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Vehicle Impounded In Record Numbers During the last 10 days, I have seen a huge uptick in the number of Chicago residents who have had their vehicles impounded. This most certainly has to do with the city of Chicago and its effort to bring in revenue from parking ticket debt. When clients don’t pay their+ Read More
The post Recovering Your Vehicle From The Pound With Chapter 13 appeared first on David M. Siegel.

Being in debt is like being overweight; you’ve got too much of a thing you want to get rid of. As with losing weight, the way to get out of debt is a simple equation – spend less money than you make.
There are only two ways for that equation to work, and those involve spending less or making more.
Spending less smacks of deprivation because it means limiting the things you love. Making more, on the other hand, sounds more palatable.
Personal finance experts such as Dave Ramsey extoll the virtues of working a second job. People who write about getting out of debt would have you believe there’s nothing better than the proverbial side hustle, a temporary or part-time job that allows you to pick up some much needed cash and have a fun experience at the same time.
Americans are listening to this advice, with the Bureau of Labor Statistics reporting that nearly 5 percent of workers hold down 2 or more jobs. Though the figures have been rising since the Great Recession, working multiple jobs has long been seen as a mark of a hard worker who’s looking to get ahead.
Back when I was starting my law practice and needed to keep a roof over my head, I had a series of second jobs. I’d do word processing at night, covered hearings for other lawyers in my spare time, and reviewed piles of real estate documents cluttered offices without windows.
I knew it was a short-term situation because my practice would either take off or I’d go get myself a “real job” working for another lawyer. Thankfully I was able to stop juggling after 18 months, but that was long enough for me to see exactly why a second job might not be the right move for everyone.
Here are some of the costs to consider before taking on a second job.

1. Less Time for Family.  If you’ve got kids, forget seeing those soccer and baseball games. Evenings by the television with your spouse are also off the table.
2. Greater Chance of Fatigue and Injury. If you’re working a full-time job during the day, you’ve got plenty of time for rest and relaxation. Taking on night or evening work is going to cut into your ability to relax and recharge, and you may find that you’re a bag of sleepiness after a short time.  In fact, a 2014 study by the Center for Injury Epidemiology at the Liberty Mutual Research Institute for Safety shows that those holding multiple jobs may be at greater risk for fatigue compared with those who hold one job because they work more work hours per week; have longer daily commute times; and have less sleep and leisure time left in the week to recover. Previous studies found those with multiple jobs also have a higher risk of injury
3. Limited Promotion Opportunities. When you’re working a single full-time job it’s easier to focus on doing your best work. You can focus on the tasks at hand, juggle your responsibilities, and improve the skills necessary to move you up the ladder. You also have more time to socialize with coworkers, which encourages teamwork and increases your chances of getting a promotion. If you’ve got a second job that’s eating your time, however, those chances disappear.
4. Your Income May Go Down. Does your full-time job offer the chance for overtime? Having a second job means saying goodbye to those extra hours of regular income, often paid at a premium. That’s to say nothing of the fact that your boss will see you as a clock watcher rather than a team player who’s willing to help out whenever possible. Unless your side hustle pays better than your main job, your wallet could end up lighter.
5. It May Get You Fired. Some employers have policies about taking on a second job, either limiting which ones you can take or prohibiting them entirely. Before you venture out into the world of the side hustle, be sure it won’t cost you that full-time employment.
6. Your Health May Suffer.  Working two jobs means less time to exercise (unless your second job involves exercise, that is). In fact, working the night shift has been proven to lead to weight gain and diabetes.
7. Your Expenses May Rise. When you shuttle back and forth between two jobs, you’ve got to tack on extra expenses for gas money and food because you may not be able to eat at home as often. For positions that require you to dress properly, laundry and clothing costs may also go up.

I’m not saying it’s a bad idea to get a second job as a way to pay off your debt, just that you shouldn’t dive head first into a side hustle without giving it some extra thought.
As a short-term solution to a short-term problem, the costs may be worth it. If you’re young, otherwise unattached and are just starting out in your career then, like me, a second job may be the right move for you.
But understand that you can work multiple jobs for only so long before the stress of constantly juggling the increased responsibilities gets to you. If you’ve got household obligations or a family depending on you to be there physically and emotionally, that breaking point may come too soon – and with too high a price to pay.
The post Thinking About a Second Job? Consider These 7 Risks First appeared first on Bankruptcy and Student Loan Lawyers - 866.787.8078.

When you use bankruptcy to get out of debt, the first thing you’re going to want is to work on your credit score. Getting your credit into tip-top shape, after all, helps put you in the best light with new lenders.
That’s where credit repair companies come in.
They play on your fears that bad credit will stand in the way of your dreams, and that bankruptcy is the end of the world. Once you’re hooked, they promise to remove bad marks from your credit report.
It sounds too good to be true – and that’s exactly what it is.
Your Credit Score After Bankruptcy
According to the Federal Reserve Bank, filing for bankruptcy actually raises your credit score.
After bankruptcy, you don’t owe money to anyone. You also don’t have any open accounts you can use. Finally, you can’t wipe out your debts in a new bankruptcy right away.
Looking at those three factors together, you’re a better credit risk after bankruptcy than you were before you went into the process.
But your score won’t go up if your credit report is incorrect.
How Credit Repair Companies Work
Credit reporting laws give you the right to request investigation of incorrect information. Those rights don’t extend to removing information you don’t want to show up.
Credit repair companies, however, dispute all bad marks on your credit report.
Credit reporting agencies pass those disputes to the creditors for verification. The information gets updated if it’s verified, and removed otherwise.
If the debt gets deleted then the credit repair company declares victory. If not, the company sends out another dispute next month.
This process gets repeated until your report is clean, which raises your credit score. Unfortunately, this tactic works only for a short period of time.
Creditors usually update their reporting information every few months, by uploading a complete set of data to the credit reporting agency. If the creditor failed to verify the debt or the credit reporting agency didn’t pass along the dispute, your old account will be uploaded to the system once again.
When that happens, the bad marks will reappear. But the repair folks hope you don’t check your reports so you won’t realize what they’ve done until it’s too late.
In sum, remember this. Any company claiming it can delete accurate information on your credit report is lying to you.

Hiring a credit repair company to fix your report after bankruptcy is a HUGE waste.Click To Tweet
Don’t Get Scammed – Check Your Credit Reports
About four (4) months after bankruptcy, go to AnnualCreditReport.com to get copies of all three (3) of your credit reports.
If you can’t get the free reports, go to Experian and get their All-In-One 3-Bureau Report that will also include information from Equifax and TransUnion.
A few pointers:

• Don’t try to start your credit repair after bankruptcy immediately.  Each creditor and debt collector updates credit information, but some do so every 90 or 120 days.  It’s best to wait a few months before you check your reports.
• AnnualCreditReport.com is the official way to get a free copy of your credit report each year.
• Make sure you get all three credit reports because each one contains different information. A lender may access any one of the reports when making a decision on whether to extend you new credit. You should check them all for your protection.

Review Each Credit Report
Once your bankruptcy case ends, the federal Federal Trade Commission says that all debts need to be updated to show a $0 balance due.
Reporting the debt any other way is  inaccurate under federal law. Debts charged off before bankruptcy may also show that information.
You should look at each tradeline on every credit report to ensure that the debt is showing as having $0 due.
If there’s an inaccuracy, send a dispute to the credit reporting agency. Be clear about which account is imcorrect, and send proof of the bankruptcy discharge.
Send the letter by certified mail. Keep a copy of the original signed letter and the certified mail receipt card.
Wait For Updated Reports
The credit reporting agency has to respond to your dispute.  That usually comes in 30-60 days, but it could be a longer or shorter.
Be sure to review the repsonse and double-check your updated reports for accuracy.
If it is, congratulations – your journey of credit repair after bankruptcy is complete. Check your credit reports every six months to make sure none of the errors resurface, but aside from that you’re all set.
You have now saved yourself a lot of money and time because you did it without hiring a credit repair company.
If You Don’t Understand The Reports Or If Errors Persist
You may not be able to resolve your credit report errors problems immediately.
You may not understand what the credit reports say.
There are plenty of lawyers who can explain your credit report to you. Other consultants may be able to help you understand what your credit report says.
If the errors continue to show up then talk with a lawyer about your rights to an accurate credit report. Together you can set a plan in motion to make sure your reports are corrected once and for all.
 
 
The post Can Credit Repair Really Raise Your Score After Bankruptcy? appeared first on Bankruptcy and Student Loan Lawyers - 866.787.8078.

People file for bankruptcy protection for a number of reasons: overdue credit card debts, tax obligations, mortgage issues, and more. One benefit of filing for bankruptcy is the ability to modify the terms of your car loan and pay it off through a court ordered repayment plan.
If you’ve got a car and want to handle a particularly difficult car loan, you’re going to look to a repayment plan under Chapter 13 of the US Bankruptcy Code. Depending on your situation you may be able to reduce your interest rate, lower the balance of the car loan, or both.
Reduce the Car Loan Balance
As the chart below shows, an average automobile loses half of its value in the first four years of life.
“Depreciation car” by João Pimentel Ferreira – Own work.
Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Commons
With low down payments required for most new car loans, it’s easy to see how the loan balance can easily exceed the value by a long shot. Under certain circumstances, you may be able to reduce the balance on your car loan to the current value. Given the fact that most cars aren’t worth nearly the amount due on the loan, this could end up saving you a lot of money.
The bankruptcy law allows you to achieve this huge money saving result if:

1. the car loan was a refinance of another car loan, or if the vehicle merely secures another personal loan; OR
2. the outstanding loan was taken out more than 910 days before you file for bankruptcy; OR
3. the vehicle is used for only business purposes or is driven by someone other than you.

If your situation matches up with any of these conditions then you will be able to bring down the balance on the car loan. Even if you don’t qualify to do so, there’s still one more way to save money using the bankruptcy laws.
Reduce the Interest Rate
Even if you can’t lower the balance of the car loan, Chapter 13 bankruptcy gives you the right to modify the terms of the promissory note between you and the car lender. If you’re paying a high interest rate on your car, this could end up saving you thousands of dollars.
Just how low does the interest rate go? Way down. As in, the interest rate on your vehicle loan can be lowered to 1.5% above the prime rate.
If you’ve got excellent credit you may not be paying a high interest rate. Most people struggling to get out of debt, however, may not have the best credit score – and that usually translates into a high-cost vehicle loan.
When you go into a repayment bankruptcy, you can reset the interest rate using a formula established by the US Supreme Court in the Till case. In that case, the Court took the prime rate of interest and added an extra 1.5 percent premium to account for the lender’s risk of nonpayment.
You can find the Wall Street Journal prime rate here. The prime rate was 3.25% as of October 2015, which translates into a Till rate of 4.75%.
Consider how much you’d save on your car if you walked into bankruptcy with a 10% vehicle loan and were able to walk out with a rate of 4.75%. That leaves a lot of money left over for paying student loans, balancing your household budget, and starting to invest for retirement.
After the Case, Get Your Title
Regardless of the benefits you’re able to reap on your car loan, you’re still going to need to pry the title from your lender’s clutches. The bankruptcy court doesn’t have your car title, nor does the trustee assigned to divide your repayment funds among your creditors.
It may not be easy to get your title from the lender, but take these 5 simple steps to make the process as smooth as possible:

1. Get hold of a copy of the Proof of Claim filed by the car lender in your Chapter 13 bankruptcy case. This will show the balance due on the car as of the date of the bankruptcy filing.
2. Obtain copies of the Chapter 13 Plan and Confirmation Order. These documents, when taken together, will show the amount you proposed to pay as well as the judge’s Order that those payments were sufficient.
3. Fetch copies of all motions filed in your bankruptcy case in connection with the car. That includes any motions made to reduce the interest rate, the loan balance, and motions made by the lender to lift the automatic stay. These will prove that your payment stream was backed by logic and the balance due on the loan.
4. Obtain a copy of the Trustee’s claims register. This shows how much the trustee paid out during the bankruptcy.
5. Get a copy of the bankruptcy discharge. This document proves that you made your Plan payments and the case ended satisfactorily.

You need to contact the lender directly to get your car title after bankruptcy.  If they give you any hassles, go through the above steps and provide the lender with all the information they need to prove you’re entitled to your car title.
In the worst case scenario, you may need to get the court to force the lender to give up the vehicle title. But considering the savings, it’s a small price to pay.
The post Use This Simple Bankruptcy Trick To Slash Your Car Payments appeared first on Bankruptcy and Student Loan Lawyers - 866.787.8078.