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Last Minute Tax Break For Distressed Homeowners

By Cathy Moran

tax break

  Days before the end of the tax year, the massive tax bill changed the rules retroactively.  And for once, the change benefited individual taxpayers. The tax bill revived, for tax year 2017, the exclusion from income accorded to phantom income upon foreclosure, short sale, or loan modification. The provision that created an exception protecting […]

Filed Under: Featured, Taxes Tagged With: 2018, qualified principal residence debt

IRS Shakedown Happening In Bankruptcy Court

By Cathy Moran

The latest IRS scam is happening in bankruptcy, out in the open. Now usually when I write about IRS scams, I’m talking about genuine bad guys either pretending to be the IRS to hijack your money or pretending to be you to the IRS, to hijack your money. But nobody is pretending in the trick […]

Filed Under: Featured, Taxes, True Stories Tagged With: 2018

Warning: Wells Fargo Can Freeze Your Account

By Cathy Moran

Preparation for filing bankruptcy should include getting your money out of Wells Fargo Bank. Unless, of course, you’re willing to have Wells freeze your money for days or weeks, on its own initiative. Wells says they are “helping” the bankruptcy trustee by denying you access to your money.  Only the bankruptcy trustee didn’t ask for […]

Filed Under: How bankruptcy works

Taxes: Building Block of Financial Literacy

By Cathy Moran

financial literacy building blocks

You’re a first time employee.  Congratulations. Welcome to the world of tax forms, withholding, and tax deadlines.   Taxes are the price we pay for civilization, according to Oliver Wendell Holmes. In fact, the first day on your new job you’ll be presented with an IRS form w-4. It’s like a rite of passage into adulthood. Even families […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, Taxes Tagged With: 2016

Are You Stuck With The Lawyer Who Filed Your Bankruptcy Case?

By Cathy Moran

New lawyer as life saver

Your bankruptcy case is filed.  It’s not going as smoothly as you expected. In fact, you’re worried you’re going under. Can you change bankruptcy lawyers after your case is filed? Certainly, you can always fire your lawyer.  It may be disruptive.  It will certainly cost more money. To decide you need to know So, how […]

Filed Under: How bankruptcy works, You & your lawyer

Your Creditors Lie In Wait For Your Kids

By Cathy Moran

creditor lurks to prey on heirs

Is your legacy to your kids an encounter with your unpaid creditors? Debt problems for those over 65 may not be problems for the elder at all.  Income and assets are largely protected by law from creditors. But that doesn’t trouble creditors:  they’ll simply wait and get their money from your kids. Seniors enjoy protection […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, Strictly California Tagged With: 2016, exemptions

How Your Property Gets Sold In Your Partner’s Bankruptcy

By Cathy Moran

co owned property

It isn’t just marriage that can get you roped in to a bankruptcy case that isn’t your own. Own community property and a bankruptcy filing by your spouse or your soon-to-be ex can drag you into a bankruptcy court. But the issue is broader:  joint ownership of any kind of asset in any state, community […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, Small business

Who’s Afraid Of Bankruptcy’s 90 Day Rule

By Cathy Moran

bankruptcy 90 DAY preference rule

Most folks considering bankruptcy know about the 90 day rule in bankruptcy.  They’ve talked to friends or read on the internet.  When they get to a bankruptcy lawyer’s office, they’re eager to tell me they know about the rule, though sometimes they have questions about just how it works. Which is all very interesting, except that […]

Filed Under: How bankruptcy works

20 Years Of Bankruptcy In Brief

By Cathy Moran

20 years of bankruptcy information

Twenty years ago this month, Soapbox’s parent website, Bankruptcy In Brief, went live with four pages of basic bankruptcy information. My law partner quietly thought writing about law for the internet was off base. My lawyer colleagues thought I was giving away the store. I persisted (which wasn’t then a catch phrase)  because I was […]

Filed Under: Featured Tagged With: 2018

Bankruptcy Alphabet: T is for Tension

By Cathy Moran

T is tension in the bankruptcy system

In my bankruptcy alphabet, T stands for Tension. I’m not talking so much about the tension the person filing bankruptcy feels, though that is real and not to be discounted. I’m talking about the tension in the law that balances the interests of creditors with the interests of debtors. Bankruptcy law in the US recognizes […]

Filed Under: ABC's of bankruptcy, How bankruptcy works

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Bankruptcy Basics

About The Soapbox

You’ve arrived at the Bankruptcy Soapbox, a resource of bankruptcy information and consumer law.

Soapbox is a companion site to Bankruptcy in Brief, where I try to be largely explanatory and even handed (Note I said “try”).

Here, I allow myself to tell stories and express strong opinions. We dig deeper into how to consider bankruptcy and navigate a bankruptcy case.

Moran Law Group
Bankruptcy specialists for individuals and small businesses in the San Francisco Bay Area

How Bankruptcy Works

Cheat Sheet For Passing Bankruptcy Means Test

The bankruptcy means test has a fatal weakness in its attempt to keep people out of bankruptcy. Like so much recently, it's health care. It's health care, in the future, to be paid before your creditors get any money in your bankruptcy. It works because, in a logic that only Congress could employ, the means … Read more

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