Northern California Bankruptcy Lawyer

On The Bankruptcy Soapbox

The Soap Box

List It Or Lose It: Why It’s Critical To Tell All

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bankruptcy disclosure

Transparency is the essential ingredient in bankruptcy. The name of the game is disclosure.

In exchange for full disclosure in your bankruptcy papers of assets , debts, and financial history, you get a discharge.

Do it right, everyone with notice of your case is bound by the discharge.

Disclosure costs you nothing and it insulates you from charges that you’ve has concealed property of value or otherwise been less than candid with the court.

That lack of candor can cost you big time, from the loss of confidence in your filings by judge and trustee; to charges of perjury or criminal fraud; to loss of the discharge.

This is serious stuff.

Pay attention

My questionnaire for clients says repeatedly that you must disclose all of your assets, yet I get back questionnaires showing no clothing (did they come to my office in a barrel?), no bank accounts, no furniture, no car, etc.

Sometimes, the client doesn’t  have the kind of property in question.

But more often, they made assumptions. They assumed that 1) if the account was overdrawn, they didn’t have to list it; 2) if the clothing was worth little, they didn’t have to list it; 3) if the bank had a lien on it, they didn’t have to list it.

The erroneous assumptions go on.

A is for Assumptions

I declined representation in a case this week that promised a five figure retainer in large part because I believed that I could not get the prospective client to take seriously the need to be open and candid with the court.

If you want to keep any asset, tangible or intangible, after the bankruptcy, list it in your schedules.

Throwing away assets

My colleague lawyer Jay Fleischman wrote about the consequences of failing to disclose the right to sue for a violation of consumer law in the bankruptcy schedules.

There’s a sneaky legal doctrine used by lawyers on the other side of your lawsuit:  judicial estoppel.  It boils down to this:

if you said in the bankruptcy schedules that you didn’t have such an asset, you are barred later from claiming you have a legal right that you didn’t list.

It usually doesn’t matter if the omission was innocent or calculating.  The result is too often forfeiture of the claim.

List everything

That way, you also get to keep the discharge, the real prize in this exercise.

More

What’s included in bankruptcy

Find what’s missing from your schedules

What to do if you missed something

High Income Earners Pass Bankruptcy’s Means Test

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means test

ALERT:   Being over the median income is not an automatic bar to filing bankruptcy

I’m so used to railing against deliberate campaigns of misinformation about bankruptcy that I forget that there’s a lot of innocent ignorance out there.

Start with “qualifying” for bankruptcy.

A very earnest and ethical financial counselor was telling me about a client of hers trying to find the right moment in time to file bankruptcy.

She was targeting the point in time after the job loss, but before the new business got established.  After the severance pay ran out and before the child left for college.

Yet the story involved a home with a mortgage and tax debts.

I couldn’t get my head around why, on those facts, the means test was a bar to filing a Chapter 7.

Til something she said tipped me off.  She thought the means test barred families with incomes over the median from Chapter 7.

Wrong, wrong,  WRONG. [Read more…]

$7000 Off The Price Of The Car In Chapter 13

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When the client finally got me a copy of the car finance contract, it saved them $7000 on the price of the car.

They’d tried just giving me the monthly statement.

But that statement on the car loan didn’t show the bombshell that I found when I finally examined the contract:

Included in the loan for the new car was the unpaid balance on their old trade in!

In bankruptcy-speak, that’s negative equity, and negative equity isn’t entitled to payment in full in Chapter 13.

So in our Chapter 13 plan, we can reduce what they  pay for the car by the $7000 of the loan that paid off the trade-in.  It really was worth the effort to find the contract.

Sleuthing in bankruptcy

I know, the amount of paper a diligent bankruptcy lawyer wants from you is daunting.

There’s loan documents, deeds, IRA statements, bank balances, insurance policies, pay stubs, and tax returns.

It can seem overwhelming and sometimes pointless.  I get it.

Some of what we’re gathering is defensive:  to show that the information in your bankruptcy schedules is correct.  After all, disclosure is the price of getting a bankruptcy discharge.

But some of the paper we need supports our offense:  having found the portion of the car loan that related to the trade in rather than the new car, we can slice $7000 off of the debt.

Same thing about getting payroll tax returns.  Not everything a small-business employer owes the IRS is a must-pay.  But we’ve got to get the right paper to figure that out.

Just believe that we are asking for documents for a real reason.  Like reducing the loan by $7000.

Car loans in bankruptcy

The auto side of this story is worth the telling, too.  The ability to manipulate car loans is one of the appealing features of Chapter 13.

Only purchase-money:  After the 2005 bankruptcy amendments, car lenders got a windfall on cars purchased in the three years, more or less, before the bankruptcy.  “Reform” entitled car lenders to more than their collateral was worth. (The lenders had a bigger lobbying budget than consumers when the law was passed).

But the 9th Circuit judges have held that the negative-equity part of a car finance transaction isn’t part of the purchase money loan.  Thus we can strip out the  payoff of the trade-in from the loan balance that must be paid.

Likewise, a debtor can reject gap insurance, maintenance contracts and other add-ons that aren’t part of the value of the car itself.

Interest rate changes:  Regardless of when a car loan was made, Chapter 13 can alter the interest rate that the lender gets on the loan through Chapter 13.  So the 10-15% car loan may pay something closer to 4-5% under the Chapter 13 plan.

Term extended:  A Chapter 13 plan can extend the remaining term of a car loan to match the length of the bankruptcy case.  Spread over more months, the monthly bite of a car loan in your budget can be reduced.

And that’s just a part of the reason that I love Chapter 13.

More

Car loans in Chapter 7

Expert tips on buying a car

Speak fluent bankruptcy

 

What Debts Were Discharged In My Bankruptcy?

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After your bankruptcy, one of the hardest questions is figuring out just which debts were discharged.

Eliminating debts was the whole point of filing bankruptcy. You’ve got a court order, but no list.

You and your creditors understandably  expect to find a single document telling them what debts are no longer enforceable and which survive the bankruptcy.

No such luck.

Bankruptcy discharge order

The official form used by most bankruptcy courts merely states that the debtor is granted a discharge. The general information on the second page of the form suggests that you might need an attorney to understand the application of the discharge in a particular case.

That’s because, while the bankruptcy schedules require you to list all of your debts, not all of your debts are dischargeable.

Some debts automatically survive the bankruptcy filing.  Survivors include family support, recent taxes, and criminal restitution.

Debts a creditor can challenge

Other debts may be non dischargeable if the creditor challenges the dischargeability of its debt and wins at trial.

Student loans may be discharged only if the person filing bankruptcy brings an adversary proceeding to establish that repayment creates an undue hardship.

And then, liens generally survive as a charge on the debtor’s property but not a personal liability.

So, it’s complicated.

And the court doesn’t work out all the intricacies before issuing the discharge order.

Who was included in bankruptcy

The basic rule about discharging debts provides that debts are discharged unless there is a statutory exception to discharge listed in the Bankruptcy Code.

The concept of due process (and a provision of the Bankruptcy Code) says creditors get their debt discharged only if they get notice of the bankruptcy.

That’s why saving your bankruptcy papers is so on point.  The schedules and the mailing matrix in your case (and any amendments to them) show who was listed in your case.

Listed creditors are most likely discharged.

Californians get broader discharge

In California, where 9th Circuit decisions are controlling, the Beezley opinion (994 F.2d 1433 1993) tells us that even a creditor who wasn’t listed is discharged in a no asset bankruptcy.

The caveat is that if the creditor has a claim to non dischargeability because of the debtor’s bad acts, the claim survives until the creditor has a chance to challenge the discharge of his debt.

Beezley stands for the proposition that even creditors not listed are discharged in a no asset case.

If everything you owned when you filed bankruptcy was exempt or not worth the trustee’s time to administer, you don’t need to amend your bankruptcy schedules to add creditors that you forgot when you filed.  If there are no assets, they didn’t miss anything financial by being omitted.

Other circuits have similar case law, too.

When creditors call after bankruptcy

In this era of debt buyers and zombie debt, most debtors can expect to get a collection letter on a debt that was discharged in their bankruptcy.

Usually what it takes to make a zombie debt collector go away is a copy of the discharge order and a copy of the schedules showing that the original creditor was listed in the bankruptcy.

A creditor who sold off bad debt can’t give the buyer anything more than the seller had;  in this case, the creditor had an unenforceable debt.

So, save your bankruptcy documents. If giving the collector a copy of the schedules doesn’t make the creditor go away, contact a bankruptcy lawyer.

The bankruptcy court stands ready to sanction creditors who blow off the discharge order.

Enforcing the discharge

Can discharged debt come back

Maximize your bankruptcy discharge

Chapter 13: Know Who Gets Paid First Under Your Plan

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The financial road isn't always smooth

Reality exists outside of television shows.

And when real-world reality hits some debtors, it’s a trainwreck.

It comes up for me when Chapter 13 clients and I sit down to write the plan for the case.

The plan will set out which classes of creditors get paid over the five year life of the plan.

Too often, my ever-optimistic client wants to keep all of his assets with secured debts AND pay off the must-pay back support or non dishchargeable taxes.

The Problem

Secured debts are things like car loans, home mortgages , and property taxes.

If you don’t pay a secured debt, the creditor has the right to take the asset that is the collateral.

More on secured debts in bankruptcy

In Chapter 13, you get a choice on secured debts:  you can cure any back payments through the Chapter 13 plan or you can surrender the asset.

If you surrender the collateral, you owe neither the back payments nor the payments that come due after you file bankruptcy.

Priority claims in a Chapter 13 must be paid in full over the life of the plan to get the discharge.

The debtor gets no choice.  Priority claims are usually income taxes and family support.

The zinger is that the Chapter 13 trustee generally pays the secured claims first.

Over optimism

So here’s the dilemma.  It’s hard to decide to give up houses and cars.  You’ve usually got some part of yourself invested in the choice.

Even if the car is a gas guzzler or the house burdened with a bad loan or too little value, it’s tempting to assume you can gut it out. Make up the back payments over five years and have something at the end.

When the collateral is a toy, a boat or bike, or a rental home, you spin yourself messages of entitlement or future appreciation.

You commit in your plan to pay both the secured claims and the priority claims within the five year limit of a chapter 13 plan.

You look at your budget and it works, barely.  You can project enough money to do it all within five years.

Hit a bump

But then, mid plan, life intervenes.  Your work hours are reduced.  The car breaks down.  A family member gets sick.

And all of a sudden, there isn’t enough money to make the plan payments that get you everything.

Worse, what you’ve paid into the plan has gone for things you didn’t have to pay for:  the Harley, the underwater rental, the house that’s too expensive.  The trustee’s order of distribution puts the debts that won’t go away behind the options you chose.

Depending on how significant the loss of income or increased expenses, you may be able to recover.

But maybe not.

Plan for the unexpected

When making choices at the beginning of a Chapter 13, don’t assume that everything in your financial life going forward will be uniformly stable or improving.

Where you will be if there is a major negative event in your life?  Have you taken care of the most important debts first?

Or does the overly optimistic plan you propose have you continuing to live on the financial edge?

Image courtesy of Flickr and  bwats2.

What To Disclose In Bankruptcy Papers

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gecko-wikimedia-cropped.If the headline drew you in, like the Geico gecko, you can complain you’ve been duped.

In bankruptcy, you disclose everything. Period.

Disclosure is the price of the bankruptcy discharge.

Shortchange the system by leaving out inconvenient facts and you risk both the omitted asset and the discharge.

Understand the difference between discharge and dismissal.

A false oath on the bankruptcy papers or transfers intended to conceal assets from creditors are each grounds on which the discharge of all of your debts can be denied, while the trustee recovers and sells the assets.

It’s nasty and comes at a very high price.

Tell the whole truth

The reason for incomplete bankruptcy schedules is seldom an intention to conceal.  It’s the filer’s failure to take disclosure seriously.

People ready to file bankruptcy don’t want to read the questionnaire that prompts them for various kinds of assets they might have. They don’t commit to thinking about how this question might apply to their situation.

Or they assume because an asset has little market value, it’s excluded from the schedules.

Not so. The schedules don’t ask for your significant assets or things you have with value;  they ask that you list what you own.

You would not believe the number of clients whose completed questionnaires tell me they have no clothes.323171462_9528e70afa_z_opt

Yet I’ve never met with a naked client.  They just perform some sort of mental shortcut when we ask about what they own.

Transparent assets

The hardest kind of things for laypeople to “see” as assets are those that are just legal rights, or even, possible legal rights:

  • the worker’s compensation claim,
  • the claim against the landlord,
  • the participation in a class action.

All of those are assets that need to be listed.

Often a trustee will elect not to administer even non exempt assets, because the effort to pursue them is too great compared to the possible return.

But even if the trustee were to administer the claim for the benefit of creditors, the loss to the debtor is usually far less than the value of the discharge of debts  you get  in bankruptcy.

More

What your signature on your bankruptcy papers says about you

Your court appearance in bankruptcy

Who you need to pay after bankruptcy

Image courtesy of Wikimedia and Frank Wouters.

Woman without clothes:  Gisela Glardino and Flickr

Debt Limits Increase For Chapter 13 Bankruptcy

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bankruptcy debt limitsNew debt limits for Chapter 13 become effective on April Fool’s Day, 2019.

The new numbers are effective for cases filed April 1, 2019 and will control for the next 3 years.

And those limits are:

Unsecured debt = $ 419,175

Secured debt = $$1,257,850

The current limits effective through March 31, 2019 are

 unsecured debt = $394,725

 secured debt = $1,184,200

In the Bay Area, that will mean more families will be eligible to file Chapter 13.

Why Chapter 13 rocks

Chapter 13 bankruptcy allows individuals to strip off worthless liens, cure home loan defaults, and pay recent taxes over time, without interest.

In Chapter 13, the person filing keeps ownership and control of their assets.  They create a plan to repay creditors, in whole, or more usually, in part from future income.

Why 13 is best

While in 13, they are protected by the automatic stay from collection actions. They have access to the bankruptcy court to enforce that protection.  The bankruptcy judge is also available to resolve disputes about the allowance of claims or mortgage accounting.

Is debt secured or unsecured

The debt limits apply to debts that are liquidated and not contingent.

Secured debts are those for which the creditor has collateral.  The most common secured debts are mortgages, home equity lines of credit, and car loans.

Tax liens and judgment liens also fall into the secured debt pile, but only to the extent that the lien attaches to value in your possessions.

More about secured debts in bankruptcy .

Unsecured debts are those where there is no collateral or where the lien is greater than the available collateral.

In my Bankruptcy Alphabet, U is for Unsecured.

A great recent decision by the 9th Circuit determined that you don’t have to count liens that have passed through a previous bankruptcy as unsecured.

There are no debt limits in Chapter 7 or Chapter 11.

Exemptions expand

The value of items protected by exemptions under the bankruptcy code also increases April 1.

This means little to Californians since the federal bankruptcy exemptions aren’t available in California.

Instead, we have the Code of Civil Procedure 703.140 series of exemptions which mimic the federal exemptions.  The dollar amounts of the §703 exemptions are found here.

The Federal Register published the Bankruptcy Code changes of other dollar amounts found in the Code, such as the cap on priority employee wage claims, preference safe harbors, and luxury goods purchases.

Enjoy the increases. They are with us for another three years.

 Image courtesy of geehall2.

Cut Tax Penalties In Bankruptcy

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Get in tax trouble and the penalties often grow huge.

What starts as a manageable problem can soon tower over you.

Breathe deep;  there is a solution.

Chapter 13 bankruptcy can cut tax penalties down to size.

All tax penalties discharged in 13

Old or new, large or small, Chapter 13 discharges all unsecured tax penalties.

In contrast, Chapter 7 discharges some tax penalties.

 Discharged are penalties for taxes that are themselves dischargeable.

Also dischargeable in Chapter 7 are penalties where the transaction or event that triggered the tax occurred more than three years before filing, whether or not the tax itself is dischargeable.  523(a)(7)(B).

That’s good, but if you are eligible, Chapter 13 is better.  All penalties are discharged.

Who can file Chapter 13

Chapter 13 is available to individuals (no corporations or LLC’s), with regular income, whose debts total less than the caps for secured and unsecured claims.

You know if you are a real person and whether you have regular income, so the thing that needs analysis is the allocation of your debts between those that are unsecured (the creditor has no lien on your assets) versus the debts for which there is a lien.

To be a secured claim in bankruptcy, that lien has to attach to an asset that has market value greater than any liens senior to it.

Tax liens don’t go to the head of the line just because they are debts owed to the government.  They fall in line behind any other lien holder who perfected their lien before.

Recent taxes must be paid

Chapter 13 plans are written by the person who has filed the bankruptcy case.  The Bankruptcy Code requires, however, that recent income taxes be paid in full through the plan.

Note that it is the TAX and the INTEREST on that tax that have to be paid during the life of the Chapter 13.

Penalties get treated just like personal loans, medical bills, and credit card debt:  what that class of creditors gets in the Chapter 13 is driven by the means test and the best interests of creditors test.   In most Chapter 13 plans, that’s little, or nothing.

Chapter 13 cuts those penalties down to size.

Tax liens whittled down

toothpicks-pixabay_optThe discussion above deals with unsecured taxes and tax penalties.  The rules change when a tax lien is filed.

At its simplest, a Chapter 7 discharge eliminates the IRS’s ability to levy your bank account or garnish your wages for taxes that have been discharged.

However, the Chapter 7 discharge doesn’t alter any tax lien recorded before the bankruptcy, even if the taxes themselves are discharged.

If the tax liability is discharged, any lien in place will not attach to assets you acquire after your bankruptcy is filed.

More about tax liens after bankruptcy

Chapter 13 does alter tax liens.  (See why I’m a fan of 13?)

Chapter 13 treats as a secured claim only that part of a lien that attaches to real value in the taxpayer’s assets.

Put bluntly, if you don’t have any assets, then the lien is worthless and will be voided at the conclusion of your Chapter 13 plan.

Oh, technically,  the tax lien may attach to your household goods, all right.  But those things have very little market value.

Pay the resale value of your pots and pans through the Chapter 13 plan, and the lien is deemed satisfied.

If you can’t cut a deal with the IRS that eliminates the tax penalties as part of an offer in compromise or payment plan, you have bankruptcy options for tax penalties.

More about Chapter 13

Get rid of credit card balances without paying interest

Why Chapter 13 Plans Fail

How Chapter 13 Works

Images courtesy of Pixabay. 

 

Can I Sell Stuff Before I File Bankruptcy

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insect-in-amberThinking about filing bankruptcy?  Need cash?

Folk wisdom supplies many “rules” about the period leading up to actually filing bankruptcy:

  • Don’t sell anything
  • Don’t pay anyone
  • Don’t make any money

This kind of thinking will have you frozen in time and space like this insect in amber.

Only, this folk “wisdom” is all wrong.

Here’s how to sell assets before filing and without messing up your right to a bankruptcy discharge.

Sell stuff for what it’s worth

Bankruptcy law objects if you dispose of assets for less than they are worth.  It’s not the sale that might be objectionable, it’s the price.

When you transfer an asset for less than its real value, there is less for your creditors.  And  Anglo Saxon law since the Statute of Elizabeth in 1571 has prohibited gifts, bargain sales, or sham transfers that have the effect of reducing your assets.

Transfers where you dispose of an asset for less than its fair market value are called fraudulent transfers.

The transfer can be actually fraudulent, where you intended to hide an asset from creditors.  Or, constructively fraudulent.  Those transfers  can be innocent or even benevolent, as when you make a donation to charity.

But, if you got less in return than you gave up, it may be a fraud on creditors.

Fraudulent transfers in bankruptcy

Bankruptcy law frowns on fraudulent transfers.

The bankruptcy trustee is empowered to recover the assets or money transferred within 2 years of the filing from the recipient  if the transfer was fraudulent.

That strips the benefit of the transfer from the transferee.

In many cases, even when a transfer is fraudulent, it isn’t worth the expense to the bankruptcy trustee to recover it.  The benefit to creditors as a group is just too small or too tenuous to make it worthwhile.

But for the debtor in bankruptcy, significant transfers of assets with intent to hinder, delay or defraud creditors constitute a ground to deny an individual a discharge in bankruptcy. 11 USC 7272(2).

Sell for today’s value

You are absolutely free to dispose of assets before your bankruptcy is filed if you get “reasonably equivalent value” in return.  That’s legalese for getting what it’s worth.

Remember, it’s only worth what a buyer will give you for this particular asset, on this day, in this market.

The stuff may be worth far less now than it was when you bought it.  It may be that the market is glutted or the thing is obsolete, worn, or out of fashion.

If you get about what the market says it’s worth, you’re OK.

If you are selling on the eve of bankruptcy, just make sure that you expose the asset to the market.  That may be Craig’s List;  e Bay; Auto Trader or like marketplaces.  Even a garage sale will do.

Keep a record of the steps you took in your sales campaign.

Disclose the transfer in the bankruptcy schedules and the Statement of Financial Affairs.

And if it genuinely doesn’t have any market value, you’re free to donate it or junk it.

More

What not to do before bankruptcy

Image licensed by Anders L. Damgaard  under Creative Commons license 3.0.

What’s Included In Bankruptcy?

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Bankruptcy is a snapshot of your situation on the day the bankruptcy case is filed.

Think of your bankruptcy like the Clampett’s Buick,  arriving in Beverly Hills, crating all their stuff.

For bankruptcy purposes, your case includes your financial “stuff”,  debts and  assets.

  • The debts that are included in the case are those existing on the day you file.
  • The assets that are included are the things you owned when you filed bankruptcy.

The bankruptcy filing draws a line between your pre bankrutpcy life and your life after bankruptcy.

With a couple of exceptions, whatever you earn after the date you file bankruptcy is not included in your bankruptcy.

Likewise, if you cause an accident or incur a debt after your case is begun, those debts will not be discharged in your bankruptcy case.  They weren’t in the snapshot of your situation when you filed your case.

The exceptions

The Bankruptcy Code has three exceptions to the rule that the bankruptcy estate is made up of what you owned when you filed.

They are

  • Assets acquired by inheritance, bequest or devise
  • Life insurance proceeds by reason of someone’s death
  • Assets acquired by a marital property settlement or judgment

If you acquire the right to any of these kinds of assets within 6 months of the commencement of the case, they are treated as if you had them when your case began.  The debtor has an obligation to report such acquisitions to the trustee.

Creditors not debt balances

Bankruptcy acts on the debtor/creditor relationship.  That’s why listing all those who have claims against you is so important in getting your bankruptcy schedules right.

It isn’t generally important to list exactly what you owe a creditor in your schedules.  The bankruptcy discharge will wipe out whatever it is you owe on a dischargeable debt.

Remember, you can list and discharge debts where you dispute your liability, so long as you give the creditor notice of your case.

Chapter  13

If your bankruptcy case is a Chapter 13, the rules are a lot less clear.

One part of the law says the rights of creditors to repayment are determined by the property you have at filing; another part of the bankruptcy code says that your earning during the case are property of the estate.

While lawyers can spend lots of time parsing the law, for the debtor in 13, the rule that is clear is that dramatic changes in your income may trigger a change to your plan payments.

Elusive assets

The biggest trouble debtors have in listing their assets in the bankruptcy schedules involves intangible assets, like the right to sue for an accident that has already happened, or a claim in a class action.

Tragic consequences of filing bankruptcy without listing her mother’s house

Even though it’s not known at filing whether you will win such a claim, and if you win, how much you will get, the claim is still an asset you own.  It has to be listed or you may lose it because you didn’t disclose it.

New day

So your fresh start really begins on the day you file your bankruptcy, not when you get the discharge.  Every dollar you now earn is yours.

Image courtesy of prewarbuick.com.

 

643 Bair Island Road
Suite 403
Redwood City, CA 94063
Phone: (650) 694-4700

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