Bankruptcy

Bulldogging a Pickup Truck in Bankruptcy Court

By Joseph McDaniel, Esq.

Pancho would only hire ditchdiggers with advanced degrees, so it was sort of an honor to get to dig his ditches; he hired me because even though I didn't have a Masters or Doctors degree, I had a degree in a subject he'd never been lectured about before. So I got to lecture him about Philosophy as we drove from job to job, or ditch to ditch, from my perspective.

Pancho was a remarkable guy, and once when he'd had a lot of analgesic after work, he was challenged to bulldog a pickup truck, and he took a shot at it. He told me afterwards that he actually figured at the time that he could do it.

Fortunately, he'd had enough beer by that time that the pickup just knocked him aside, rather than breaking any major bones.

I just finished talked to a lovely young woman who has a few million in debt, and a bunch of properties that aren't cash flowing, and the properties are massively upside down. She can't qualify for a Chapter 13 because she doesn't meet the debt limits at 11 USC 109. Her income is somewhere between small and very, very small.

She thought a Chapter 11 might be a great idea, and she'd heard at some seminar or another that by listing all of her debts as unsecured in a Chapter 11 she could get massive leverage to force the banks to negotiate favorable deals with her.

My initial response, which I shared with her, was that the idea was simply a gimmick dreamed up by somebody who had not been in the trenches, and that such a course of action would not help her in the slightest.

I listened to her for a few more minutes, as she explained some other neat tricks of expert negotiators that she'd learned in her seminar, and I told her I thought she was looking at a slow meltdown followed by a quick Chapter 7, and she reacted as though I'd challenged her.

"I'm not one to lie down and take it!", she said.

So I gave her two names for two alternate legal opinions. And I told her I'd buy the champagne if they came up with a great solution that wasn't a Chapter 7.

She reminded me of Pancho and the pickup truck.

And I hope she doesn't get hurt trying to bulldog the bank.

NOTHING HERE CONSTITUTES LEGAL ADVICE RE A CHAPTER 7, CHAPTER 13, CHAPTER 11, OR CHAPTER 12. FIND AN ARIZONA BANKRUPTCY LAWYER WHO IS BOARD CERTIFIED IN BANKRUPTCY LAW, AV RATED, AVVO 10 RATED, ON SUPERLAWYERS, OR JUST VERY EXPERIENCED AND A FORMER CHAIR OF SOME BANKRUPTCY SECTION OR COMMITTEE. NOTHING HERE MAY BE USED AS LEGAL ADVICE IN CONNECTION WITH ANY BANKRUPTCY, WHETHER THAT BANKRUPTCY IS IN PHOENIX, GLENDALE, TEMPE, MESA, SCOTTSDALE, OR ANYWHERE ELSE.

Full post as published by Arizona Bankruptcy Attorney Blog on August 18, 2009 (boomark / email).