The last check before you file your client’s bankruptcy schedules should be a step back to see if the schedules “tell the story”. The background and the color don’t make it to schedules and SOFA, but you need to read them from the trustee’s point of view to see if they make sense and reflect […]
Fixing the Omission from the Schedules
Twice yesterday new bankruptcy practitioners asked about how to deal with debts or assets not listed in the debtor’s original schedules. The answer in either situation is amend the schedules. As soon as you know that the schedules are not accurate on a meaningful issue, make them accurate. Creditor left out For an omitted creditor, […]
Head Start on Bankruptcy Research
Have you found Judge Randall Newsome’s bankruptcy research binder on the Northern District Bankruptcy Court’s website? This is an awesome compilation of leading cases on the total range of bankruptcy topics. While it’s focused on the 9th Circuit, I suggest that new bankruptcy lawyers use it as a starting point for their personal bankruptcy law […]
Bankruptcy Schedules Look Forward and Backward
New bankruptcy lawyers are often frustrated by the internal inconsistencies required by the “reformed” Bankruptcy Code. Whether it’s rational or not, the means test income figure looks backward while the means test expenses set forth are prospective. Some of those prospective expenses are actual (taxes ) while others are contractual (mortgage payments). Social Security income […]
Answer to Every Question Starts in the Code
If Jews, Muslims, and Christians are People of the Book, we, as bankruptcy lawyers, are, or ought to be, People of the Code, the Bankruptcy Code. Virtually every question that a new bankruptcy lawyer asks ought to send her first to the code for a start. The Bankruptcy Code adopted in 1978, was well thought […]
Track Down All The Client’s Creditors
While a new client may seek out a bankruptcy lawyer when they are served with a lawsuit, they may overlook the plaintiff in that very suit when listing their creditors. Pretty amazing, but if you rely on the client to identify their creditors, their list will often omit creditors who didn’t send them a bill […]
Convert, Don’t Dismiss, That Bankruptcy Case
Young lawyers just learning bankruptcy practice seem to have missed the portions of the Bankruptcy Code that allow a debtor to convert a case under one chapter of the Code to a case under a different chapter. All too often, when it looks like the client is in the wrong chapter, they propose to dismiss […]
