a Chapter 13, a debtor is able to make the regular mortgage payment on time once again and pay the part that they fell behind over the next 3 to 5 years.  The amount that they pay per month is dependent upon their income, their expenses, their assets and their liabilities. In a typical Chapter 13 bankruptcy case, there is a Meeting of Creditors, a confirmation hearing and then an amount that is solid in terms of + Click Here For Read More

Typically student loans are going to be non-dischargeable.  A non-dischargeable debt is a debt that is not going to be eliminated in a bankruptcy case.  Student loans are the type of debt that are typically non-dischargeable except for extreme hardship cases.  In my 21 years of practice, I have never had an extreme hardship case that was winnable before the court.  I did have a case where someone was schizophrenic and did not have the ability to work.  However, we could not prove that the schizophrenia occurred after the bankruptcy case was filed.  The threshold is very difficult and the burden is very difficult as well. The federal government and the private student loan carriers are + Click Here For Read More