Follow Advice For A Smooth Chapter 7
If you want a chapter 7 bankruptcy case to go smoothly, then you want to follow all of the advice of your attorney. This advice starts with being open and honest regarding your financial situation. Your attorney is going to want to know everything that you have in terms of property, assets, liabilities, and debt. Your attorney is going to want you to disclose whether or not you have given away or sold anything in the last year to a family member or two years to anybody else. Your attorney is going to want to make sure that all of your assets are protectable under Illinois exemption laws. If for some reason your property is not going to be fully protected, then the attorney is going to give you advice on either chapter 13 or other ways to protect your property in the future.
Documents To Provide
Chapter 7 bankruptcy also involves providing all the necessary pre-filing requirements to your attorney. These include the one hour credit counseling session which must be completed before a bankruptcy case is filed. This also includes providing two months’ worth of pay advices or other proof of income. This also includes providing your most recent federal tax return. It also involves taking the two-hour financial management class after your bankruptcy case is filed, but before it is discharged.
If you provide all the necessary documents to your attorney and if you make it to your 341 meeting of creditors as scheduled, then you likely will have a smooth chapter 7 bankruptcy. If, however, you failed to provide the necessary documentation or you failed to be honest in your production of information to your attorney, then you may have a difficult time. My suggestion is that you follow the good practices and advice of your experienced, bankruptcy lawyer. Your lawyer is going to know what to do on your particular case scenario. Do not take it into your own hands believing that you cannot say certain things to your attorney regarding your assets and liabilities. The worst thing that happen is you can you lose property or property that you transferred can be recovered by the chapter 7 trustee. If you are open and honest with your attorney, you should not have any problems and your chapter 7 should complete with ease.
Problematic Activity Prior To Filing
If you failed to disclose assets or if you do other things in anticipation of filing chapter 7 bankruptcy, you may run into problems with the US trustee, the chapter 7 panel trustee and potentially creditors. If you use your credit cards within 60 days prior to filing bankruptcy, the creditor may bring an adversarial complaint in an attempt to hold that debt nondischargeable. The best advice under those circumstances is to not use your cards at all within 90 days of filing a bankruptcy. If you do so, you run the risk that you are going to be facing a separate lawsuit inside the bankruptcy court which will definitely hold up your fresh start.
For more information and advice on how to have a smooth chapter 7 bankruptcy filing, contact my office at 847-520-8100. You will receive a complimentary copy of the book chapter 7 success which I wrote to benefit my clients.
