The caller with a pending foreclosure sale called and canceled an initial consultation with me last week. He wanted to “think about it” before coming in.
Huh? Think about being homeless? Think about the cost of getting relief through bankruptcy? Think about confronting a dire situation?
It was almost as if gathering information about options and process was an irrevocable step in his mind. A painful step.
Good bankruptcy information is essential
Gathering information about bankruptcy does not commit one to filing.
There is such a lot of bad information out there about bankruptcy, not to mention the information that might have been good once, but is outdated since bankruptcy “reform”.
Reliable information is neutral. It is, itself, painless. What’s painful is the situation, not efforts to deal with the situation.
Clients can make themselves feel as badly about filing bankruptcy as they choose, but the pain is largely self inflicted.
Money and emotions
Money issues come with so much emotional baggage. My pitch to clients is to look at their financial options as purely a business issue.
- can you repay this debt
- what important purchases or savings would be slighted to do so
- what would be at risk in a bankruptcy
So many clients come in, full of bankruptcy myths, misunderstandings, and “research” from which they’ve drawn erroneous conclusions. Several industries deliberately try to make bankruptcy scary or humiliating.
Once we’ve sorted truths from all the other baggage they came with, the situation and the options look much clearer.
What does merit thought
My fear for the guy facing the foreclosure sale was that he might conclude that he was willing to let the property go, and not consider the significant adverse tax consequences that a foreclosure outside of bankruptcy might trigger. He might not know that Chapter 13 could allow him to keep the house and cure the arrears over 5 years. Or sell the house through bankruptcy and realize the equity in the property.
“Thinking about it” without solid information to contemplate is pointless.
More
How to interview a bankruptcy lawyer
Hold or fold in the face of debt
Image courtesy of jcfischer
As Bill Clinton used to say, “I feel your pain!” There hasn’t been more than a couple of days that go by in the 20+ years I’ve been practicing that clients either cancel appointments with me or don’t even want to go through the effort to provide basic information and schedule an appointment so that I can, for FREE, give them my analysis of their options, eligibility and usually a ton of free advice about their situation.
It’s made me start to take a very cynical view of some people out there. Very frustrating. Perhaps we should start paying them to consult with us….