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The Debt Podcast 
Hosted by Jay S. Fleischman, a bankruptcy and consumer lawyer located in New York City. Information and news designed to help you learn more about bankruptcy, debt relief, and consumer credit options.
Post Frequency: 4.9/day Last Entry: November 23, 2010 at 18:33:08 Recent Entries: 1537
Go to The Debt Podcast, find other Bankruptcy blogs, or browse all law blogs.
Mortgage Company Abuse of Bankruptcy Laws
Posted on March 31, 2008Mortgage companies routinely ignore Chapter 13 bankruptcy law. You complete your plan payments, believing you are once again current with the mortgage, having accomplished your goal. But then, you get a notice from the mortgage company, claiming you still owe them thousands of dollars...
Credit Counseling Comment Deadline
Posted on March 30, 2008April 1, 2008, is the last day for citizen comment on an important regulation! The date may be full of irony but this deadline is no joke. The US Trustee has submitted a proposed rule that includes specific requirements for the credit counseling “briefing” required of all individual debtors by 11 USC §109(h)(1)...
Struggling homeowners find little cooperation from lenders
Posted on March 30, 2008In a March 30th article by reporter Kevin G. Hall of McClatchy Newspapers, he recounts the struggle of distressed homeowners seeking the relief promised by the Bush Administration and mortgage lenders. The lesson learned from Hall?s subjects ? Chris Jennings and Julie Mickley ? is that homeowners must be bold and relentless in dealing with their [...
How to Treat ?Rent to Own? Accounts in a Chapter 13 Bankruptcy
Posted on March 29, 2008If you are filing a chapter 13 bankruptcy case and have purchased household goods under a “rent to own” contract, you may wonder how to treat this debt in your chapter 13 repayment plan. Because rent to own contracts typically involve total rental payments amounting to many times the actual value of the items “purchased,” [...
Offer in compromise vs. bankruptcy
Posted on March 29, 2008My office has been flooded this week with clients with failed offers in compromise for IRS tax debt. Like most clients, they have been clinging to the hope that there was a solution other than bankruptcy. The comparison of OIC vs. bankruptcy is neatly laid out in an article by Larry Heinkel in the Florida [...
Chapter 13 Trustees in Florida, Georgia and Puerto Rico to double their fee in May!
Posted on March 27, 2008Bankruptcy attorneys practicing in the Middle District of Florida, Jacksonville Division received the following email from Chapter 13 Trustee Doug Neway: “Effective with all cases filed on May 1, 2008 or later: . . . All plans should be calculated using a 10% fee...
What Am I Required To Do In Order To File Bankruptcy?
Posted on March 26, 2008Before a consumer chapter 7 or chapter 13 bankruptcy can be filed, there are certain minimum steps which every debtor must complete. In order to file an “emergency” or partial bankruptcy, you must: Complete a credit counseling session with an agency from the Justice Department’s approved list...
Credit Cards and Bankruptcy: Beware Recent Use
Posted on March 26, 2008Most credit card debt can be wiped out in bankruptcy. The most common way to lose that right is for a lender to prove they were defrauded. Only rarely do folks intentionally charge up a credit card without having some intention of eventually repaying it and they are even less likely to [...
Do I Really Need A Discharge?
Posted on March 26, 2008Recently, two different clients came in to see me about filing bankruptcy with similar problems: they had filed a bankruptcy within the last couple of years and therefore aren?t eligible to get a discharge in a new case filed now. One of the things that BAPCPA, the law that went into effect in October 2005, did was [...
Am I Allowed to Refile My Chapter 13 Case?
Posted on March 25, 2008With the recent rise in gas prices and the ripple effect resulting in increased costs of many goods and services, Chapter 13 debtors may very well discover that a payment plan which worked a year ago no longer works at all. Here in Atlanta, we are seeing a significant number of Chapter 13 cases fail [...
What Do Aloha Airlines And You Have In Common?
Posted on March 24, 2008Aloha Airgroup, Inc, recently filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Aloha Airgroup, Inc. is the parent corporation of Aloha Airlines, Inc. This is the company’s second bankruptcy in less than three (3) years. You may be asking yourself, what do I have in common with Aloha Airlines? I will answer that soon, but before I [...
When Should I Assume A Lease In Bankruptcy?
Posted on March 24, 2008One of the features of bankruptcy is the ability to reject a residential lease. But what if you want to assume an unexpired lease? Obviously, you must live somewhere, so consider the following factors when making this decision: Can you find a better deal on rent than you are currently paying? What are the terms of the lease? [...
Can I Take Out Credit Cards During My Chapter 13 Bankruptcy?
Posted on March 23, 2008Can I take out credit cards during my Chapter 13 Bankruptcy? Short answer, you may not take out any lines of credit either through credit cards or loan applications during your Chapter 13 Bankruptcy. You might think that you will have no opportunities to ever have a credit card again after filing bankruptcy [...
Why I Will Not Respond to Every Question I Receive by e-Mail
Posted on March 23, 2008Several times a month, I receive email with detailed case questions from bankruptcy debtors who already have cases filed and who are currently represented by counsel. I think that as a group, consumer bankruptcy lawyers are almost always willing to answer questions and we genuinely desire to help people in the community...
What Is A Discharge?
Posted on March 23, 2008The goal of most bankruptcies is to obtain a ?discharge.? But what is that? In broad terms, a discharge is relief from your obligation to pay that debt. The debt goes away, and you need no longer worry about it. Thus, in a typical chapter 7 bankruptcy, when you are done, you will have discharged all [...
How Do I Figure Out What My Monthly Expenses Are?
Posted on March 23, 2008Before you sign your bankruptcy petition, you must review all of the schedules for accuracy. One of the schedules, called “Schedule J - Current Expenditures of Individual Debtor(s)” is where your monthly expenses are listed. If there is one place on the bankruptcy petition that my clients consistently get wrong, it is on “Schedule J”...
Student Loan Zombie Debt
Posted on March 23, 2008Was that student loan discharged in bankruptcy, or wasn?t it? Two recent decisions leave the answer to that question in doubt. Hoxie v. Educational Credit Management Corporation (US Dist. SD California, November 13, 2006) and Mersmann v Educational Management Credit Corporation (US App 10th Circuit, September 24, 2007) threaten the financial security of many people [...
Creditors Beware: Please Follow The Laws When Filing Bankruptcy Proof of Claims
Posted on March 22, 2008This last week, Bankruptcy Judge Taylor in the Southern District of California Bankruptcy Court, sanctioned First Future Credit Union and Keypoint Credit Union for failing to redact personal and confidential information belonging to debtors, in the proof of claims they filed in a Chapter 13 Bankruptcy Case...
The Bubble That Could Not Last, Who Will Pay, Who Will Be Bailed Out?
Posted on March 22, 2008As readers of this blog know, the Greenspan bubble that led to the sub-prime crisis was not a secret. Of course, Chairman Al is not out of excuses. I think we should all adopt one of them, the “I got a hand-written exoneration note, after the public criticism, from the guy who is now dead” [...
Should I File a Proof of Claim For a Creditor Who Didn?t File a Claim?
Posted on March 22, 2008Generally, if a creditor doesn’t file a proof of claim in a timely fashion in your Chapter 13 case, that creditor does not get paid. If it is a dischargeable debt, and if the creditor got proper notice of the Chapter 13, the debt will be discharged at the end of the case...
How Will a Judgment Affect My Real Property And What Can I Do About It?
Posted on March 22, 2008As noted recently on these pages by Doug Jacobs, a California Bankruptcy Attorney, a judgment lien against your real property can be removed from the property if the lien impairs an exemption you claim in your bankruptcy. In New York State, you can only remove a judgment lien against your personal residence...
Creditors Beware: Please Follow The Laws When Filing Bankruptcy Proof of Claims. PART 2 of 2
Posted on March 22, 2008In my last blog, I spoke about identity theft arising from proof of claims. This blog is a continuation of that article and contains a copy of the tentative ruling issued by the Judge for two creditors that broke the laws with respect to publishing identity information...
Property Valuation: How to Give Your Lawyer Accurate Estimates for Use in the Bankruptcy Papers
Posted on March 21, 2008In preparing for filing a bankruptcy, your lawyer has probably asked you to provide him or her with a list of all your property, along with your estimate of its market value. This may seem like a major headache, because you may not know what “market value” means...
A River Runs Through The Looking Glass Into The Means Test
Posted on March 21, 2008The Southern District Bankruptcy Court of Illinois sits along the east bank of the Mighty Mississippi River from a spot just north of St. Louis, Missouri to the southern most point in Illinois. Across the river and far across the state of Missouri is the Western District Bankruptcy Court of Missouri...
Seek Legal Advice Before Making Significant Financial or Lifestyle Changes
Posted on March 21, 2008Several months ago, I referred a potential bankruptcy client to a colleague because the case involved a business situation very similar to a somewhat complicated case my colleague had handled previously. The prospective client called my friend and actually paid a fairly sizeable retainer, but never ended up hiring him...
Alice in Wonderland: 401(k) Withdrawals as Income?
Posted on March 21, 2008Do 401(k) withdrawals during the prior six-months before a bankruptcy filing “count” as income for the means test? My friend Andy Miofsky outlined today the well-reasoned Zittel decision from Southern Illinois that concludes they do not. The decision was set in opposition to In re Sanchez from my neighboring district, the Western District of Missouri, [...
Truth in lending a lever against foreclosure
Posted on March 21, 2008Many of the same miserable exploding ARM loans that bring clients into my office contain Truth in Lending Act violations. The right to rescind a transaction that violated TILA is an arrow in my quiver for saving a house. Absent some legal theory that challenges the lender’s right to foreclose, we are left with the argument [...
How Do I Check My Credit?
Posted on March 21, 2008As you probably know, there are companies that gather information about the history of your payments on your credit obligation. These are called Credit Bureaus, and they not only gather your information, but they also report this information to anyone who pays for it, including your creditors, potential employers, landlords and insurance companies...
What Retirement Planning Tools Are Available to Me?
Posted on March 20, 2008Each of us has our own goals as to how much we would like to have set aside for retirement. There are a variety of retirement plans available. Some are sponsored by employers and others are more individual. Employer-sponsored plans include: 401(k) plans are offered by employers to their employees...
Can I Lose My Job if I File for Bankruptcy?
Posted on March 20, 2008Recently I have received a number of bankruptcy inquiries from higher earning individuals who are facing bankruptcy because of the real estate slowdown, the sub-prime mess and other problems in the economy. Some of these folks have hundreds of thousands of dollars in credit card debt but are fearful about losing their jobs if their [...
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New Jersey Legal Update - Podcast # 57
This week's New Jersey Legal Update podcast will address federal l...
New Jersey Legal Update - Podcast # 53
This week's New Jersey Legal Update podcast will discuss the landm...
The Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act
Phantom Income Relief on Debt Cancellation
Collection Agencies and Creditors
How to deal and stop the harassment
Bankruptcy Law
A complete prime (pre-2005)
The Paulson Toxic Mortgage Debt Security Act: The Biggest Government Bailout of All Time
Legislative Proprosal for Treasury Authority to Purchase Mortgage-related Assets
Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008
Bailout Bill HR124
Truth In Lending Act
Consumer Loans and Consumer Credit Protection Act
If I unknowingly cash a fictitious check, am I responsible to repay the bank?
Definitely, please go to court! Those crooks should be behind bars!...
Some elses debt is being reported by a bank to the crecit agencies. They know and have ackowledged it is not mine, yet it is still being listed as mine. it was my son's and no I didn't co-sign. It is adversly
It is easy for the bank and the credit reporting agencies to clear this confusio...
Am I obligated to pay on a home equity line of credit that has been discharged through chapter 7?
The reaffirmation is done through the payments you have been making to the compa...
A month or so ago I was with some new people I met, and one of them asked me to cash a couple of checks he had, that he couldn't cash because he didn't have a bank account or a driver's liscence. I didn�
If the call was from your bank it may mean that the checks were bad. You may hav...
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If I unknowingly cash a fictitious check, am I responsible to repay the bank?
Definitely, please go to court! Those crooks should be behind bars!...
Some elses debt is being reported by a bank to the crecit agencies. They know and have ackowledged it is not mine, yet it is still being listed as mine. it was my son's and no I didn't co-sign. It is adversly
It is easy for the bank and the credit reporting agencies to clear this confusio...
Am I obligated to pay on a home equity line of credit that has been discharged through chapter 7?
The reaffirmation is done through the payments you have been making to the compa...
A month or so ago I was with some new people I met, and one of them asked me to cash a couple of checks he had, that he couldn't cash because he didn't have a bank account or a driver's liscence. I didn�
If the call was from your bank it may mean that the checks were bad. You may hav...
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