Blog

When Can I File Bankruptcy After Moving To Florida? A lot of clients call our office asking "When can I file Bankruptcy after moving to Florida? In Florida you can file bankruptcy after moving here f ...     Read More »

Payment Plans For Attorneys Fees In Chapter 7 Bankruptcy Most Bankruptcy Law Firms will not allow clients to make payments on the fees and cost of a chapter 7 bankruptcy. Our firm will. We allow the ...     Read More »

Chapter 7 Bankruptcy Unprotected Property Keeping Your Unprotected Property in a Chapter 7 Bankruptcy While the majority of Chapter 7 Bankruptcy cases filed by the Law Offices of Keith D. Collier co ...     Read More »

Loan Modification Through Chapter 7 Bankruptcy Chapter 7 Bankruptcy is referred to as “clean slate” or “fresh start” bankruptcy.  A major change has recently occurred in the Middle Distric ...     Read More »

Did you know it's possible that when you die you may be leaving all of your outstanding debt to your children to pay? CNN has recently published an article describing all the different scenarios where ...     Read More »

Stripping Mortgage in Chapter 7 Bankruptcy Filing a Chapter 7 Bankruptcy with the Law Offices of Keith D. Collier can yield many unexpected and significant benefits.  For example, did you know tha ...     Read More »

In the last week I randomly pulled 10 new client files to look at how their credit score was affected by their bankruptcy. We pull credit reports using  a service provided by a company called CIN Leg ...     Read More »

Automatic Stay When you file chapter 13 or chapter 7 bankruptcy, you have basically thrown up a huge wall against your creditors.  This huge wall is the bankruptcy code’s “automatic stay.”  ...     Read More »

Qualify for a Chapter 7 Using the “Business Debt Exception” Chapter 7 bankruptcy is a powerful tool, one that can help you get out of debt quickly so that you can start to rebuild your financia ...     Read More »

Get Out of Debt With Your Federal Income Tax Refund Every year millions of Americans receive their federal income tax refund for many things from property taxes, automobile and homeowner’s insura ...     Read More »

To recover from bankruptcy is easy. The hard part is actually making the decision to file. Hundreds of people go to my web site each day and think about calling. 20-30 actually make the call and sche ...     Read More »

Short Sales can be good if you understand that you may have a tax liability after. If you short sale your property and the bank settles for lets say 100k and you owe 180k, they will 1099 you for the d ...     Read More »

We use a company to pull credit report is called CIN legal data services. The allow us to pull Credit Data from Experian, TransUnion, and Equifax in either a 2-Bureau or 3-Bureau Report. This data ...     Read More »

1.) Don't lie about assets. Anything in your name needs to be listed in your schedules. What's an asset? Everything you could sell or own according to the law. Potential lawsuits are even considered a ...     Read More »

Do I lose everything when I file bankruptcy? Generally not.  There are Federal and State exemptions that protect assets.  Depending on your situation you could lose things. However, if you have a ...     Read More »

Tax Refunds and Chapter 7 Bankruptcy When you file Chapter 7 bankruptcy, a Trustee is appointed to your case. The Trustee’s job is to look for assets. One asset a lot of clients or their attorney ...     Read More »

Don't pay anyone to dispute your credit reports. Pull each report directly from the source and examine each entry. If you see things that are incorrect follow the companies dispute guidelines. If you ...     Read More »

Credit scores range between 300 and 850. The higher the score the better. 500 or lower is considered a low credit score. 700 or above will save you money on your financed purchase by lowing your inter ...     Read More »

General cost of filing may vary from state to state or city to city.  On average I have seen fees charged from $1,000.00 to $2,500.00 for a simple chapter 7 case.  More complex case can go a little ...     Read More »

First things first . . . the recent credit bust and changes in the housing market has caused many financial institutes and mortgage lenders to be merged or bought out. Since lenders have different int ...     Read More »

The Means Test, formally called the Statement of Current Monthly Income and Calculation of Commitment Period and Disposable Income, has two main purposes: 1) To determine one’s eligibility t ...     Read More »

What Makes the Means Test “Mean”? The most notable change of Bankruptcy Reform in 2005 and probably the most criticized was the inception of the Means Test. A Debtor can no longer fill out a si ...     Read More »

Reaffirmation Agreements in Chapter 7 Bankruptcy Cases are documents that are generally prepared and filed by secured creditors. When done properly and timely they hold the debtor liable on the debt t ...     Read More »

When a creditor gets a Judgment against you they are essentially getting what is called a Judicial Lien against property that is in your name. This judgment allows them to garnish your bank accounts, ...     Read More »

I get this question 5 times a day. Can or how long before  I can purchase a new or used car after I file for chapter 7 bankruptcy? Well the answer is generally anytime after you are discharged. After ...     Read More »

This video on CNN (http://money.cnn.com/video/pf/2012/04/30/pf-file-bankruptcy.cnnmoney/ ) talks about when to file bankruptcy. Even though this videoarticle tells people to look into other options ...     Read More »

This resent article on CNN "Too broke to go bankrupt" backs my argument against last months article published in the Jacksonville Daily Record reporting that bankruptcy are down because the economy is ...     Read More »

The Law Offices of Keith D. Collier won a great victory in court this year litigating against the United States Trustees office. This new ruling by Judge Paul M. Glenn in the Middle District of Florid ...     Read More »

How often can you file Bankruptcy? Chapter 7 –> Chapter 7 or Chapter 11? You can file chapter 7 or file a chapter 11 and get a discharge in a chapter 11 only after 8 years from the date of fi ...     Read More »

You may have to pay income taxes after Foreclosure takes place if you don't file Chapter 7 or Chapter 13 Bankruptcy before the foreclosure sale. Once a house is foreclosed the lender will likely cla ...     Read More »

What is a BuyBack?  A buyback is done in a chapter 7 case.  It's were the debtor makes an offer to purchase their unencumbered non-exempt assets back from the Chapter 7 Trustee. When you file chapt ...     Read More »

What are the Pitfalls of Chapter 7 Bankruptcy? Chapter 7 has some pitfalls. That is why you should always hire an attorney to guide you through the law. If you don’t then you may lose assets and m ...     Read More »

Is it best to file a chapter 7 bankruptcy to surrender my house before or after the foreclosure? It’s best to file the chapter 7 before the foreclosure to prevent receiving a 1099 for the deficie ...     Read More »