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The Reason Bankruptcy Filings Have Decreased From Last Year

Chris — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 02:27:13 +0000

There has been a decrease from last year in bankruptcy filings due to new changes between banks and consumers. Banks have started tightening credit, and mortgage lenders have stopped foreclosures due to challenges in their internal processes. Some debtors will have already filed for chapter 7 bankruptcy in the past two years, or need to wait eight years from filing their last chapter 7 bankruptcy.

Lockheed Martin: 3,300 Jobs and Counting

Chris — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 01:21:29 +0000

One of the Pentagon’s top defense suppliers, Lockheed Martin, recently announced a voluntary layoff program for 6,500 employees its Bethesda, Md. headquarters and business services unit. That announcement comes on top of 1,500 layoffs in the company’s aeronautics division, 1,200 layoffs in its space systems unit and 600 voluntary buyouts of senior executives earlier this year.

If a Loved One Passes Away

Chris — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 20:57:36 +0000

If a loved has passes away with debt their debt dies with them. Unless members of the deceased family co-signed with the loan, they are usually not legally obligated to pay. This doesn’t stop debt collectors from harassing families to pay the debt. The number of debt collectors using this deplorable tactic has grown in recent years. They work on the behalf of financial giants such as; Bank of America, Capitol One, and others. Targeting families when they are at their most vulnerable.

Read the full story at the Wall Start Journal.

Harrisburg City Council’s Appeal on Bankruptcy decision

Chris — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 16:05:36 +0000

Federal bankruptcy judge, Mary France, made a ruling last month that Harrisburg, Pennsylvania may not seek bankruptcy protection. Harrisburg is burdened with about $300 million in debts related to the city’s old trash incinerator. After the machine was hindered with environmental problems and fines for numerous years the Environmental Protection Agency shut down the incinerator. Harrisburg’s City Council attorney filed an appeal with the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania on Saturday about Judge France’s decision to discard the bankruptcy petition of the city.

Read the full story at the Sacramento Bee

US Postal Service Making Cuts to Avoid Bankruptcy in Upcoming Spring

Chris — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 22:55:05 +0000

The U.S. Postal Service’s first-class mail will slow down next spring due to the company cutting costs to try and avoid bankruptcy next year. The cuts would close 251 mail processing centers around the country as well as cutting about 28,000 jobs. Changes are expected, such as delays and added costs to mail delivery. Public opinion is opposed to the cuts, Maine Senator Susan Collins the top Republican on the Senate committee overseeing the post office thinks the agency is moving in the wrong direction, and the service cuts will push consumers to online bill payments and private carriers such as UPS and FedEx.

Read the full story at the Washington Post

American Airlines’s Parent Company AMR Files for Bankruptcy

Chris — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 03:43:57 +0000

American Airlines’s parent company, AMR, filed for bankruptcy last week, leaving many DFW residents concerned with the airline’s future. Economic experts say AMR’s bankruptcy will have more have smaller effect than thought on Tarrant county’s economy. Director of the Maguire Energy Institute at Southern Methodist University and economist, Bud Weinstein, said ” We won’t see any effect in the short term, but in the long term American’s impact in the region’s economy will be smaller than it is today.”

AMR filed bankruptcy not to shrink drastically, but to relieve debt and pension costs. The early estimates of how much the pension cuts would be about $1 billion.

Read the complete story in the Star Telegram.

Borders Files for Bankruptcy

Chris — Wed, 16 Feb 2011 09:00:24 +0000

Borders, the 40-year-old chain that helped define the age of the book superstore, filed for bankruptcy protection on Wednesday, a widely expected move after years of increased competition, declining sales and months of missed payments to its vendors.

Publishers, who have anticipated the bankruptcy filing for months, said they hoped that it would be a chance for the beleaguered bookseller to reinvent itself. But they were also skeptical that the company’s deep-rooted problems could be overcome.

Borders, which began in 1971 as a used-book store in Ann Arbor, Mich., will close some 200 stores and shed much of its staff. The company currently operates more than 650 stores, including about 500 superstores, and employs 19,000 people.

Publishers were told on Tuesday that Borders had secured debtor-in-possession financing and that a meeting to form a creditor committee would most likely occur next week.

The company listed $1.29 billion in debt and $1.27 billion in assets in a filing in United States Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan.

New York Times

Bankruptcy and Social Security Benefits.

Chris — Fri, 21 Jan 2011 15:00:22 +0000

I filed for Chapter 13 bankruptcy after being laid off. Do Social Security benefits count as income in bankruptcy, or are they protected?

Your benefits are protected. Social Security is excluded from the calculation of disposable income when setting up a debtor repayment plan.

Bankruptcies Up for Older Adults

Chris — Thu, 06 Jan 2011 15:00:02 +0000

When the economy tanked in 2008, Alvin Ferdinand depleted his retirement nest egg and maxed out his personal credit cards trying to save his Michigan business. At age 64, he says, he had no choice but to file for bankruptcy, losing the three assisted living facilities he owned and administered.

Irene Froehlich, 61, dutifully paid her credit card bills on time, even after her commission-only income fell by 75 percent two years ago. But when the credit card companies raised her interest rates, says the Chicago resident, she was backed into a financial corner. She filed for bankruptcy in November 2009.

The recession that drove these two people to the edge is helping drive a larger trend: a rising rate of bankruptcy filings by older Americans. Historically, soaring medical debt was the main reason older adults took this extreme step.

These days, the rate is pushed up increasingly by lost or reduced income, a weak labor market and depleted retirement accounts.

In a sign of the times, the number of personal bankruptcy filings by people of all ages rose to 1.5 million in 2010, the highest level since 2005, when the law was revised to make it harder to wipe out debt, according to the American Bankruptcy Institute.

The Institute for Financial Literacy (IFL), based in Portland, Maine, did an age breakdown of the data for 2009, when 1.4 million people sought bankruptcy protection (analysts are still processing the 2010 figures). The study found that older people are making up an increasing proportion of the nation’s bankruptcy filers.

People ages 45 to 54 accounted for 27 percent of all filers in 2009; in 2006, when 598,000 people filed for bankruptcy, this age group accounted for 25 percent of the total.

The 55-to-64 age group made up 17 percent of filers in 2009, up from 14 percent in 2006. The 65-and-up group, meanwhile, made up 8.3 percent of all filers in 2009, a rise from 7.8 percent in 2006.

Leslie Linfield, executive director of the IFL, is concerned by numbers like these.

“A young person has the ability to rebuild themselves financially,” Linfield says. “Are seniors afforded that same opportunity by virtue of their age? Are we as a society taking care of our seniors when so many have to seek bankruptcy protection to begin with?”

AARP

Foreclosures

Chris — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 19:51:13 +0000

If a borrower defaults on a mortgage, the lender may seek foreclosure on the property. In Texas foreclosures may be ordered by a court or without court involvement. Typically, a non-judicial foreclosure is conducted by auction “on the courthouse steps.” Defaults that lead to foreclosure may be monetary or technical, and specified notice and other requirements must be followed if the foreclosure is to be valid.

Non-judicial foreclosure auctions are conducted on the first Tuesday of each month between the hours of 10:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m. at the courthouse of the county in which the property is located. Notices must specify a three hour period during which the sale will take place.

A “Notice of Default and Intent to Accelerate” which gives the borrower an opportunity to cure the default (at least 20 prior). A “Notice of Acceleration and Posting for Foreclosure” must be given at least 21 days before the sale date. “Acceleration” is defined as the declaration by the lender that the entire amount of the mortgage now fully due and payable.

There are many legal requirements the mortgage holder must meet to foreclose on a property, but in Texas, a judge is not always involved and the responsibility to protect the borrower’s rights may be that of the borrower.

The foreclosure process in Texas can be as quick as 41 days and there are no effective defenses to this process except for the borrower to block it with a temporary restraining order or file bankruptcy. For either option, the buyer needs an attorney.