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Bankruptcy Is Not A Pizza!

By Rachel Lynn Foley, Kansas City, MO, Bankruptcy Att

Bankruptcy is not a pizza!  You can not just walk into an attorney and say, “Hey I want a Chapter 7 with extra cheese” and call it a day.  Bankruptcy is a very specialized area of the law and if you don’t hire the right attorney or know what you are doing if you are filing yourself, you could lose everything including your freedom. It is said time and time again, my case is easy and should not cost me very much to handle.  Every case is as different as snow flakes because there are truly no two cases exactly the same.  There is no combo meal number 7 or 13 that you can order for bankruptcy relief.Although many cases are similar in nature there are factors that make your case unique.  Those factors may make your case harder or they may make your case easier.  It just depends.  When you hire an attorney to review those facts and to analyze your financial situation.  You are purchasing our time and talent.  Even though you may not walk out with the combo meal number 7 you have something from us, our time and talent.  There is a value placed on that time and talent and that is what you are paying for, regardless if you decide to file or not.  Once you use our time we cannot go and recapture those moments, but you have walked away with the knowledge we have given you.

Now, to be honest, there are attorneys out there that may cookie cutter your bankruptcy and for them it is like making a pizza.  They take a basic Chapter 7 and a little bit of this and a little bit of that.    But none of my colleagues practice that way and neither does my office.

Many of my clients think I am just plain nuts because of the way I practice until they get to the 341 meeting of creditors.  When they find out that I have prepared them for most of the questions or they witness someone else being grilled because their attorney did not ask the right questions, I hear “Now I understand why you asked so many questions.”

Not only is bankruptcy not a pizza, it is not a game!  This is not hide the asset from the creditors and/or the trustee. This is the time to lay all the facts on the table and find the best possible solution for you.  The bottom line is you may have to pay back some, all or none of your debt.  It just depends on the facts of your case.

Look at your financial situation from the flip side as a creditor.  Let’s say the Joe Mokey owed you $10,000 and he did not live in Florida or Kansas.  Now let’s say Joe owns a million dollar home free and clear.  If Joe filed for bankruptcy and walked away debt free and still owning his million dollar home you would be very upset.  Why?  Because it is not fair or just under this situation that you are not paid but Joe gets to keep his million dollar home.

So when you file for bankruptcy the attorney has to analyze your case under the standard as to what is fair and just for you as the debtor.  The trustee will analyze what is fair and just for the creditor.  Each bankruptcy should at a minimum be analyzed from the trustee’s perspective and anticipate possible problems or exposures.  This process takes time, talent and training.

The article pigs get fat and hogs get slaughtered illustrated what effect greed has on a situation.  The mortgage companies have been hogs for a long time and now they are being lined up for slaughter.  But whether you are a mortgage company or an individual, greed will take you under at some point in your life.

Remember that knowledge is power and the more knowledge you have about filing bankruptcy the more power you will have to determine who is going to treat your case like making a pizza or who is going to take the time and talent to properly analyze your financial situation.

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Full post as published by Bankruptcy Law Network on October 07, 2010 (boomark / email).