A bankruptcy discharge provides the debtor with a fresh start. It is a court order that releases a debtor from personal liability for certain types of debts that were incurred pre-bankruptcy or pre-petition. Once a bankruptcy discharge issued, the debtor is absolved of any obligation to repay their debts. The bankruptcy discharge voids personal liability on judgments and acts as a permanent injunction against any act to collect a discharged debt as a personal liability of the debtor. The bankruptcy discharge applies only to debts.

Whether you have filed for bankruptcy already or are considering filing, you may be wondering what budget friendly recipes are out there to feed your family. 

Before filing bankruptcy in Minneapolis, Minnesota, your bankruptcy attorney will review your entire case with you. They will go through assets, debts, income and expenses, and financial transfers.

    Bankruptcy was designed to be a remedy, to help people who would like assistance and guidance to be in a better financial situation. The bankruptcy system was created to provide honest debtors a fresh start. Therefore, Congress enacted bankruptcy fraud and related statutes to deter and punish those who commit bankruptcy fraud. One of the more commonly charged bankruptcy fraud provisions is 18 U.S.C. §152(1), which makes it a crime for a debtor to “knowingly and fraudulently” conceal estate assets from the court, the trustee, or creditors.

Technically, every bankruptcy case is public information after it has been filed. This is because all case filings go to the United States Bankruptcy Court website and can be accessed through Pacer. Although the case is public information and anyone can find a bankruptcy case and the documents filed within the case, there are steps you have to take to access this information. 

When a person files a chapter 7 bankruptcy case, they must make a decision as to what they intend to do with their existing secured vehicle loans. Bankruptcy eliminates the debtor’s personal legal responsibility to repay a vehicle loan but does not eliminate the lender’s lien against the vehicle. Therefore, when a debtor files a chapter 7 case, they must choose whether to keep the vehicle and pay for it, or stop making payments, and surrender the vehicle back to the lender. 

    Saint Paul is one of the greatest cities in the world in which to live. I know I may be biased due to the fact that I was born here, and now live here again, but I strongly believe any objective out-of-towner who relocates here would agree! Just because the city Saint Paul itself is a great place to live doesn’t mean that one’s particular apartment here is the best place in which to live. Sometimes, people simply find themselves stuck in a bad lease they wish they could do anything to get out of. There is one solution to this problem. You can file for bankruptcy (never saw that one coming, huh?).

LifeBack Law Firm, Minnesota’s largest, nicest, and most helpful bankruptcy law firm, has recently opened a new office location in the heart of the Cathedral Hill neighborhood in St. Paul, Minnesota. Our modern, quaint, and historical St. Paul office is surrounded by trendy restaurants, such as Moscow on the Hill, Handsome Hog, and W.A. Frost. All of these restaurants are conveniently located next to, and just across the street from, our St. Paul office. Come see us at 370 Selby Ave Suite 224, St. Paul, MN 55102, and grab a bite to eat at one of these posh restaurants.

Welcome back to our series of blog posts on the history and philosophy of the economy, bankruptcy, and debt – today we continue to discuss public benefits in the 21st century. Thus far, we have been picking and choosing public benefit programs to discuss based on whether they provide a true monetary benefit, but there are so many public benefit programs that offer funds or necessities. Now, we will discuss some public housing benefits.

Welcome back to our series of blog posts on the history and philosophy of the economy, bankruptcy, and debt – today we continue to discuss public benefits in the 20th-century public, other than traditional social security. 

At LifeBack Law we file both chapter 7 and chapter 13 bankruptcy cases. A chapter 7 is referred to as a liquidation bankruptcy, where as a chapter 13 bankruptcy is a restructuring of your debt.

The timing of your bankruptcy discharge will depend on which chapter you file. With a chapter 7 bankruptcy you will receive your discharge roughly 90 days after filing. For a chapter 13 your discharge date will be three to five years after your case was filed. 

    Once a creditor files a lawsuit and gets the court to enter a judgment against a person for they can then take action against that person to collect on the judgment. One of the ways a creditor can collect on their judgment is by garnishing the person’s wages. In Minnesota, a creditor may garnish up to 25% of a person’s net pay (the money they actually take home after deductions, like taxes, are taken out of their paycheck). This can cause a significant hardship to that person’s financial circumstances, especially if a person is already struggling to make ends meet and is living paycheck to paycheck. 

In the current way our society is structured, the rich are exemplified as the model American, no matter how they obtained their wealth: inheritance, lying, cheating, evading taxes and the poor are vilified regardless of how they got there: mental health issues, medical limitations, inadequate and unfair wages, and the poverty trap. 

To be an eligible debtor in a Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing in Minneapolis, Minnesota, a debtor must complete a credit counseling course within 180 days prior to the bankruptcy filing. The event that prompts the 180-day period is the filing of a petition for relief, not the completion of the credit counseling.

Although, there are many great reasons to file bankruptcy, below are five of the biggest reasons a lot of clients decide to file. 

The biggest reason is a chapter 7 or chapter 13 bankruptcy is going to discharge your unsecured debts (there are exceptions). Although this list is not exclusive, exceptions include, fines or penalties, student loans, taxes, and domestic support obligations.