Impact of New Bankruptcy Law
The fact is that the relief that was once available in Oregon prior to the changes in the bankruptcy laws is still very much
available today. The vast majority of people who were eligible for chapter 7
before the law changes are eligible now. The director of the American Bankruptcy
Institute recently estimated that the new bankruptcy changes will adversely
affect less than three percent of all debtors.
You may wonder how the law changes will impact you. Ultimately, you will have to
cut through a little more red tape in order to file for bankruptcy. In essence,
three more steps have been added to the chapter 7 process. Each of these new
steps may be easier and simpler than they appear.
First, you will now have to attend a counseling session before filing. The fact
is that the counseling session could take the form of a simple thirty-minute
phone call to a credit counseling agency. Some of these agencies are even
offering on-line counseling sessions. You may have already spoken with credit
counselors before deciding on bankruptcy anyway.
Second, you will have to attend a financial management course after you file,
but before you receive your discharge. The fact is you will only have to do this
if the Trustee's office approves agencies to provide the course, or offers the
course itself.
Finally, you will also need to provide more documents to your attorney to file
for bankruptcy. These additional documents might have to be made available to
creditors under the new legislation. Keep in mind that you can easily obtain
these additional documents yourself or with the help of your attorney.
In the worst-case-scenario, the new means test will force some people (up to
three percent, as reported by the ABI director as cited above) to file a Chapter
13 bankruptcy. Certainly, it would be desirable to be able to choose your
bankruptcy yourself. The fact is though that some portion of this already small
percentile would have likely opted to file a chapter 13 anyway. Besides, a
Chapter 13 bankruptcy simply requires you to pay back your debts on a payment
plan that you can afford. Typically a Chapter 13 plan can still save you
thousands and thousands of dollars over struggling to pay debts outside of
bankruptcy.
The new law simply requires you to complete more steps. If you would like to
discuss your unique situation with a bankruptcy attorney, feel free to give us a
call at any of our offices at in the Portland metro area at (503) 352-3690, or fill out our
free legal evaluation form and an
experienced attorney will discuss your options with you so you can decide
whether or not to retain an attorney to file a bankruptcy for you.
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