Business Bankruptcy Law | Small Business Bankruptcy Laws

My in-laws purchased a home and got a loan under my wife’s name prior to us getting married. They used my wife’s name because they weren’t able to get a loan themselves. They make all the payments on the home. My wife and I don’t live there nor do we have any intention of living there as it’s in a bad location. I had no idea about it until after we were already married.

The in-laws are close to losing their business and can barely pay their bills. A bankruptcy seems imminent and i’m pretty sure the house which is mortgaged under my wife’s name will be foreclosed. Is there anything I can do to protect my wife and myself against this? If it makes a difference they just transferred the Deed to my mom in-law, but the loan isn’t. The home is worth 0k and they still owe 0k since they’ve been making interest only payments.

I worked really hard to get my credit score over 800. I want my own house!!! I couldn’t even qualify for any of the first time home buyer programs because of what my in-laws did under my wife’s name.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. My brother suggested divorcing my wife (just on paper) so I can at least avoid ruining my credit.

My husband and I filed bankruptcy in 2007 due to my failed business; he has always been steadily employed but just traded up to a new, better job. I have been working at a law office for more than a year now, and we have a credit score of about 643. We have never missed rent, and have excellent landlord references. We would like to move closer to my husband’s work, but I am worried about our credit score effecting our chances (we are in our 40s by the way – quiet, no children, but have cats). I am trying to get an idea of how difficult it will be to get approved with a new landlord in Marin County (Novato area). Any suggestions/opinions?

My question is, how do I get out of a checking account that i co-signed, never used, don’t even know the account number, and now it has been reported to ChexSystems. My own personal accounts for 11 years are closing because my step dad had a negative balance, and ChexSystems has reported it to my accounts. Overdraft fees that he never paid had snowballed to a whopping 0. I never got notices or phone calls from the bank he owed…and don’t get me started with credit cards. I am 000 in debt all because of him. He hid these cards from me until they were in the verge of going thru collections…I have a great job, I’ve always paid my bills on time and had a good credit score…now, I’m forced into bankruptcy (Chapter 13) and he has left me in the dark. How do I stop my own banks from closing my personal accounts? Thank you so much in advance for answering my questions.
By the way, my step dad doesn’t have anything on his name. To be honest, he went to jail for 3 years for fraud. I thought he changed and I wanted to help him put his life back together. Biggest mistake of my life.

I have recently raised my credit score from very poor to poor. I have 4 credit cards that I pay off every month, which has raised my credit score significantly. I am starting my own business and need to apply for a specific kind of license. However, because of this thing, I can’t apply for this license until it is paid off. This thing was left on my by my exhusband. I’ve tried to make him pay but he won’t and the courts says I am responsible since my name is the primary. I was in chapter 13 bankruptcy for 3 years. I had it dismissed when i dismissed my husband. I think that why I keep getting denied. Just because the bankruptcy is on my credit. The banks never ask if it is dismissed or discharged. Can anyone help? I have been denied by the following:
Prosper
CitiFinancial
American General
HSBC
Cash Call
E loan
Bank of America
and the list goes on. Please help. LEGITIMATE HELP PLEASE.

Thank you

I understand that business credit is different than personal and that at first many entrepreneurs personal credit is their business credit at first or at least the basis thereof. My question is, if you open a business is there any effect on your personal credit score? The reason for the inquiry is my personal credit score is decent about 700 but is falling because of a high debt ratio. So, because of the high debt ratio, lately no credit cards will touch me and what I want to do is transfer to an introductory rate to get out of high interest debt. I am able to pay all of my minimum balances plus 100 percent each month but I am of limited income from disability but get ,000 a year for grants for Grda school each year, 000 of which is government sub loans. So what is happening is I get the installments twice a year. I immediately pay down all of my cards ranging from ,000 payment to 00. My total debt is about ,000 and most happened prior to my disability.

Nearly all of my Grad school grants and loans are going to my credit cards and by the end of a semester I am out of funds from supporting my wife and son and myself. So, I use the credit cards I originally tried to pay down at the beginning of the semester and the whole thing cycles again. What should I do, bankruptcy? I really feel a moral obligation to pay off my debt, I spent the money and that is my responsibility. The problem is that because my debt ratio is so high and I constantly teeter on the limits of my cards I get hit with crazy rates. The last one was a raise from 5.9 percent to 15 percent and 32 months later a raise to 29.9 percent from Citibank. I think that with the upcoming laws the credit card companies are trying to lock me into these high rates and since my situation is that of a stressed borrower they immediately hit my account with any raises.

That was really long winded. The 2 questions I have are will opening a business help my personal credit and can I freeze my credit card APR’s or cards because of becoming "permanently" disabled in the span of accruing interest about 2 years ago. Any advice would be really appreciated, I”m really stressed out and trying to support my family while going to grad school and on disability all the while making the maximum amount allowed to stay on disability per month, 0.00. I’m so bogged down in interest that I can’t make any head way on my credit cards because al of my payments go primarily to interest. Thanks.

Did it just dawn on you how much control congress has on our money?

Now, if you have a low credit score, have to pay for everything in cash anyway, have no investments and or stocks, the current economy may not have effected you.

However, if you are a money maker with money to make, does it piss you off that we just paid for our rebate check ten times fold?

Please don’t try to feed me the B*S that we must bail these businesses out in order to save the economy because if you have any sense at all you would know that these CEO’s have the very best economist, accountants, and lobbyist in their pockets and knew exactly what they were doing all along!

Does it piss you off that the businesses, which most congress men invest in any way, have brought the economy to its knees and now walks away with a pat on its back?

Does it piss you off that the Bush administration passed the new Bankruptcy laws that mandate you to still pay back a portion of your debit, yet the big businesses are being bailed out scott free?

This is why we can not afford the same! No McCain, No way!

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080929/ap_on_bi_ge/financial_meltdown

I recently inherited a great deal of money from the passing of my aunt, I don’t wanna say a specific number but lets just say I am a little over ,000 in debt and I will have it paid all off by the end of the week plus still have money to live for the next I’d say 15 years or more if I invest right. my question is how do I pay off the debt to a company that is no longer in business?? I paid a accountant to pull my credit report and find everything, even the smallest thing that could effect my score. There are a few companies on there that don’t even exist as a business anymore, like I had an amp’d mobile cell phone years ago and everyone knows amp’d they filed for bankruptcy in 07 I think and nobody wanted to purchase their debt being as almost 80,000 of their subscribers weren’t paying their bill, how do I pay that if they don’t even have a way to reach them anymore and other companies like I took out a loan from a financial loan company that was up and coming in 2002 and now they aren’t even around, how do I get those things off of my credit report if I cant pay them?? Please help, I plan on opening a nightclub with in the next year and I only wanna use half of the money I inherited and get a bank loan for the rest but even with my new found fortune a bank will pull my credit score or something and still look at me funny or not do business at all with me. Thanks in advance.

The short story is that after a failed business, my home was lost to foreclosure, several bills mounted and I now have a means to payback debt. The other day I was successful at obtaining an agreement to pay a month on a 5k balance and it is my hope I can manage to do so with all of my debts. The monster in the closet is a 20k equity loan that was secured by my home which has no longer mine. When I approached the office I would typically make my payment to they gave me the number for the collections department and before I could even reach them DCS (collection agency) contacted me. Now I have told them that I would like to begin making payments but with my other debts that I am trying to honor being added on to monthly expenses, the old payment on the equity loan (250/mo) is pretty tough to manage. Is it possible to negotiate with these people? They offered a settlement of 13k on the 20k loan but I dont have that kind of money. I had actually hoped to go through the same company I had the loan with perhaps get it back in good standing in hopes that it would eventually help me to recover my credit status after being rocked by the foreclosure. any thoughts? I want to avoid bankruptcy, heck I think after I get my taxes back it would put me over the Median income for my small family of just my son and I anyway. Not sure what to think about chapter 13 either.
Update….Debt consolidation loans are out of the question due to lack of credit score. The debt is not credit card debt though it seems like everyone wants to help people out of credit card trouble. It’s utilities, a couple business debts and the dang equity loan. I need a dependable car and have to use the income tax to buy one. If I buy a decent used car I can lose it to bankruptcy, if I go chapter 13 it seems like I have to live how the court tells me to live and would have no money beyond living expense and with a 9 year old child to raise that is impossible.

Over 50 years old. No retirement, but will inherit 40 acres of wooded land. Do I need an life insurance policy?

Own a VERY SUCCESSFUL RESTAURANT BUSINESS (15 YEARS) ,,,not the real estate THOUGH. Have ,000.00 saved from it. DOING OVER A MILLION. THIS TYPE OF BUSINESS IS NEVER REAL SECURE.

Have ,000.00 saved in my personal

Have a ,000 savings bond.

Owe ,000 in student loans

Buying home, have 0,000 left on mortgage. Need to refinance right now people are telling me. I have an arm? and my payments are getting ready to go way up. Have owned this home for 3 years. My previous home I had for 17 years.

Credit score in the 700’s, but I can’t get the Bankruptcy off my credit report which was paid off almost 7 years ago to the day.
And it wasn’t even a Bankruptchy, it was a reorganization of my bills, through a lawyer, I THOUGHT.

HELP!!

im going to need a personal loan or small business loan in the next 2 weeks for a store im looking to rent and open a bakery. my credit score right now is 662, im waiting for it to update this week which should be going up into the high 670’s or even low 680. my credit is short only about 4 yrs old. I dont have much collertal to use to secure it. My parents just declared bankruptcy and my house is probably only worth 40k for secureity. I need around 75k. Anyone think i have a shot? or know of any banks that would be willing to work with me.

I have about 25k in credit card debt. Use to be about 9500 but after 10 years they are all judgments and with all the interest and fees its about 25k now. About a year and a half ago i had a really nice job was making decent money. I saved about 9000$ so i can try to pay my debt off. Originally on average i owed about 2500 to each of the credit cards i had. I got all my info together and called each of them to try to set up a plan so i could pay them off. Right now discover says i owe about 7k originally 3k, and city says i owe 6.5k originally 2.4k, washington is now about 4.5k originally 1.8k those 3 are my highest and all three wouldn’t agree for nothing lower then what they say i owe. all others agreed to a very nice settlement. I offered discover 4.5k , city 4k, and Washington about 2.5k to settle. Washington accepted 3k. but city and discover gave me a no and said that if i didn’t have the full amount they would just garnish my checks till its paid in full. At the time i was off work because my back started to give in. I had the doctor take some x rays and she told me that i had to take physical therapy for my back and should stay away from heavy lifting. Which means i cant do my job no more. So now i am unemployed and well luckily i still had that 9k i saved. Well now i am just fed up with them. I already ran out of money and my brothers and sisters are supporting me and i want to just file for bankruptcy and go to school and get my self a degree in business. Does anyone have any advise you can give me. Thanks in advance.

I also forgot to put this in. My brother was going to help me before when i was working he was willing to put in about 3k on top of my 9k so i could get out of debt. But now hes also low on funds and well i just decided to file for bankruptcy and hes willing to help me pay a lawyer for the process.

Also I am not really worried about the credit score part, i have 6 sisters and 3 brothers and well i learned my lesson and i made sure they learned from my mistakes and they are really thankful for my advise about credit cards lol and bank loans. They all have almost perfect credit scores and i had a big hand in getting them there. My sister offered me a position in a business she is opening and all i have to do is go to school for the position. She was actually the one that tried to negotiate with the credit card company’s on my behalf and she just told me to file since they wont accept a settlement.

I just want to see how many options are available for a situation like this. So i am open for any suggestions, advise, ect… from respectful people who can understand the situation. If you want to criticize, go right ahead too lol I want to here all your opinions.

The funniest part about this is they all want to settle now that i have no money. LOL I just think thats really funny.
hehe ya i already knew about that but i am safe from that too because my sister owns about 3 businesses and she is willing to offer me a marketing position. I am really good at it too i have been helping her with allot so i just want to get a degree in that field and go work for her.

I was divorced last fall, in Texas, where I still reside. My attorney refused to ask my x for disclosure, so I did not know that my x had ,000 in credit card debt. The divorce papers say she’s liable for debts she incurred from the day I walked out on her, and for all debts that are in her name, which these 3 revolving accounts are. But, she hasn’t paid and yesterday, after getting turned down for credit, I checked my credit online and found out that two of her credit card companies have put charge-offs on my credit, a third one is about to, because she’s 190 days past due on it, and she never paid the phone bill so Embarq has put a charge-off on my credit, too, for 0, which is the least of my worries, but my credit score is barely over 400 now. Everything else on my credit shows "paid on time/as agreed". I’ve never made a late payment on anything my whole life.

I’m considering bankruptcy, but I own two homes (one is a rent house, both are mobile homes). The industry I work in is winding down and I had planned on moving into the landlord business. I’d planned to purchase an RV park, not only as a new career, but as my only retirement income, as well. I’ll be 50 years old in a few months. I don’t have years left over to build more credit.
Suing my x for whatever she owes me will not do any good, because she refuses to work, doesn’t have a job skill and will surely never pay me once I win in court.
My income is excellent, and I may make too much for Chapter 7. Also, one of my homes is in a mobile home park inside a city limits. My main home sits on 2 acres in a subdivision, outside of city limits. I’m concerned that if I file bankruptcy, I won’t be able to keep both houses. I also have two cars. One is a junker that my X trashed and gave back to me while the divorce was still pending. I owe less than ,000 on it. The other car is very nice, only 2 years old, and I owe a lot on it. I’m paying on all this, on time. My only concern is losing my homes and the good car.
Personally, I have no other bills besides the two house payments and the two car payments & their insurance. I have no revolving accounts.
Given my plans for retirement and my unsteady job security right now, which do you think I should do, file or consolidate just her bad bills and pay them off over time?

In April I filed Bankruptcy. I quit my job after having a devastating miscarriage and felt like there was no other way for us to survive financially. My husband’s job with the Army requires him to have a security clearance and with already shaky credit we decided it would be best for me to file alone. Most of the debt was in my name anyway, so I filed a Chapter 7 in April. Due to my lawyer’s incompetence it wasn’t discharged till December. We’ve been told that with my husband’s low score and my recent bankruptcy our only option is to wait 12-24 months to apply for a mortgage. This makes sense to me, but I’m hoping there is another option out there. We were foster parents for a time and hope to continue that next fall when my husband returns, but he’s stationed in central Texas where CPS prefers foster parents who own their home. We had established a small business in training and boarding horses and would like to continue that in our own back yard and grow from there.
I’ve contacted the three major credit bureaus to clean up any inaccuracy and I’ve been working at my job for almost a year. Our debt to income ratio is great and despite my bankruptcy my credit score is slightly higher than my husband’s, but still low. I’ve done all of our baking with US Bank in hopes of establishing a relationship with them and I have a low-limit credit card I use for gas and pay off monthly and a secured card I use for business expenses and pay off monthly. So, this is probably much more information than you needed, but it will hopefully be enough to help you answer my question. I would hate to spend another 12-24 months paying 0-800 a month in rent and 0 a month boarding our horses when that could be -30k we’ve paid toward a mortgage.
I understand that all actions have their consequences, but we’re a Christian family and hope that through the right network, education and of course prayer there may be some chance of purchasing our first home so my husband comes home from Iraq feeling accomplished and secure.

I am currently being sued in civil court, and have no money for an attorney, the case has gone on for a year now in federal court, and have basically lost my business because of all the time I’ve put into defending myself from something I did not do, and am being "lawyered" to death by 6 lawyers. Because of all this, even if I "would easily win" if I could afford an attorney, I will have to file bankruptcy (chapter 7 for me).

Therefore, relating to an ONGOING CIVIL case and a need to file BANKRUPTCY, here’s my QUESTIONS if you would please use the same numbering system to answer them so I can keep track (thanks thanks thanks):

I would LOVE it if filing the bankruptcy would END the case so I could go on with my life, find another job, build another company etc. I read a lot of yahoo answers and one said “If they haven’t gotten judgment against you … then your bankruptcy filing can and will stop the case.”, but I need to be sure.

1) is there any ADVANTAGE to me in filing bankruptcy BEFORE the judgment (now is preferred so that I can go on with my life which has been destroyed)?…. and what will opposition do if they know I’ve filed for bankruptcy? Will they attempt to continue the case when they know the bankruptcy will go thru? If so, why would they continue the case?

2) Since I’m going to be filing In advance" of the judgement, can I "claim" the "injuries" they haven’t yet enumerated " …on my petition for bankruptcy? …or do I just “list the case” and say “amount pending”? THANKS.

I know about the "automatic stay" (keeps creditors (I currently have NONE and a perfect credit score I’ve worked hard to build all my life) from coming after you etc).

3) After I file for bankruptcy (I know it takes so many months to go thru), these additional related questions, thanks:

3a) what happens to the current civil case?
3b) what do i tell the judge? Do i have to tell the judge or just inform the other side?
3c) will i still have to finish the case (expected one more year of my life)?
3d) if we’re currently in discovery, will it / can it stop discovery / subpoenas etc?
3e) ….or…does it just “suspend” the case until the b/k procedings are over? …or does the case just continue on in real-time?

Thanks so much for answering all of these "sub-parts" to my ‘compound" question. They’re really important to my life and my families lives.
Ryan K,

That was totally useless. I can’t believe you actually answered 195 other people. You’re a joke.

We filed chap. 7 bankruptcy on our home/business 4 years ago. We opted to reaffirm with our local bank on our home/business. Does anyone know of bank that will help a business after 4 years of bankruptcy. I know our credit score is pretty good now.