If you are expecting an inheritance, or even if you are not, the special rules about them are worth your attention to prevent bad surprises.
Keeping Property in a Spendthrift Trust
If you are the beneficiary in a spendthrift trust, most likely a bankruptcy trustee can’t touch whatever property is in that trust.
Your Property of the Bankruptcy Estate Excludes a Power of Attorney
If you have a power of attorney over someone’s assets, or any similar power, those assets are not affected by your bankruptcy case.
What’s Property of the Estate under Chapter 7?
To find out if you can keep everything you own in a Chapter 7 case, the first step is finding out what’s in your bankruptcy estate.
Who’s the United States Trustee?
You hear in bankruptcy about the “trustee,” and maybe about the “U.S. Trustee.” They’re clearly easy to confuse. Who’s the U.S. Trustee?
5 More Essentials about Protecting Your Property with Exemptions
There’s a lot more to using property exemptions than just matching them to your assets. There are benefits worth taking advantage of.
The 5 Essentials about Protecting Your Property with Exemptions
Most of the time you get to keep everything you own when you file bankruptcy. It’s all covered by property exemptions. But not always.
Use the Property Exemptions You Qualify For
Usually you use the property exemptions available for the residents of your state. But not if you haven’t lived there long enough.
Your Chapter 7 Trustee Disputing an Asset’s Value
What happens when your bankruptcy trustee thinks you undervalued an asset? How does the trustee determine what you own and its value?
An Asset Unprotected
Usually everything you own is exempt (protected). But what happens if you own an asset that is not exempt? What does the trustee do? Chapter 7 is the “liquidation” form of bankruptcy. But in our last blog post we introduced the bankruptcy trustee as an only sometimes liquidator. That’s because in most Chapter 7 cases nothing gets liquidated. Nothing … Read More
The Trustee in a Chapter 7 Case
Besides your creditors, the main person you need to be careful about in a “straight bankruptcy” Chapter 7 case is the trustee. Who’s that?
Protect a Fraudulent Transfer without Paying Anything More
If you owe “priority” debts like income taxes and/or support payments, you may be able to pay no more while protecting a transferee.
Stop the Undoing of a Fraudulent Transfer through Chapter 13
Overall, Chapter 13 can be more powerful and more flexible than Chapter 7. That often also applies to a fraudulent transfer.
The Charitable Gifts Exception to Fraudulent Transfers
Charitable donations made during the two years before filing bankruptcy may fall within a safe haven of not being fraudulent transfers.