The U.S Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit, recently ruled that on the means test’s Form B22A, a vehicle ownership expense is allowed even when the debtor has no car payment. The court’s ruling in In re Tate, No. 08-60953 (5th Cir. June 10, 2009), agrees with the only other circuit court opinion on this issue, In re [...]
June 2009
Privacy about our personal lives declines further as credit card companies get more information about us. Now, in order to increase credit card collections, they are training employees to bond with people, and connect emotionally, to get us to pay them. As new Federal Reserve Rules, effective next year, restrict some of the abusive practices [...]
High rate loans continue to plague consumers. But, new legislation, introduced by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse from Rhode Island, will limit creditors from collecting on high-interest loans in bankruptcy court. The bill has gone to the Senate Judiciary Committee for review, according to an article from Bloomberg. As proposed, this bill, the “Consumer Credit Fairness Act,” [...]
Strange as it may seem, you can end up with a tax bill if you settle a debt for less than the full amount due or if your home, or other property, is foreclosed or sold without full payment of the loans against it. Federal tax law provides for tax on debt that is canceled [...]
Conventional wisdom and prudent financial planning caution against borrowing against a 401(k) retirement account for anything other than emergencies.  A post by Dana Wilkinson on Bankruptcy Law Network similarly urges caution in using 401(k) loans to pay off dischargeable credit card debt. Now, given last year’s overwhelming decline in investment portfolio value, people who borrowed [...]
The Eighth Circuit Bankruptcy Appellate Panel recently reversed a Minnesota bankruptcy court’s ruling that under Minnesota law, a chapter 7 trustee was not entitled to $90,000 which had been mistakenly deposited by a bank president into the debtor’s bank account before he filed bankruptcy. The bankruptcy court had ruled that because the deposit was a mistake, [...]
