• Home
  • Bankruptcy in Brief
  • ABC’s of Bankruptcy
  • Considering Bankruptcy
  • True Stories
  • Chapter 13
  • Blog
  • About Us

Northern California Bankruptcy Lawyer

On The Bankruptcy Soapbox

The Soap Box
  • How bankruptcy works
  • Mortgage Matters
  • Consumer Rights
  • Newsworthy
  • You & Your Lawyer
  • Small Business
  • Family Law

Can Your Business Survive The Pandemic?

By Cathy Moran

ailing business

When the virus shutdown is over, ailing businesses must consider whether to continue.

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, Small business Tagged With: 2020, covid-19

When You Can’t Pay Your Bills Because Of The Virus

By Cathy Moran

virus and money

The coronavirus has us locked at home where the  worry demons play unrestrained in our heads. Money troubles cause us worry, in “good” times.  These are hardly good times. As more and more of us are hit with shelter-in-place orders that keep us from work and our kids from school, we have even more time […]

Filed Under: Featured Tagged With: 2020, coronavirus

Bankruptcy Questions Have Few Quick Answers

By Cathy Moran

The caller to my law office kept telling my assistant: I just want to ask  Cathy a question. To which my assistant replied:  you need to first fill out our questionnaire and make an appointment. But I don’t want a meeting, I just want to ask a question. At which point, both sides of the […]

Filed Under: Consumer Rights, You & your lawyer Tagged With: 2020

When Is The Time Right To File Bankruptcy

By Cathy Moran

time to file bankruptcy

Just like stand up comedy and batting in baseball, filing bankruptcy is all about timing. Timing your bankruptcy filing is no different. File bankruptcy too early, or too late, and you risk losing assets or advantages that better timing could have assured. Admittedly, you don’t always have the luxury of filing bankruptcy on your own […]

Filed Under: Considering Bankruptcy, Featured Tagged With: 2020, when to file bankruptcy

Bankruptcy Means Test: New Numbers, Little Impact For Bay Area

By Cathy Moran

means test numbers

The bankruptcy means test line in California is up, so higher incomes still escape the means test. The median income in your state is the starting point for bankruptcy’s means test. Below median, and it’s a given you qualify for the bankruptcy chapter of your choice. Above median, more calculation is required to see whether […]

Filed Under: Strictly California Tagged With: 2020, Alameda, means test, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz

Mortgage Forbearance And The Hidden Gotcha: Escrow

By Cathy Moran

escrowed taxes forbearance

Got a mortgage forbearance? Watch out for the escrowed taxes after the forbearance is up. While the CARES Act made forbearance on federally backed mortgages available for the asking. But no one talked about the escrow portion of the skipped mortgage payments. Federal guidance urged servicers to offer easy ways to pay the skipped payments […]

Filed Under: Featured, Uncategorized Tagged With: 2020, covid-19

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

Does Bankruptcy Bar Retirement Savings?

By Cathy Moran

retirement contributions

Ongoing retirement saving by Chapter 13 debtors has been a touchy subject since the means test became a part of the bankruptcy scene. The means test was intended to squeeze every available dollar from consumer debtors. It works by limiting the expenses that can be deducted from income in figuring what a debtor can/must pay […]

Filed Under: Chapter 13, Developing law, Featured Tagged With: 2020, means test, retirement

  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • Next Page »
Coronavirus & Your Finances

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

High Income Earners Pass Bankruptcy’s Means Test

ALERT:   Being above the median income on the means test 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 … Read more

More Posts from this Category

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

Categories

All content copyright © Moran Law Group. All rights reserved.