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Debt Collector Threats: Which Ones Are Real?

By Mike Cardoza

debt collector

“What debt collector threats should people be afraid of?” was the question my friend bankruptcy attorney Cathy Moran asked. To which I replied, “Afraid of? Pretty much none of them!” Because they’re mostly all empty threats. You’re not going to jail,   They are not going to come get you, Your credit is not about to […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, Debt Collection Rights Tagged With: 2018

Financial Fundamentals: Credit v. Debit

By Cathy Moran

financial literacy building blocks

Just because it’s plastic, doesn’t mean it’s a credit card. Yet when I ask my clients about their credit card accounts, too many of them proffer their debit card. And the confusion about plastic cards that aren’t credit cards isn’t confined to those in debt. My young adult son struggles with the distinction, too. So, […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights Tagged With: 2017

No Rush To File Bankruptcy

By Cathy Moran

filing bankruptcy

When the virus steals your income, it’s easy to be overwhelmed with unpaid bills and terrifying economic uncertainty. Immediate relief by filing bankruptcy may look appealing. Make it all go away, you say. I’ll never pay this off. But not so fast. With few exceptions, this bankruptcy attorney thinks it’s too early in this pandemic to […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights Tagged With: 2020

Reaffirm Your Car Loan: The Bankruptcy Fight You Hope To Lose

By Cathy Moran

reaffirmation loss

It isn’t often I go into bankruptcy court, hoping to lose. But when the issue is reaffirmation of a car loan, that’s the strategy.  I desperately want the judge to deny approval of my client’s proposed reaffirmation of his car loan. And most of my judges will deliver, from the bench, the pitch I’ve made […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights Tagged With: 2020

You Can Make Debt Collectors Stop

By Cathy Moran

stop debt collectors

You can make debt collectors stop. You don’t have to endure phone calls and threatening letters. In fact, you have a statutory legal right to be free from harassing debt collection.  All it takes is a letter to the collector. We’ll show you how to write that letter and exercise your right. And, if you […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, Debt Collection Rights Tagged With: 2018, collection calls, debt collection, debt collectors

Chapter 13 Bankruptcy Disrupted by Coronavirus

By Cathy Moran

chapter 13 case

Has your Chapter 13 bankruptcy case been turned upside down by coronavirus? You are not alone. And attorneys, trustees and judges are all working on adaptations and adjustments that will save pending cases. Practices and procedures in Chapter 13 vary widely around the country.  What follows is what I see here in the Bay Area […]

Filed Under: Chapter 13, Consumer Rights Tagged With: 2020, covid-19

If You Can’t Make Your Car Payment During The Virus Shutdown

By Cathy Moran

car payments coronavirus

  How am I going to keep my wheels while the coronavirus looms? The fight against the coronavirus has cut off income for millions.  While there’s been broad discussion about mortgages and student loans,  there’s less discussion about rent. So far, I’ve heard no governmental discussion about how to proceed if you can’t make car […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights Tagged With: 2020

Free Bankruptcy Advice: Consider The Source

By Cathy Moran

Who gets their legal advice from their adversary? My client did. Get your legal advice from your adversary, your brother in law, or the internet and be prepared to get a surprise.  Often, not a pleasant surprise. My client insisted that his tenant’s debt to him survived the tenant’s bankruptcy “because it was listed on Schedule […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, True Stories

Incorporating Your Business Has Surprise Benefit

By Cathy Moran

incorporation protects

Incorporate to protect yourself from the debts of your  business, shriek the ads. That’s the theory of incorporation for business:  create a separate legal entity in the form of the corporation. Let that entity incur debt and expose itself to other risks.  If it fails, the personal holdings of the owners of the corporation are […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, Small business

Old Tax Liability Discharged In Bankruptcy, If….

By Cathy Moran

Discharging tax debt in bankruptcy gets lots of families out of a horrible hole. Tax debt can be large and swelled beyond the tax by interest and penalties.   Collection on old tax debt often compromises the ability to stay current on more recent years. Bankruptcy can save their bacon because taxes found on returns […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, Taxes, True Stories

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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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