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Sloppy Mortgage Servicers Prey On Borrowers

By Cathy Moran

banks behaving badly

  Given the way they behave, you’d think mortgage servicers actually flew a pirate flag over their operations. They cash your check for the mortgage payment, then who knows what they do with it and what they credit it to. Outside of bankruptcy, screw ups in handling your payments are a breach of the contract […]

Filed Under: Chapter 13, Real property & mortgages Tagged With: 2017

Bankruptcy Judge – Umpire In A Robe?

By Cathy Moran

bankruptcy judge

The most powerful tool for debtors fixing things is the bankruptcy judge. My friend bankruptcy lawyer Doug Jacobs explains the difference between the bankruptcy chapters available to individuals this way: Chapter 7’s fix things;  Chapter 13’s allow debtors to fix things. Kinda like the difference between grabbing a quick shower and spending a week at the […]

Filed Under: Real property & mortgages

Chapter 13 Discharges HOA Debt

By Cathy Moran

HOA debt discharged

Condo fees that come due after a Chapter 13 bankruptcy is filed are discharged at the conclusion of the case. In a victory for condo owners, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the more expansive Chapter 13 discharge trumped a bankruptcy statute sticking condo owners with the fees. Or really, this is a […]

Filed Under: Chapter 13, Real property & mortgages Tagged With: 2018, HOA

Feds Offer Deferral Option For Home Mortgage Payments

By Cathy Moran

save house

Homeowners with federally backed mortgage loans got a lifeline for payments skipped under COVID 19 home loan forbearance agreements. The feds have mandated that servicers offer deferral as one way to repay those payments that came due while the loan was in forbearance. Deferral results in the missed payments being added to the back end […]

Filed Under: Real property & mortgages

Mortgage Forbearance For Non-government Backed Loans

By Cathy Moran

Covid 19 home loan forbearance

Are you one of the homeowners whose mortgage isn’t eligible for the government’s COVID forbearance protections? Home loans not backed by the federal government are excluded from the protections for borrowers implemented by FHFA . But as much as one third of US home loans are not backed by the federal government. If that includes […]

Filed Under: Real property & mortgages Tagged With: 2020, covid-19, mortgage

Mortgage Payments During California Shelter-in-Place

By Cathy Moran

mortgage in pandemic

Is my house at risk if I have no income due to coronavirus? With economic activity at a dead halt due to COVID-19, California homeowners worry about next month’s mortgage payment.  And the month after that, for as far as the pandemic can see. While it’s early days, and I fully expect broad governmental measures […]

Filed Under: Real property & mortgages Tagged With: 2020, pandemic

Home Mortgage Forbearance: Will It Save Your Home From Pandemic?

By Cathy Moran

mortgage forbearance

Mortgage forbearance for homeowners, shout the headlines.  No need to make a house payment. Borrowers who can’t make this month’s mortgage payment were thrown a lifeline of sorts in the coronavirus rescue package. Only it’s probably not the help you think it is. And the lifeline may be far more fragile than you will need […]

Filed Under: Real property & mortgages Tagged With: 2020, covid-19

Explaining The Increase In Monthly Mortgage Payments On Long Established Loans

By Cathy Moran

mortgage payments jump

Why has my mortgage payment increased so much? That’s the question I’m getting from lots of clients recently. Interest rates are creeping up on variable rate loans, but not dramatically. For most of those asking, it’s because the interest-only period of their home loan has run. Loans promised increased mortgage payments Borrowers forgot that lots […]

Filed Under: Real property & mortgages Tagged With: 2018

The Foreclosure That Was Longer Than War & Peace

By Cathy Moran

foreclosure timeline

How much time til foreclosure? Foreclosure is coming.  Whether by choice or circumstances, you know the bank will take the house. Should you start packing immediately? The way banks are currently operating, the answer is:  not yet, not soon, not for a long time. For one of my clients, the answer to how long was well more than […]

Filed Under: Real property & mortgages, True Stories Tagged With: 2015

The Tax Deduction No One Tells You About

By Cathy Moran

Money on the table

Did you file Chapter 13 to save your house from foreclosure? Making payments to the trustee to catch up on the mortgage? If you haven’t claimed a tax deduction for the bankruptcy plan payments that go to the lender, you’re leaving money on the table. That’s money that fattens Uncle Sam’s coffers at the expense […]

Filed Under: Real property & mortgages, Taxes Tagged With: mortgage interest

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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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