Filing bankruptcy in Arizona: Credit card companies are unforgiving

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Phoenix ($995/Chapter 7) and one thing I've learned from clients is how unreasonable credit card companies have become. Several years ago they would work with you if you got behind on payments. There were more banks offering credit cards and it was very competitive to get your business. Now they have become very rigid and unwilling to give consumers a break. Even though they can pull "soft credit reports" on you to see that you are up to your ears in debt and cannot possibly stick to their strict terms, they won't back down or try to offer you a reasonable settlement on your debt. I see the offers they have given my clients and they're unrealistic for someone who has just lost a job or encountered huge medical bills. For example, if you're behind on $5000 in debt, they'll offer to settle with you for $4000. The problem is how are you going to come up with $4000? Then they send the debt to a third-party debt collector or attorney. Once the attorneys take over, it's a matter of weeks or at most a few months until they take you to court and get a judgment against you. Within days of getting a judgment they can start garnishing your paycheck. If you are self-employed, they can get at that money too sometimes. They can also seize your tax refunds. If you have a bank account with the same bank that holds your credit card, they don't even need to take you to court to get a judgment against you, the second you get behind in payments they can seize all but $300 from your bank account.

We have many clients who come to us who have tried to use debt management companies to help them work on their debt, but they have no luck (do a google search to see how realistic going that route is). For most people with unaffordable credit card debt, the best solution is to file Chapter 7 bankruptcy. Call us now to set up a free consultation.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-910-6812. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

Filing Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Arizona: The scoop about the lowest priced bankruptcy lawyers

I am a bankruptcy lawyer in Arizona ($995/Chapter 7) and one thing I've discovered is that not all bankruptcy attorneys are consistent in their pricing. Some may advertise a very inexpensive flat fee but when you come into their office for a consultation, you are quoted a much higher price. One law firm in town advertises that they charge $995 for a Chapter 7 bankruptcy, but when you come in to consult with them, they explain that fee is only for people on a fixed income. That firm and many other firms also charge extra fees for things like copying, phone calls, emails, the mandatory court 341 meeting, credit reports and the initial consultation.

I don't charge clients for any of those extras. The only additional costs a client can expect are the $299 court filing fee and the price of the two online credit and financial courses required by law, which can be taken as cheaply as $5 and $12. 

So do your homework when finding a bankruptcy lawyer. If you are considering setting up a consultation with a law firm, ask them first on the phone if they charge for those extra things mentioned above on top of the flat fee they advertise. The cheapest attorney you find on Google may end up being the most expensive!

A guide to mortgage refinancing as rates hit lows

Never have average rates on long-term fixed mortgages been as low as they are now: 3.91 percent for a 30-year home loan and 3.21 for a 15-year loan.
The new lows mark the eighth straight week in which the average on the 30-year loan has hovered near 4 percent.
Those rates make now a tantalizing time to refinance. And, with home prices having sunk in most areas of the country, many would-be buyers are tempted, too.
Yet the pace of refinancing and home buying has been mostly unchanged over the past year. That's mainly because so many Americans lack the home equity, credit scores or cash to refinance or buy. Many who do qualify to buy or refinance have already done so.
Here's a look at whether and why it makes sense to refinance or buy.

Read the rest of the article at Google News

Record low mortgage rates drop even lower

Record low mortgage rates push the average 30-year loan to 3.91 percent. But can these record low mortgage rates last?

Read the rest of the article at The Christian Science Monitor

Mortgage deals are there, if you look

Lenders and economists will tell you flat out: The lack of accurate information about the availability of loan programs that are designed to address special needs is discouraging far too many consumers from even considering an application, much less shopping around.

Mortgage banker Alex Stenback of the Residential Mortgage Group in Minnetonka, Minn., says he sees it every day: "People just aren't aware of what's possible right now" and as a result, they are missing real estate prices and long-term interest rate opportunities they shouldn't. Doug Lebda, founder and CEO of LendingTree, the online site that allows banks to make competing offers to applicants, believes that "the fear of being rejected" because they don't conform to standards that may not even exist, is keeping qualified applicants on the sidelines for no reason.

Read the rest of the article at the Hartford Courant

Foreclosed Homeowners Sue Mortgage Giants

In a federal class action, foreclosed homeowners sued Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and other "leading providers of residential real estate mortgages," claiming their disregard for underwriting standards caused the mortgage meltdown, which brought more than 930,000 foreclosure filings in the third quarter of 2010 alone.
IndyMac Bank and Countrywide Financial are among the host of mortgage originators named in the 101-page complaint, which seeks damages for the 11 named plaintiffs whose "credit ratings and histories were damaged or destroyed."

Read the rest at Courthouse News Service

What Fannie and Freddie Knew

Democrats have spent years arguing that private lenders created the housing boom and bust, and that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac merely came along for the ride. This was always a politically convenient fiction, and now thanks to the unlikely source of the Securities and Exchange Commission we have a trail of evidence showing how the failed mortgage giants turbocharged the crisis.

That's the story revealed Friday by the SEC's civil lawsuits against six former Fannie and Freddie executives, including a pair of CEOs. The SEC says the companies defrauded investors because they "knew and approved of misleading statements" about Fan and Fred's exposure to subprime loans, and it chronicles their push to expand the business.

Read the rest of the article at the Wall Street Journal

Mortgage Default Is A Financial Bonanza For Many Homeowners As Foreclosure Crisis Continues

Those homeowners who made conservative financial decisions, saved for a significant down payment and are making their mortgage payments on time even if it involves financial sacrifice may wonder if the government is being fair.

Higher income groups apparently made a rational and rapid decision that default was the best option. Why continue making a large mortgage payment on a house that is worth considerably less than the mortgage balance? Does anyone really think that a house purchased for $1 million 5 years ago and now valued at under $400,000 will increase in value by 150% any time soon?

Massive, expensive and time consuming government programs to “modify” mortgages have basically been a disaster which have extended the housing crisis to the same degree as foreclosure moratoriums. Since 2008 a total of 2,258,026 mortgages have been modified, resulting in payment reductions of up to 35% or $567 per month.

A recent study predicts that the foreclosure crisis in not even in the fifth inning yet.

Read the rest of the article at Problem Bank List

U.S. Reps Miller and Jones Call for Investigation of Illegal Foreclosures of U.S. Servicemembers

U.S. Reps. Brad Miller (D-NC) and Walter Jones (R-NC) today called on the United States Justice Department to investigate thoroughly and prosecute vigorously violations of the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (SCRA) that resulted in the illegal foreclosure of active duty servicemembers’ homes while some served in the war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan.

In a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder, Reps. Miller and Jones cited the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency’s (OCC) requirement to review some 5,000 improper foreclosures on military personnel by ten mortgage servicers or banks that may be in violation of the SCRA.

Read the rest of the article at LoanSafe

Foreclosure program's demise brings jeers

The 20th Judicial Circuit in Lee County and other circuits across the state are in a tizzy over how to proceed in the wake of the Florida Supreme Court’s decision Monday to terminate the state’s mandatory foreclosure mediation program.

“Literally everything across the state is upside down,” said Jonathan D. Conant, president of the Conant Mediation Center, which manages the state program for the 20th Judicial Circuit, which covers Lee, Collier, Charlotte, Glades and Hendry counties.

Read the rest of the article at News-Press

Michigan Governor Signs Bills to Help Prevent Foreclosures

Highlights of the legislation include requirements for lenders to provide written notification to people facing foreclosure. That notification must include a list of housing counselors, as well as the date the foreclosure proceedings are scheduled to begin. That way, homeowners can get immediate advice on their situation.

Read the rest of the article at WHTC

Lawyer seeks class status for robo-signing lawsuit

A lawyer in Las Vegas has filed a civil lawsuit seeking class-action status on behalf of homeowners he says have been hurt by the filing of fraudulent foreclosure documents during an alleged "robo-siging" scheme.

Matthew Callister said he wants a state judge to stop tainted home sales and evictions and order Lender Processing Services Inc. and several bank and mortgage companies to modify loans and pay monetary damages to affected homeowners.

"This is to say, 'Stop. Let us try to modify the loan appropriately,'" Callister said. "Then we'll seek damages."

Read the rest of the article at CBS News

Foreclosures by major banks increase 21.1% in third quarter

The jump in foreclosures from the second quarter came as mortgage servicers lifted holds they instituted as authorities investigated faulty paperwork. Separate research showed homes en route to being seized fell 15.8% in October from a year earlier.

Read the rest of the article at the Los Angeles Times

Foreclosures May Delay Housing Rebound to 2013

The two-bedroom Denver row house that Kyle and Jennifer Zinth bought in 2005 is a tight fit now that they have an 18-month-old son, Max, and a coonhound named Beauregard. They plan to put it up for sale next month, hoping to at least break even so they can buy a larger home.
“My understanding is it’s a better time to buy than sell,” Kyle Zinth, 34, a paralegal, said in a telephone interview. “If we can get out of this one without financial harm and get a good deal on the next place, then that’s ideal under present market realities.”
The Zinths are wading back into a U.S. housing market where prices may fall further under the weight of foreclosures and not rebound until 2013, even as the economy builds momentum and mortgage rates fall to record lows, according to a survey of 109 economists released this week by Zillow Inc. When values do rise, the gains probably won’t match those seen in the years prior to the bursting of the bubble in 2006.

Read the rest of the article at Bloomberg

US cities declare bankruptcy crisis

With less than a year to go until America elects its next president, the country has been warned of a looming new economic crisis.

Major cities across the United States are declaring themselves bankrupt in the face of huge debts and declining revenues.

Birmingham, in Alabama, and Harrisburg, the state capital of Pennsylvania, are the latest high-profile cities to file for bankruptcy. Analysts warn as many as 100 American cities are at risk.

Read the rest of the article at SkyNews

Reform has made filing bankruptcy more costly

Bankruptcy is a way to escape from debt, but it doesn't come without a price — and consumers now pay as much as 55% more since the 2005 bankruptcy reform was passed.
The average cost of Chapter 7 bankruptcy cases has jumped from $900 to $1,399, according to a national study released on Dec. 15 by the American Bankruptcy Institute.
The study looks at major changes to the consumer bankruptcy system. Bankruptcy filing costs more and takes much longer because it is more complicated and cumbersome. And because attorney fees typically must be paid upfront, debtors often must hold off on filing until they can first sock away enough cash. Among changes from the bankruptcy reform bill:

Read the rest of the article at USA Today

Filing bankruptcy in Phoenix: Putting your student loan debt on your credit cards then filing bankruptcy?

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona (Chapter 7/$995) and frequently hear clients complain that student loan debt is not dischargeable in bankruptcy. Perhaps this is part of the reason why the Occupy Wall Street protesters are so upset about student loan debt. Why are credit cards dischargeable but student loans aren't? Student loans were taken out for a legitimate serious purpose, whereas credit cards could be used to buy anything, no matter how frivolous. You can thank Congress for setting the laws up this way.

One way some have worked the system to get rid of their student loans is to pay them off using their credit cards, then file for bankruptcy. This does not seem very ethical and is risky since the bankruptcy trustee will likely see what you have done when you file for bankruptcy. For more on this subject and some advice on what to do if you have student loan debt, click here.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-910-6812. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

Filing Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Arizona: Short sales and discharging taxes

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona ($995/Chapter 7) and two of the most common questions clients ask me about are what their options are on their house and can they discharge past due taxes. Most people want to keep their home, and filing Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Arizona will allow them to as long as they don't have more than $150,000 equity in their home. This is not a problem since I rarely encounter any clients who have equity in their home; most people are underwater do to the economy. However they must be able to afford their mortgage payments. Many people have $1500 or $2000/mth mortgage payments that are difficult to afford right now. The federal government has set up a program to permit people to lower their payments, called the Home Affordability Mortgage Program (HAMP). Representative David Schweikert has created an office, the first of its kind, to help people work with their lenders to set up HAMP, since some banks have been difficult about negotiating this program with homeowners.

Homeowners who are unsuccessful obtaining this program frequently consider short selling, also known as strategic default. It allows a homeowner to sell their home back to the bank without owing any of the difference, walking away free and clear. It is not available in all states, only in "non-recourse" states like Arizona. Short selling affects your credit much less than foreclosing. It has become so prevalent in this economy that there is now a book available for $20 for download on how to short sell your house. Or you may want to find a real estate agent who specializes in short selling, like my friend Will Wright of Eagle First Realty (will@willliamwrightrealty.com or 480-216-6882). Short selling is not easy so it is best to study up extensively on it first or go with a professional like Will.

Most taxes are not dischargeable in bankruptcy, and the laws vary state by state. In Arizona, past due income taxes older than three years are dischargeable. For example, if you owe taxes on work from 2008, and those taxes were due on April 15, 2009, you would be eligible to file for bankruptcy and have those discharged on April 16, 2012 or later. There are a few exceptions; if the tax debt was "assessed" or there was an Offer of Compromise, that adds a 240-day period of dischargeability. Or if you obtained an extension.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-910-6812. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

Senator Jack Harper wants to change Arizona's non-recourse status

The head of a key House committee wants to scrap state laws that now allow homeowners who are “under water’’ on their homes to simply walk away.
Rep. Jack Harper, R-Surprise, says Arizona’s status as one of a handful of “non-recourse’’ states is keeping the real estate market from recovering here. He contends that having people abandon their homes further depresses the value of nearby homes.
“The idea is to keep people from being encouraged to just walk away from their house any time they’re a little bit upside-down’’ on their mortgage, he said.
But the move is getting a fight from the Arizona Association of Realtors. Tom Farley, the group’s chief executive officer, vowed to “utilize every resource that we have here in protecting consumers.’’

Read the rest of the article at the Sierra Vista Herald

Filing bankruptcy in Arizona: How bad is it, really?

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona ($995/Chapter 7) and encounter many people who are nervous about filing personal bankruptcy because they think they may lose some of their property, are worried about the stigma, and think they cannot afford it. All of these worries are usually unnecessary. Most clients will get to keep everything they own (one exception is if you own a nice car with a lot of equity in it - but most people don't, they are still making payments on their cars). There is little stigma, because who will know you filed for bankruptcy other than a few faceless creditors? Although bankruptcy is a public record, it's not published anywhere and the average member of the public does not have a login to federal court to find your filing. Finally, bankruptcy is not that expensive. I charge a low flat $995 fee for Chapter 7 (includes both spouses), plus the $299 court filing fee. Other than the cost of two required online financial classes (as cheap as $5 and $12.50), there are no other expenses (other bankruptcy attorneys may charge differently).

If you are paying huge bills every month to credit card, medical debt, or other dischargeable debt, you will never see that money again. Every day you put off bankruptcy is hundreds of dollars you could have saved. If you live in Arizona, set up a free consultation with us to get a better understanding.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-326-9116. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

How to get cash from your house through a reverse mortgage

I’m getting a lot of questions these days about “reverse mortgages,” which offer a way to unlock the equity in your home without selling it. The mounting interest in this topic speaks to the desperation many Americans feel as they struggle to fund increasingly long retirements.

In order to qualify for a reverse mortgage you must be 62 or older, own your home, have equity in that home, and can never have defaulted on a government loan. In addition, you must receive Home Equity Conversion Mortgage counseling before the loan can be consummated. The purpose of this last rule is to ensure you understand the unusual nature of the commitment you are making with a reverse mortgage.

Read the rest of the article from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution 

Occupy Oakland: Reality behind 'liberated' homes

On Tuesday, activists stood in front of two West Oakland foreclosures, proclaiming that they had "reclaimed" or "liberated" the properties as part of the "Occupy Our Homes" national day of action organized by the Occupy movement and community groups to highlight the foreclosure crisis.

In both cases, others with legal claims to the properties said they had suffered harm from the occupations and disputed aspects of the protesters' narratives.

Read the rest of the article at the San Francisco Chronicle

What went wrong with foreclosure aid programs?

The Obama administration's initial foreclosure-prevention programs, launched in early 2009, were intended to help 7 million to 9 million people. So far, they've aided about 2 million, and not all of those are out of foreclosure danger.

Programs begun later have also faltered. One intended to help at least 500,000 has helped just a few hundred a year after its launch. Another initiative to extend $1 billion to help the jobless or underemployed avoid foreclosure ended in September, obligating less than half of its funds. The unused money went back to the U.S. Treasury.

As of Nov. 30, the government had spent just $2.8 billion of the $46 billion war chest it had in 2009 to devote to the housing crisis, the Treasury Department says. More has been committed, but only $13 billion will ultimately be spent, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office estimated in March.

"There was nowhere near the effort to help Main Street as there was to help the banks," says former senator Ted Kaufman, D-Del., who chaired a congressional oversight panel that oversaw $475 billion in Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) funds. Most of that went to banks and the auto industry, but $46 billion in TARP money also funded foreclosure-prevention efforts.

Read the rest of the article at USA Today

Tips for Avoiding Foreclosure Aid Fraud

Phantom Help Scam
Rent to Buy Scam
Bait And Switch Scam

Read about these scams at Fox Business

Bankruptcies may offer hope for newspaper industry

I've covered many bankruptcies over the years, and last week was the first time I can remember a CEO calling the filing a "welcome event."
It was also the first time I've been an employee of a company that was headed into bankruptcy court. Lee Enterprises, which owns the Post-Dispatch, said Friday that it will make a prepackaged Chapter 11 filing on Dec. 12.
Chief Executive Mary Junck used the word "welcome" because the legal action will extend nearly $1 billion in debt that comes due in April. Most of the lenders have already agreed to new terms, so Lee expects to be in and out of court in 60 days. Unlike many bankrupt companies, Lee plans to pay all its bills, and shareholders' ownership will be diluted but not wiped out.

Read the rest of the article at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch

A First: Law Firm Finds New Life, Not Death, in Bankruptcy

A South Florida law firm recently used bankruptcy to do something no one in the legal industry has done before: sell itself to another firm.

Companies across corporate America, from Blockbuster to General Motors, have sought court protection while they try to sell continuing businesses to potential white knights. But until last week, law firms usually used bankruptcy to shut down.

So the $7.8 million cash-and-debt sale of midsize law firm Ruden McClosky out of bankruptcy to fellow South Florida law firm Greenspoon Marder made legal and bankruptcy history, as I reported in this WSJ story. What’s more, the deal will likely inspire other struggling law firms to turn to bankruptcy as a place to find new life rather than a place to die, restructuring professionals say.

Read the rest of the article at the Wall Street Journal

Saab to file for bankruptcy

Citing “several independent sources”, Swedish business daily Dagens Industri (DI) reported early on Monday that Saab's parent company Swedish Automobile (Swan) is expected to submit a bankruptcy petition on Monday afternoon to the Vännersborg District Court.

Read the rest of the article at The Local

The RoomStore files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy

The RoomStore Inc., the last vestige of former home furnishings giant Heilig-Meyers Co., filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection this morning.

The Goochland County-base chain listed $55.97 million in assets and $52.45 million in debts, according to its filing with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Richmond.

Read the full article at The Richmond-Times Dispatch

Filing bankruptcy in Arizona: Is my income too high?

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona ($995/Chapter 7) and clients are frequently worried they make too much money to file bankruptcy. The 2005 changes to federal bankruptcy laws put in place an income cap eligibility requirement for filing Chapter 7 (you can still file Chapter 13 with a higher income).

Generally, you cannot file Chapter 7 if you make above the median income for your state. In Arizona, the median income is $42,603 per person, and for a spouse it is a total of $55,404 for both.

However, that is not an absolute bar. If you have legitimate expenses that reduce your income, you may be able to fit under the cap. Legitimate expenses include things like child support or alimony, mandatory retirement taken out of your paycheck, healthcare expenses, insurance, educational materials, union dues, as well as payroll taxes.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-326-9116. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

CFPB Begins Collecting Reverse Mortgage Complaints, Will Take Action

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has begun collecting and fielding mortgage complaints from borrowers, including those with reverse mortgages, the Bureau has announced via its official blog. Officials have said this information will be used to guide rule making in the future when it comes to mortgage products.

So far, the bureau has a similar collection under way for credit card complaints, which it began in July following the bureau’s official launch.

“While we’ve only been able to accept complaints on credit cards right now, we’ll begin taking complaints and inquiries related to home mortgages on or about Dec. 1,” a blog post containing a report from the CFPB’s first three months of collecting credit card data stated. The complaint portal is now open.

Read the rest of the article from Reverse Mortgage Daily

Bank of America settles mortgage suit for $315 million

Bank of America agreed to pay $315 million to settle claims by investors that they were misled about mortgage-backed investments sold by its Merrill Lynch unit.

The class action lawsuit was led by the Public Employees' Retirement System of Mississippi pension fund. The fund claimed that the investments were backed by poor quality mortgages written by subprime lenders Countrywide Financial Corp., First Franklin Financial, and IndyMac Bancorp, a bank that failed in 2008.

Read the rest of the article at the Los Angeles Times

Study examines link between vacancies, foreclosures

The Government Accountability Office just released a study of nine cities in the US where there are a large percentage of vacant properties. According to the study, the city of Cape Coral's vacant properties are likely due to unemployment and purchases by investors.

The study was designed to look at the trends in vacant properties and how they relate to the increase in foreclosures. The study found in some cities, vacant foreclosed properties reduced the prices of nearby homes by $8,600 to $17,000.

Read the rest of the article at NBC 2

California, Nevada team up to investigate mortgage abuses

California and Nevada, which suffer the highest foreclosure rates in the country, will team up to investigate mortgage abuses by the nation's largest banks.

California Attorney General Kamala Harris joined Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto in Los Angeles today to announce the alliance, saying it will speed along dual investigations in the states, both among the nation's hardest hit by the mortgage fraud crisis.

The deal comes as the two states pulled out of nationwide settlement talks with the banks and have aggressively pursued independent investigations into the so-called "robo-signing" practices in which banks and mortgages servicers were accused of rubber stamping foreclosures without actually reviewing homeowners documents.

Harris has subpoenaed some of the nation's largest financial institutions such as Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Bank of America Corp. and Lender Processing Services Inc.

Last December, Masto sued Bank of America for violating a three-year-old loan modification agreement with the state over predatory lending policies by its Countrywide unit.

Read the rest of the article at the Sacramento Bee

Blame Jimmy Carter for American Airlines' Bankruptcy

Airline bankruptcies are a bit unusual in that they’re aimed more at labor unions than at creditors.

Read the rest of the article at Slate

American joins long list of airline bankruptcies

American Airlines on Tuesday joined a long list of airlines that have filed for bankruptcy protection. American was the only U.S. legacy airline that hadn't yet filed. Several airlines have filed multiple times; Delta and Northwest filed on the same day six years ago. There have been 189 total since 1990. Here's a look at some of the airlines which filed for bankruptcy protection or went out of business over the past two decades:

See the list of airlines at the Sacramento Bee

Will Bankruptcy Take Ex off the Mortgage?

Dear Bankruptcy Adviser,
I am divorced, and my ex-husband is on the deed to the house. I am unable to refinance my home, which was given to me through the divorce. Can I file bankruptcy, and would the bankruptcy judge order the lender to get his name off the mortgage?
-- Sheila

Read the answer at Fox Business

American Airlines' bankruptcy -- what could go wrong?

American's bankruptcy will have almost no immediate effect on consumers: That was my initial assessment before the actual announcement and it parallels what just about every other travel reporter and financial analyst has said since the announcement. But that doesn't mean there will be no effects, ever. Because of the timing, I couldn't get into print or online to cover the bankruptcy when it was first announced, but I can at least take a new look after a week's consideration.

First, to reiterate the "no change" aspect. If you have an American ticket, almost all of you will get where you're going. You shouldn't hesitate to buy a ticket for a future American flight, either -- that, too, will be likely to operate as advertised. And your frequent flyer stuff will also be OK -- your accrued miles, any award trips you've already booked, and your elite status. American will remain in the OneWorld alliance and it will continue its extensive British Airways partnership.

Read the rest of the article at the Orlando Sentinel

Facing bankruptcy, US Postal Service plans unprecedented cuts to first-class mail next spring

Already mocked by some as “snail mail,” first-class U.S. mail will slow even more by next spring under plans by the cash-strapped U.S. Postal Service to eliminate more than 250 processing centers. Nearly 30,000 workers would be laid off, too, as the post office struggles to respond to a shift to online communication and bill payments.

The cuts are part of $3 billion in reductions aimed at helping the agency avert bankruptcy next year. They would virtually eliminate the chance for stamped letters to arrive the next day, a change in first-class delivery standards that have been in place since 1971.

Read the rest of the article at the Washington Post

Filing Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Arizona: Help for veterans to keep their homes

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona ($995/Chapter 7) and was grateful to find out there are organizations that help veterans stay in their homes when they get behind in their payments. The nonprofit organization USA Cares assists post-911 veterans facing foreclosure.

The Veterans Administration also is making an effort to step up and work with veterans to save their homes, however some of the comments left after this article seem rather skeptical about the success they've had dealing with the VA.

Two Congressman introduced the Veterans' Homelessness Prevention and Early Warning Act of 2010 last year, Representative Tim Walz (D-MN) and Senator-elect John Boozman (R-AR). Veterans might try contacting their offices and asking for assistance or direction on where to go for help. Representative David Schweikert (R-AZ) is also assisting homeowners deal with their lenders.

In Orange County, the nonprofit Veterans First has helped numerous veterans. Daniel Foster, a wounded 23-year old army veteran who holds a purple heart and silver star, was unfairly facing foreclosure because there had been a mistake and he was not receiving benefits. Lenders had threatened to foreclose the day before Thanksgiving. Veterans First jumped in and with the help of an anonymous $12,000 donation, saved his home.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-326-9116. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

Wounded War Veteran Threatened With Foreclosure Receives Help

Donors have come to the aid of Daniel Foster, the 23-year-old wounded Army veteran who holds a Purple Heart and Silver Star but was facing foreclosure because he couldn't get his veterans benefits.
One donor, who asked to remain anonymous, wrote a check for $12,000, the amount Foster and his disabled father Rex Foster owe for delinquent mortgage payments for the family home in Costa Mesa. Lenders had threatened to foreclose the day before Thanksgiving.
In addition, other checks have been received for $10, $25, $100 and two checks for $500 since a Voice of OC article on Foster's ordeal was published on Veterans Day, said Deane Tate, president and CEO of the nonprofit Veterans First.

Read the rest of the article at Voice of OC

Filing Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Arizona: Banks can seize your account money if you owe money on a credit card

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona ($995/Chapter 7) and warn clients about getting behind on credit cards if they also have a bank account with that financial institution. Usually creditors need to obtain a judgment against you in order to collect past due money, and the entire process of taking you to court and then collecting usually takes a few months and you have forewarning.

But there is an exception if you have a bank account with the same financial institution you have a credit card with. When you signed up for your checking or savings account, the bank probably included language in the agreement which said that you granted them approval to seize funds in your accounts should you owe them money.

If you do start getting behind on credit card payments, the best thing to do is to close out your checking or savings accounts - including business accounts - with the bank, or withdraw all of your money from the accounts.

If more than $600 is frozen or seized, you may be able to get it back if you file bankruptcy within 90 days. Or the trustee may take the money that was seized and divide it up amongst all of your creditors.

This is what I want you to take away from this: DO NOT WAIT TO ACT if you get behind in your credit card payments and have a checking account with that bank.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-326-9116. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

Three Alleged Mortgage Scammers Arrested In California

Just one day after government authorities announced they would be bringing the hammer down on loan-modification scammers, three people have been arrested in California for allegedly defrauding homeowners looking to revise the terms of their mortgages.

Magdalena Salas, Angelina Mireles and Julissa Garcia, all of Stockton, California, were arrested Thursday and are being held at the San Joaquin County Jail, according to a release from the Office of the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or SIGTARP.

Salas, Mireles and Garcia are accused of multiple counts of conspiracy, false advertising, and grand theft of personal property. The SIGTARP release claims that the three collected thousands of dollars in fees from California homeowners who were hoping to modify their mortgages, but that the homeowners never got the help they were looking for, and that some of them ended up losing their homes.

Unsavory mortgage practices have become widespread since the onset of the housing crash, which has left countless homeowners trying to stay one step ahead of foreclosure -- presenting a prime opportunity for scammers who claim they can lower homeowners' payments.

Read the rest of the article at the Huffington Post

Over one in five mortgages are underwater, negative equity declining slightly

As of the third quarter, 10.7 million mortgages are underwater, 22.1 percent of all residential properties with a mortgage, according to CoreLogic. The number of homes with negative equity is down from 10.9 million in the second quarter.

Beyond those that are underwater, an additional 2.4 million borrowers a near-negative equity with under 5 percent equity in the third quarter. Near-negative equity homes and negative equity homes now account for 27.1 percent of all U.S. homes with a mortgage.

Nevada has the highest negative equity percentage with 58 percent of all of its mortgaged properties underwater, followed by Arizona (47 percent), Florida (44 percent), Michigan (35 percent) and for their first time featured in the top five is Georgia (30 percent).

Read the rest of the article at AG Beat

Fixer-Uppers Can Help Fix Foreclosure Mess, Stabilize Home Prices

While both the government and financial institutions like JPMorgan and Bank of America have managed to slow down the flow of foreclosures, it’s now time to move those homes through the process. It’s a crucial step in jump-starting housing construction, a critical engine of economic growth in the U.S.

So here are a few no-brainer solutions that could keep banks from retreating to the government, asking for bailouts we can no longer sustain.

Read the rest of the article at Forbes

Massachusetts AG Sues Big Banks over Robo-Signing

Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley sued five banks today for “deceptive and unlawful conduct” in foreclosures. Federal officials have attempted to get states to reach one grand settlement with the banks, but attorneys general have increasingly balked at that idea.

Coakley’s targets include Citigroup (C), Bank of America (BAC) JPMorgan Chase (JPM), Wells Fargo (WFC), and Ally Financial.

California, New York and Massachusetts have now split off from the larger pack of state prosecutors who are trying to come to a group deal. The states have been negotiating with the banks to secure a cash settlement for faulty foreclosure practices — expected to be about $25 billion — as well as possible reforms to foreclosure practices.

Read the rest of the article at Barron's

The Average Foreclosure Now Takes A Record 631 Days

The average foreclosure time in the U.S. has hit a record high of 631 days, according to Mortgage Monitor, a data-tracker analysis by LPS Applied Analytics.
That's nearly 21 months.
Time Moneyland's Alison Rogers attributes the startling statistic to several factors in the foreclosure process.
For example, lenders have started painstakingly reviewing foreclosures ever since the "robo-signing" scandal, in which borrowers accused financial institutions of moving foreclosures without following the proper protocol.

Read the rest of the article at Business Insider

Record number of homes in foreclosure

The foreclosure pipeline has never been more crammed, with lenders attempting to push 2.2 million homes through the process as of the end of October, according to a monthly report issued today by Lender Processing Services Inc.

Foreclosure starts jumped 5.7 percent from September to October, to 232,865, LPS said. But the report also showed significant improvement in the long-term outlook for foreclosures.

Read the rest of the article at Inman News

American Airlines bankruptcy could hit Tucson two ways

This week's Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing by AMR Corp., parent of American Airlines, could impact Tucson two ways - the more than one out of five passengers who fly the carrier out of Tucson International Airport and the 754 employees who work at its southwest reservations office.
For the immediate future, American is stressing that it is continuing operations as normal and no decisions have been made about employees, according to spokesman Tim Smith.

Read the rest of the article at Inside Tucson Business

GOP senator calls for investigation into MF Global bankruptcy

A top Senate Republican is demanding an independent investigation into how regulators monitored the financial firm MF Global, which recently underwent a massive bankruptcy.

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), the ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee, is also asking for a probe into the decision by Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Chairman Gary Gensler to recuse himself from the bankruptcy fallout, given his close ties to the firm's former head, ex-New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine.

In a letter sent Wednesday to the CFTC's Inspector General, Shelby asked for a report detailing how the CFTC monitored MF Global leading up to its high-profile failure, one of the largest in the nation's history.

The financial firm headed by the former state head and Democratic senator has come under particular scrutiny due to the fact that over a billion dollars in customer funds have gone missing, driving speculation that the firewall between customer funds and firm cash was breached in an attempt to keep the company afloat.

Read the rest of the article at The Hill

Enron Bankruptcy 10 Years Later: Before Bailouts Were Big

Ten years ago, on Dec. 2, 2001, the Enron Corp. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in what was then the largest corporate reorganization in U.S. history. Though just a decade ago, the Enron era in some ways seems to belong to another era—a time when failing companies met with bankruptcy rather than bailouts.

According to John Berlau, of the free-market-oriented Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), it was the Bear Stearns bailout in 2008 that “changed everything.” Berlau, who directs CEI’s Center for Investors and Entrepreneurs, told AdvisorOne the Enron failure “was of course devastating to employees, but it didn’t really hurt the larger economy.”

In today’s “culture of bailouts,” Enron might well have been seen as “too big to fail,” according to Berlau. Enron had a substantial $63 billion in assets at the time of its Chapter 11 filing. “With Enron," he said, "you could make the case it was as systemically important as Bear."

Read the rest of the article at Advisor One

Pension Turbulence the Reason for American Airlines Bankruptcy?

Did pension plan turbulence cause the crash of AMR Corp, the parent company of American Airlines?

This is the question posed by many in the industry, including Jon Waite, Director of Investment Management Advice of SEI Institutional Group, who notes that the bankruptcy exposes the challenge of providing a legacy benefit in an industry where the competition is not doing the same.

General Motors —perhaps the symbol of the deteriorating affect of pension debts on corporate profits—was not created as a pension plan, yet its pension grew to dwarf its core business, and like many plan sponsors, the scheme has become a legacy problem. Similarly, early signs are indicating that the four underfunded pension plans of AMR Corp. were a significant factor in the company’s decision to file for bankruptcy.

Read the rest of the article at Asset International

Newspaper publisher Lee to file for bankruptcy

Lee Enterprises Inc., the owner of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and one of the largest newspaper publishers in the country, announced Friday that it will file for bankruptcy on or about Dec. 12 after efforts to work out an out-of-court refinancing deal with its lenders failed.

In a news release, Lee Enterprises, based in Davenport, Iowa, said that filing a "prepackaged" Chapter 11 bankruptcy plan would allow the company to restructure its debts and exit bankruptcy in sixty days or less.

The publisher said the bankruptcy will have no impact on its business. Vendors, advertisers, subscribers, employees and the company's operations will not be affected.

Read the rest of the article at the Los Angeles Times

Filing bankruptcy to afford Christmas?

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona ($995/Chapter 7) and know that society has really gotten out of hand when clients tell me they need to file bankruptcy now in order to afford Christmas. The pressure that is put on families to buy gifts for everyone has grown to an alarming level. If you don't buy presents for family members, close friends, co-workers, etc., people think there is something wrong with you. I would say that Jesus would be rolling over in his grave if he knew what had happened to the original meaning of Christmas, but he rose again and instead is looking down shaking his head.

This is the worst economy in years, and everyone is either underemployed, out of a job, or knows lots of people who are. Ironically, many of those underemployed are working for retailers this Christmas season, and need people to buy gifts. Sort of a catch-22. The stores are not going to let up on the pressure to buy-buy-buy.

If you are going to consider filing bankruptcy in order to afford Christmas, keep in mind the bankruptcy trustee will look long and hard at any large expenditures made around the bankruptcy filing. Bankruptcy is not supposed to be a license to spend freely. Everything should be done in moderation, and that includes buying presents at Christmas. Don't succumb to the pressure to be like Mr. and Mrs. Smith down the street.

Here are some ideas for inexpensive Christmas gifts:

http://collectibles.about.com/od/auctionsandshopping1/tp/twentygiftsforundertwenty.htm
http://www.redbookmag.com/kids-family/advice/inexpensive-Christmas-gift
http://www.coolchristmaspresents.org/inexpensive-christmas-gifts-cheap-christmas-gifts-theyll-love.html
http://www.moneyunder30.com/cheap-gifts-53-inexpensive-christmas-gifts
http://www.betterbudgeting.com/articles/money/63giftsunder10dollars.htm
http://www.mydollarplan.com/inexpensive-christmas-gifts/

Here are some tips for dealing with children who expect a lot of presents for Christmas. I found the book above which offers an in-depth explanation of why buying presents for Christmas is a bad idea.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-326-9116. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

Cheap Mortgages Aren't Helping Housing Market

Despite near-record lows for interest rates and a glut of houses available for sale, Americans simply are not lining up to purchase new or used homes.

According to Freddie Mac (FMCC) average mortgage rates remained below 4 percent for the fourth consecutive week. The current rate, which hovers around 3.98 percent, should be a positive factor in driving the housing market.

People can’t get refinanced if they’re upside down on their mortgage. That’s why the news that we’re near record-lows for interest rates isn’t going to do much for housing sales.

Read the rest of the article at Forbes

Help for the underwater homeowner: HARP 2.0

Who is eligible?

1. Your loan must be owned or guaranteed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac.

2. Your loan must have been sold to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac before April 1, 2009.

3. You haven’t already refinanced under HARP or you refinanced under the program between March and May 2009.

4. Your loan-to-value ratio must be higher than 80 percent.

5. You haven’t been late with a mortgage payment

6. You’re refinancing your primary residence.

7. You must benefit.

Read the rest of the article at Gaston Gazette

Fannie, Freddie caused the financial crisis

Efforts to blame the banks for the financial crisis are failing because they are not supported by data. The key fact is that, by 2008, before the crisis, half of the 54 million mortgages in the U.S. financial system were subprime and other low-quality mortgages.

More than 70% of these 27 million weak mortgages were on the books of government agencies, primarily the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. When these mortgages defaulted in unprecedented numbers, they drove down housing prices, weakened most large financial institutions and caused the financial crisis.

Read the rest of the article at USA Today

Moving beyond Freddie and Fannie

The term “permanent conservatorship” is an oxymoron. By its very construct, the conservatorship of a corporation is meant to be temporary. And yet three years after the bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, we are no closer to transitioning them off government life support than we were the day in 2008 when they came under direct government control.

This is unacceptable.

Read the rest of the article at The Washington Post

Occupy protesters squat on Oakland foreclosure property

Anti-Wall Street demonstrators in Oakland, evicted from three public spaces in recent weeks, have set up camp on a privately owned vacant lot as they look to regain momentum for their protests.

The so-called Occupy Oakland activists, touting their latest move as a bid to rescue a piece of property from foreclosure, said the owner of the lot was allowing them to stay. But the owner, Gloria Cobb, would not confirm she gave her permission.

Read the rest of the article at Reuters

Banks will hold off on some holiday foreclosures

Got an e-mail from Wells Fargo responding to my column this week suggesting that banks consider a moratorium on home foreclosure activities, at least during the holiday season.

"Wells Fargo is suspending eviction actions from Nov. 23 to Nov. 25, and again from Dec. 19 to Jan. 2, 2012. We will not physically evict or conduct lockouts on the foreclosed properties in our owned portfolio during these times," said a Wells Fargo spokeswoman.

Read the rest of the article at the San Francisco Chronicle

Mortgage servicers making progress on fixing bad foreclosures

Banks and mortgage servicers are making progress in improving their processes and contacting homeowners hurt by invalid or flawed foreclosures, the Office of the U.S. Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) reported.

Under the consent decrees, banks were required to hire consultants to identify borrowers who improperly lost their homes, failed to get loans rewritten or were forced into court in 2009 and 2010 because of mistakes made by mortgage servicers or their vendors.

Mortgage servicers this month began contacting borrowers who may have suffered financial injury from errors and misrepresentations.

The companies also established a central website to help borrowers contact servicers and file claims.

Companies including JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup and Wells Fargo were part of the April accord.

Read the rest of the article at the Seattle Times

Bankruptcy filings in Phoenix area keep falling

Bankruptcy filings in the Phoenix metropolitan area continue to drop.

Filings in October rose slightly from September, but fell 22 percent from October 2010. That's the ninth consecutive month of year-over-year declines.

The Arizona Republic says filings are down 13 percent for the year to date, compared with the first 10 months of 2010.

The same trends are apparent across Arizona, where statewide filings fell 23 percent in October and the year-to-date numbers are down 13 percent.

Read the rest of the article at KPHO

Bankruptcies Fall 8% in Fiscal 2011

U.S. bankruptcies fell 8 percent in the year through September to 1.47 million as consumers reduced debt and fewer businesses sought to reorganize or liquidate, the American Bankruptcy Institute said.
Business bankruptcies declined 18 percent in the first nine months of the year, with Chapter 7 filings down 18 percent and Chapter 11 reorganizations decreasing 22 percent from the same period in 2010, the ABI said today, citing data from the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. Business bankruptcies include filings under Chapters 7, 11, 12 and 13, ABI said.
Consumer filings fell 11 percent to 1.06 million in the January to September period, according to the data cited by ABI in a statement. Nevada remained the state with the highest per capita filing rate in the U.S., at 9.7 per 1,000 residents.

Read the rest of the article at Bloomberg

Understanding bankruptcy

Chapter 7 is the most prevalent personal bankruptcy. It includes no repayment plan. Chapter 13 bankruptcy, also known as the "wage earner's plan," allows people with regular income to develop a plan to repay all or part of their debts.

"If you don't have a source of income, you will not qualify to file Chapter 13," Erickson said. "If you are unemployed but can make mortgage and car payments, you can file Chapter 7."

While you can keep your house in Chapter 7, unsecured debt such as credit card debt will be discharged, he said. But debt acquired within 90 days of filing may be excluded — an assurance that you won't go on a shopping spree, which was common under prior bankruptcy laws.

Read the rest of the article at the Chicago Tribune

Bankruptcy of Ireland's former richest man challenged

The Irish Bank Resolution Corporation (IBRC), formerly Anglo Irish Bank, launched a formal application on Thursday to overturn the bankruptcy declaration made by Ireland's former richest man, Sean Quinn.

IBRC wants to claw back as much money as it can from Quinn and is arguing that the insolvency proceedings should be annulled as the centre of Quinn's main interest was not in Northern Ireland.

Read the rest of the article at Reuters

Mortgage Insurer PMI Group Files for Bankruptcy

Mortgage insurer PMI Group Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Wednesday after an Arizona judge rejected its bid to overturn the October seizure of its mortgage-insurance unit by state regulators.

Read the rest of the article at the Wall Street Journal

Filing a Subsequent Chapter 7 or Chapter 13 Bankruptcy

With our country still in the midst of the "Great Recession," it is becoming more common for people to find themselves in need of additional bankruptcy protection long after an initial filing. The highly publicized 2005 amendments to the United States' bankruptcy laws (known as the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act or "BAPCPA") changed the way in which subsequent bankruptcy filings were handled in an attempt to prevent so-called "serial bankruptcies." It is still possible for an individual to seek a second or even third bankruptcy, but there is a mandatory waiting period.

Read the rest of the article at Digital Journal

Bankruptcy: Debtor's downfall and trustee's boon?

The country's shattered economy has driven many a distressed debtor to bankruptcy court for relief.
Yet their creditors may walk away with nothing because of costs claimed by some bankruptcy trustees administering the estates.
Those bankruptcy trustees, who are appointed by the U.S. Trustee Program and are allowed to appoint themselves as attorney as well, argue that pocketing money recovered from debtors without disbursing any to creditors is within the law.
Some highly placed bankruptcy attorneys in Northwest Indiana, however, say the practice — especially with estates of less than $5,000 — is an abuse of the system.


Read the rest of the article at NWITimes.com

Harrisburg, PA Bankruptcy Petition Thrown Out of Court by Judge

Harrisburg’s bankruptcy case was thrown out by a judge who ruled the city council wasn’t authorized to file the petition for Pennsylvania’s capital.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Mary D. France held a hearing today in Harrisburg on whether the council violated state laws last month when a majority opted to file under Chapter 9 of the bankruptcy code. Mayor Linda D. Thompson opposed the filing.

“For Chapter 9 bankruptcy to work, all of the branches of the municipality must be on the same page,” France said. “Therefore I find that city council was not authorized to file the petition on Oct. 11.”

Read the rest of the article at the Washington Post

Filing bankruptcy in Arizona: Does the flat fee cover everything?

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona ($995/Chapter 7) and frequently clients are confused about the pricing. Some bankruptcy attorneys advertise a flat fee, but end up charging extra for things like phone calls, emails, and more complicated bankruptcies. At the Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm, we don't do any of that. What you see is what you get. We fully disclose on our website homepage that the only additional costs are the court filing fee ($299 for Chapter 7) and the two mandatory credit counseling classes (which you can take online cheaply for as low as $5 and $12). We don't charge extra for more complicated bankruptcies.

Many clients who don't have the full amount of money ready to pay us can make payments up until the filing date. We accept virtually all kinds of payment; credit cards, checks, money orders, etc. If you're looking for a competitively priced personal bankruptcy law firm, check us out.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-326-9116. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

Filing bankruptcy in Arizona: Stopping calls from creditors and debt collectors

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona ($995/Chapter 7) and one thing my clients are relieved to hear is that annoying calls from debt collectors stop when they file for bankruptcy. In fact, as soon as a client meets with me and retains me, I have him or her refer all these kinds of phone calls to me.

Occasionally I encounter a persistent debt collector who refuses to comply with the law, and continues to call clients right up until they file. Debt collectors are subject to a $1000 fine if they violate the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. This Act provides that debt collectors who are collecting on behalf of a first creditor must stop calling when asked in writing (I've noticed that usually they will comply if you ask them over the phone). This means if you incurred a debt with a bank, but a collection agency is now collecting on behalf of the bank, the collection agency must stop (this does not appear to apply to third parties like subsequent banks who have assumed the debt in course of business, not just for the specific purpose of debt collection, however). Debt collectors who flaunt the law should be reported to the Better Business Bureau, your state Attorney General's Office, and the FTC.

Original creditors are not covered by the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. However, some states have even stricter laws in this area that restrict original creditors. Arizona does not appear to be one of them.

It has been my experience that even most original creditors will stop harassing phone calls to clients once I notify them that a client will be filing bankruptcy. Unfortunately, once in awhile there is a rude creditor who refuses to leave my clients alone. Wells Fargo is one of them. This is not surprising considering Wells Fargo's arrogance and treatment of homeowners while getting preferential treatment by the government. Until they reign in their practices, they will continue to be the focus of the Occupy protesters' and others' anger.

For more information, click here and here. One of these websites explains how you can block creditors' phone calls with Anonymous Call Rejection.


The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-326-9116. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

Filing Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Arizona: Bankruptcy is actually a good deal

I am a bankruptcy lawyer in Arizona ($995/Chapter 7) and have observed that most people hear the word "bankruptcy" and think of it as something terrible, that will involve losing many of their assets and leave them with a devastating credit score that will affect their ability to do everything from lease to obtaining new credit.

The truth? Almost almost all of my clients are able to keep EVERYTHING they own when they file Chapter 7. The bankruptcy code protects a certain level of property - your home, car, home furnishings, pension, etc. As long as you are not wealthy, you will very likely end up keeping everything.

A year after filing bankruptcy, most clients' credit scores actually INCREASE by 100 points. The reason is all the bad debt is removed from their credit reports, and replaced by just one bankruptcy. After filing for bankruptcy, my clients start receiving offers of credit in the mail immediately. They may not have great interest rates, but they will improve.

Finally, most people will never know that you filed for bankruptcy. Other than the creditors you owe money to, it is not something that is published. Most people don't have a login to look up your bankruptcy in federal court records. Unless you're planning on becoming really famous or running for political office, there is very little chance anyone will ever know.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-326-9116. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

U.S. House Backs FHA Loan-Limit Boost Over Republican Objections

The U.S. House of Representatives approved higher limits for mortgages backed by the Federal Housing Administration, bypassing the objections of Republicans who said the increase could threaten the agency’s stability.

Lawmakers voted today for increasing the limit to $729,750 as part of a $182 billion spending bill that included funding for the government through Dec. 16. The legislation, approved in a 298-121 vote, was opposed by 101 members of the House’s Republican majority, some of whom said they opposed the measure primarily because of the loan-limit increase.

Read the rest of the article at Businessweek

Fewer mortgages going bad but foreclosures expected to increase

Fewer home loans are in trouble these days, but despite some improvements, the nation is not even halfway through cleaning up the foreclosure mess, industry experts said.

It could take three or four years to return to a typical pattern of delinquencies and foreclosures, the Mortgage Bankers Assn. said in releasing its quarterly delinquency report Thursday.

Read the rest of the article at The Los Angeles Times

Google yanks alleged mortgage scammers' ads

The alleged scammers preyed on homeowners seeking to lower their mortgages through a program created by the bailout. The program, known as the Home Affordable Modification Program, offers homeowners who are having difficulty paying their mortgages a way to alter their payments to ease the burden.

Read the rest of the article at MSN

California attorney general's office subpoenas Fannie, Freddie

Information is sought on the mortgage giants' roles as landlords who own thousands of foreclosed properties in California. Also sought are details of their mortgage-servicing and home-repossession practices, a source says.

Read the rest of the article at Los Angeles Times

8% of NJ Mortgage Holders in Foreclosure Process

About one in 12 New Jersey mortgage holders were in the foreclosure process in the third quarter, reflecting a backlog caused by the “robo-signing” mess, the Mortgage Bankers Association said Thursday

About 8 percent of mortgages are in the foreclosure process in the Garden State, compared with 4.4 percent nationwide, the mortgage trade group said.

In addition, about 3.8 percent of New Jersey mortgage holders, and 3.5 percent of U.S. mortgage holders, are “seriously delinquent” — 90 days or more late on their payments, the group said. Housing counselors say many homeowners can’t pay their mortgages because they’ve lost their jobs.

Read the rest of the article at LoanSafe.org

Ask a real estate pro: The foreclosure process, in simple terms

Q: I read in the paper that the banks are starting the foreclosures again. I just got served with a foreclosure lawsuit. Can you explain the process in layman's terms?

Read the answer at Sun-Sentinel

Foreclosure Crisis Is Far From Over, Report Finds

Five years in, the nation is less than halfway through its foreclosure crisis, the nonpartisan Center for Responsible Lending warned in a report released Thursday.

"For people that think we're out of the woods, they need to kind of rethink that premise," said Roberto Quercia, director of the Center for Community Capital at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and one of the study's authors.

Roughly 42.2 million Americans took out a mortgage loan between 2004 and 2008. By February of this year, 2.7 million of those households, or 6.4 percent, had lost their home to foreclosure. CRL estimates that an additional 3.6 million households, or 8.3 percent, are at "immediate, serious risk" of losing their homes.

And that estimate is probably lowballing the problem, the researchers said: CRL's research only extends through February 2011, and it excludes both loans originated outside the given time-frame and loans that are not yet seriously delinquent.

What exactly is pushing homeowners to the brink? Researchers found the type of mortgage a borrower has can have a greater impact on the borrower's ability to stay in their home than even income or credit history.

Read the rest of the article at the Huffington Post

Couple's plight shows toll of foreclosure crisis

Ocea and Alicia Rice never thought they'd have to depend on food stamps or TennCare to survive. They never thought they'd face homelessness, either, but with her out of work and their College Street home foreclosed on, life on the streets is beckoning.

"Physically, I would not last one night," says Ocea, who is disabled, sitting on the couch with his wife, holding hands as tears roll down her face while they describe their experience.

Read the rest of the article at DNJ.com

11 Reasons Occupy Wall Street Should Become Occupy Foreclosure

Hear me out here... I'm not the most sympathetic toward the Occupy movement, but occupying foreclosures has the following benefits:

Real shelter means fewer deaths (as long as they don't do drugs).
The action is directly related to the financial sector (although they would quickly discover that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are bigger culprits than Goldman Sachs).
It would be genuinely disruptive to the financial sector. Don't fool yourselves, sleeping in a park is more disruptive to a bagel shop than to a hedge fund manager.
Far less impact on small businesses whose owners just want to make ends meet.

Read the rest of the article here

Should Occupy Wall Street become Occupy Foreclosures?

An argument for occupying foreclosures. But if you separate out the anarchists, mentally unbalanced, homeless and hipsters, there might not be much of a movement left — certainly not many protesters who would want the unglamorous task of occupying a house and keeping it up.

Read the rest of the article at The American

First Criminal Charges Filed in Association with Robo-Signing Scheme

In a statement, Nevada Deputy Attorney General John Kelleher said the grand jury found probable cause that a robo-signing scheme initiated by the two individuals resulted in the filing of tens of thousands of fraudulent documents.

Robo-signing is an act that came to light last year when it was discovered that major mortgage servicers had been completing the foreclosure process without first presenting notary public-verified sworn affidavits to courts as required by their states. Instead, they issued foreclosures with falsified, computer-generated signatures.
The illegal act is believed to have been responsible for thousands of wrongful foreclosures nationwide over the past few years. In fact, experts say the act has crippled the already troubled housing market by creating a backlog of foreclosures that now could take decades to clear out.

Read the rest of the article at GoBankingRates.com

Foreclosures rise, late payments fall in quarter

U.S. lenders started foreclosures on more properties in the third quarter, the first increase in a year, as a backlog stemming from claims of faulty home seizures began to ease.

New foreclosures rose to 1.08 percent of all loans from 0.96 percent in the prior three months, according to a report Thursday from the Mortgage Bankers Association. The rate had been falling since the third quarter of 2010, when regulators began investigating robo-signing, the practice of pushing through unverified paperwork.

Several of the nation's largest banks called a temporary halt to foreclosures at the end of last year while they addressed claims of flaws in their court documents. The moratoriums clogged the foreclosure pipeline as banks investigated their procedures, said Patrick Newport, an economist at IHS Global Insight.

Read the rest of the article at the San Francisco Chronicle

Fewer mortgages going bad but foreclosures expected to increase

Fewer home loans are in trouble these days, but despite some improvements, the nation is not even halfway through cleaning up the foreclosure mess, industry experts said.

It could take three or four years to return to a typical pattern of delinquencies and foreclosures, the Mortgage Bankers Assn. said in releasing its quarterly delinquency report Thursday.

An economist for the trade group declined to estimate how many households had lost their homes since the mortgage meltdown four years ago, or how many more foreclosures were to come.

Read the rest of the article at the Los Angeles Times

Top House Democrat demands explanation of penalties for late foreclosures

A top House Democrat is questioning why government-controlled Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac charged mortgage servicers millions of dollars in penalties for not moving fast enough on foreclosures.

House Overnight and Government Reform Committee ranking member Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) sent a letter Wednesday to Edward DeMarco, acting director of Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), the regulator of Fannie and Freddie, requesting information about $150 million in fees the troubled mortgage giants charged mortgage servicing companies last year exceeding foreclosures timelines.

Read the rest of the article at The Hill

Lawmakers Contradict on Speeding up Foreclosures

So according to one committee member, it's bad to push the servicers to ramp up foreclosures, but another thinks it's good to push the judges to rubber stamp them faster? I realize these are two different lawmakers from two different sides of the aisle, but seriously folks, are fines/funding threats really the answer?

Read the full article at CNBC

How do you know when it's time to file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in Arizona?

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona ($995 Chapter 7) and often get asked when should someone consider bankruptcy. Generally the rule of thumb is when you can no longer afford your bills, and are accumulating more debt than you are paying off. If you have more than $10,000 in credit card debt, medical bills, etc. and find yourself in this situation, you should consult with a bankruptcy attorney. The longer you put it off, the more money you lose. For example, if you are trying to make $800 payments on your debt each month, that is $800 each month you will never see again. Whereas if you file for bankruptcy now, you can stop the payments now. For most people, there is no good reason to put it off.

Another factor to take into consideration is your home and car. If you file for bankruptcy, an automatic stay goes into effect which protects creditors from seizing your home or car even if you are a couple of payments late (provided you do not have over the legal limit of equity in each). As long as you keep current on your payments, you will be able to keep your home and car. But if you start getting behind on your payments now, there is nothing to stop your auto lender or home lender from seizing your property in the near future. After you miss three months of payments on your home, many lenders will start foreclosure proceedings immediately. If you are in that situation, it is best to file bankruptcy ASAP to protect your home and/or car.

Is FHA the next housing bailout?

Yes, is the answer to the question posed in the title of this report. That will seem a brave conclusion to some, given that the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) has not needed a direct recapitalization from Congress since its founding over three-quarters of century ago. However, it is highly likely, given FHA's current condition.
FHA's present state is precarious. For the past two years, it has been in violation of its most important capital reserve regulation, under which it is supposed to hold sufficient reserves against unexpected future losses on its existing insurance-in-force. To be barely compliant with this rule would have required just over a $12 billion capital infusion in fiscal year 2010, and that presumes that future losses are not being underestimated by FHA. This report suggests that they are by many tens of billions of dollars, so that the recapitalization required will be at least $50 billion, and likely much more, even if housing markets do not deteriorate unexpectedly.

Read the rest of the article at the American Enterprise Institute

Rich Neighborhoods Riddled With Foreclosures

Victoria Gotti, the reality TV star and daughter of infamous mob don John Gotti, made headlines in 2009 as the latest high-profile homeowner facing foreclosure. According to the New York Post, Zillow.com and others, she had stopped making mortgage payments to lender JP Morgan on her Long Island, N.Y., estate, which she had put up for sale the prior year, finding no takers at an asking price of $3.9 million. The home, in the tony neighborhood of Old Westbury, originally cost close to $4.1 million. Two years later, she’s still in the house–now listed for $2.9 million with Sotheby’s International Realty.

Read the rest of the article at Forbes

Update on Home Foreclosure Mediation

Here is another update on the development and operation of foreclosure mediation programs throughout the United States written by Mediate.com

Read the rest of the article at Mediate.com

Mass. pressed to reject 50-state foreclosure deal

Massachusetts housing advocates and victims of the housing crisis are pressing Attorney General Martha Coakley to reject a settlement over foreclosure abuses that federal officials and other state attorneys general are negotiating with major U.S. banks.

Critics of the resolution are scheduled to gather at the Statehouse in Boston on Tuesday to rally against a reported $20-billion settlement they say amounts to "a slap on the wrist" for financial institutions whose practices fueled the economic crisis.

Read the rest of the article at the Boston Herald

Freddie Blacklists New York’s Biggest Foreclosure Firm

The past few weeks have been grim for Steven J. Baum PC, New York’s largest foreclosure firm.

There were those photos, published in the New York Times, that depicted firm employees mocking victims of the mortgage crisis. And that $2 million settlement with the U.S. Attorney’s office in Manhattan over errors in the firm’s legal filings in state and federal court.

Now, more bad news: National mortgage servicing giant Freddie Mac has blacklisted the firm.

Read the rest of the article at the Wall Street Journal

Cain accuser's past includes financial troubles

Her motives and personal history under scrutiny, the woman who publicly has accused Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain of groping her inside a parked car in July 1997 says she came forward out of duty.

Cain rejected Sharon Bialek's claims as "totally fabricated," with his campaign pointedly noting her history of bankruptcies, unpaid debts and legal troubles.

"I tried to remember if I recognized her, and I didn't," Cain said at a Tuesday news conference. "I tried to remember if I remembered that name, and I didn't. The charges and allegations, I absolutely reject. They simply didn't happen."

Read the rest of the article at the Wall Street Journal

Bankruptcies Fall 8% in Fiscal 2011

U.S. bankruptcies fell 8 percent in the year through September to 1.47 million as consumers reduced debt and fewer businesses sought to reorganize or liquidate, the American Bankruptcy Institute said.
Business bankruptcies declined 18 percent in the first nine months of the year, with Chapter 7 filings down 18 percent and Chapter 11 reorganizations decreasing 22 percent from the same period in 2010, the ABI said today, citing data from the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. Business bankruptcies include filings under Chapters 7, 11, 12 and 13, ABI said.
Consumer filings fell 11 percent to 1.06 million in the January to September period, according to the data cited by ABI in a statement. Nevada remained the state with the highest per capita filing rate in the U.S., at 9.7 per 1,000 residents.

Read the rest of the article at Bloomberg

Behind on Mortgage in Bankruptcy. What Now?

Dear Bankruptcy Adviser,

We are three years into a Chapter 13 bankruptcy, and we have had issues with our house. We have fallen behind on our mortgage since filing, and we have also not paid our real estate (property) taxes. We are not sure what to do or if there is any way to turn this around. Should we let the house go?

- Mike

Read the answer on Fox Business

Don't wait until the last minute if your home is near foreclosure!

I am a bankruptcy attorney in Arizona, and try to help clients in danger of having their homes foreclosed. Once you file for bankruptcy, the automatic stay goes into place and your lender cannot foreclose on you. It is important after the bankruptcy is discharged to catch up with your payments or work out a deal with your lender if you want to keep your home.

Recently we encountered something new and disturbing with lenders trying to foreclose on clients' homes. Lenders like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that aren't able to find a buyer for foreclosure are instead taking ownership of homes that are more than three months behind in payments, and telling the homeowners they can "rent" their homes for a brief period of time before being evicted. If a homeowner has not filed for bankruptcy yet, they may lose their home. There is an appeal process however when this happens, and I recommend that any homeowner in this situation look into this.

So just because your home was put up for foreclosure sale and no one bid on it, does not mean you can breathe for awhile. Your lender may take possession of your home the next day instead. If you find yourself in this position and have been considering filing bankruptcy and want to save your home, do not hesitate, file bankruptcy ASAP.

The Alexander Bankruptcy Law Firm provides low low cost Chapter 7 and 13 personal bankruptcies. $995 Chapter 7 or $2500 Chapter 13 bankruptcies plus court filing fee. Free consultation with a compassionate attorney who will handle your case personally. Call 24/7, available to meet with you around your schedule. 602-326-9116. Conveniently located in Central Phoenix along the Camelback corridor. AlexanderBankruptcyLawFirm.com

Occupy Bankruptcy!

Bankruptcy, on a personal, business, and nationwide scale, is the agent of this flexibility in the financial sphere, and bankruptcy laws need to be as liberal and generous to the borrower as possible. This ensures that the lenders, the wealthy and the investment banks, actually accept their share of the risk. They are the ones getting the high rate of return on their money, and you shouldn't get to do that without a gamble.

Read the rest of the article at the Huffington Post

Yes, there’s life after bankruptcy

Question: Why were they declared bankrupt?

Answer: In the majority of  cases,  they have defaulted on their payments,  especially vehicle loans, personal loans and housing loans. It has become so easy to get a loan now, especially car loans.

Car dealers and financial institutions offer such attractive deals that buyers do not even have to put down a deposit to secure a loan. But some of  these borrowers do not have the financial means to service the loans. So, when they are unable to make  payments  after some time, the banks can repossess the car and institute bankruptcy  proceedings to recover the loans.
Do you know that people like (president Dwight D.) Eisenhower and Donald Trump were bankrupt before?

Read the rest of the article at New Straits Times