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Loan Modification: The $100,000 Mistake

By Cathy Moran

loan payoff

    The job of a mortgage servicer is to collect loan payments and keep track of what’s owed on the mortgage.  That shouldn’t be too hard. But the evidence is that they don’t do that basic job very well. Throw a loan modification into the mix, and who knows what you’ll get. Accounting for modification […]

Filed Under: Real property & mortgages, True Stories

How Their Telephone Can Ruin Elders

By Cathy Moran

The elderly couple was suddenly in financial trouble. The two mortgages on their home were a couple of months delinquent. Their bank account had just been levied by the state taxing authority. They hadn’t filed tax returns since 2009. From the outside, it didn’t seem like anything had changed.  Yet their financial world was imploding. […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, Managing Money, True Stories

Who Files Bankruptcy In The Face Of Booming Bay Area Economy?

By Cathy Moran

who files bankruptcy

Silicon Valley is booming; our highways are so full of people getting to work that we can’t get to work. Employment is approaching the level of the dot.com bubble.  Property values soar. So who needs bankruptcy in this pocket of prosperity? All kinds of people, it turns out. Let’s look at the people who sought me […]

Filed Under: Featured, True Stories Tagged With: 2016

Drive-in bankruptcy?

By Cathy Moran

We got a call about three o’clock the other afternoon from someone who wanted to come in that afternoon and file bankruptcy that day. When my partner hesitated, the caller responded, “Well , you are open now aren’t you?” I had a mental image of one of those parking lot, drive up coffee vendors, selling […]

Filed Under: How bankruptcy works, True Stories

New Bankruptcy Trends From An Old Hand

By Cathy Moran

bankruptcy trends

I’m seeing a real change in the people seeing me about filing bankruptcy. Used to be, the problem was credit card debt, unemployment, or divorce. A surprising trend over the past six months is developing. I acknowledge the sample size is small.  Statistically, you can challenge the significance, but here are the trends. My office is […]

Filed Under: Featured, True Stories Tagged With: 2017

When Realtors Go Rogue

By Cathy Moran

real estate train wreck

True story from the mortgage meltdown 10 years ago. Usually, I try to be the voice of common sense, conservation of energy, and moving on after a debacle. The client I saw the other day had the warrior side of me overwhelming the lawyer’s logic. The facts: the client, an immigrant carpenter with limited English […]

Filed Under: Featured, True Stories

Spotting The Mean In The Means Test

By Cathy Moran

means test

Just being a consumer is enough to put you on Congress’s bad side when it comes to bankruptcy. How do I know? I read the “reformed” bankruptcy code. Only those individuals whose debts are primarily consumer debts have to prove that they aren’t abusing the bankruptcy laws. The Bankruptcy Code attempts to exclude from its […]

Filed Under: Featured, True Stories Tagged With: 2016

Dead Debts Haunt Home Purchase

By Cathy Moran

Watch for old debts

Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom. It’s also the price of freedom from old debts, as my former bankruptcy client learned. He was about to close escrow on a new home a couple of years after his discharge. But the sale came to a screaming halt when an old, discharged debt reappeared on his […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, Life after bankruptcy, True Stories

Facing Foreclosure? Your Kids Can Cope

By Cathy Moran

I talk with clients about walking away from underwater houses day after day. * The  mortgage payments on their home eat up fifty percent or more of their income. They’re struggling now, and the mortgage will reset soon. Attempts to modify the mortgage are fruitless. They expect a foreclosure notice any day. Yet despite the pain and the […]

Filed Under: Real property & mortgages, True Stories

The Struggle To Surrender Underwater Real Estate

By Cathy Moran

surrendering real propery

How difficult it can be to surrender real property in bankruptcy when you have no hope of paying for it. After all, the lender takes a mortgage on the property so they can take it from you if you don’t pay. My client’s bankruptcy plan said he would make no payments on the rental’s mortgage […]

Filed Under: Featured, Real property & mortgages, True Stories Tagged With: 2016, surrender

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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 on how I think law should work for the consumer and small businesses when it comes to debt.

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

How Bankruptcy Works

Bankruptcy Alphabet: E is for Exemptions

E stands for exemptions in my Bankruptcy Alphabet. Exemptions describe the possessions you get to keep when you file bankruptcy. E could also stand for Exception, since exemptions are the only place in bankruptcy law where the law is explicitly different from state to state. Exemptions vary The Bankruptcy Code … Read more

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