Jeff Kelly: Hello, this is Jeff Kelly and in today’s episode I want to talk about how rising home prices cause bankruptcy problems. How in the world could rise any equity in real estate cause financial problems for a homeowner? I know that sounds super strange, but I’m going to go on to explain how it’s happening.

Jeff Kelly: I have been practicing consumer bankruptcy for over 22 years, and I’ve never seen a real estate market like the one that is currently roaring. You would think that rising Home Equity would be good for all owners. But that is not the case for families who are in need of getting relief from credit card and medical debt that has accrued because of COVID related unemployment. How can rising home value stop people from filing bankruptcy?

Jeff Kelly: In Georgia, the most equity that a married couple can protect is $43,000. A single person can protect only 21,500. So what happens if you need to file bankruptcy? But you have equity that is way over the limits? The answer to this question is the same as the answer to most legal questions. It depends, depends on what? it depends on the exact amount of equity. When a family has slightly more equity than the exempted limits, they usually won’t present a significant problem in bankruptcy. Because you have to factor in real estate transaction cost if the trustee were to move to sell the house in question. You know, in most cases, you can count on 10% of the purchase price is going to go to real estate commission real estate costs and legal costs for closing on a house. However, it’s not uncommon right now. For me to see potential clients who have over $100,000 in equity, because real estate is so ridiculously hot right now. It is so hot. I’ve got a family member who just put their house for sale in Cobb County. And no joke in one week. They have 23 offers. It’s crazy. I’ve never seen anything like it. When is it going to end? I don’t know.

Jeff Kelly: The funny thing about real estate to me right now is that most of my clients don’t realize how high the value of their homes have climbed. In the past, we could rely on the tax assessor evaluations. Now the market is so ridiculously hot. Zillow seems to be a better source in most cases, and Zillow seems to be getting better and better at their formula for how they evaluate. So the question is, can you lose your house in a chapter 7 if you have too much equity? And the answer is yes, you can. The reason a person must be extremely careful and ascertaining the value of their home before filing chapter 7 bankruptcy is because once you’re in the thick of it, you can’t get out.

Jeff Kelly: Little side note, one of my favorite television shows growing up was Gilligan’s Island. And it seemed like there were a lot of episodes where Gilligan would get stuck in quicksand. Now, of course, Gilligan’s Island is a great, wonderful show. And so he always got out, but I mean, sometimes he had to struggle really, really hard. Okay. But chapter 7, if you’ve got equity in your house is kind of like quicksand. But unlike Gilligan, you ain’t getting out. Once you file a Chapter 7 bankruptcy, and the trustee takes an interest in your house and finds a buyer. Your house is as good as gone Pack your bags. Now the trustee would have to pay off your mortgage and pay you all of the exempted amount that you were able to claim in your bankruptcy case. And next, of course, he would pay himself or herself a handsome fee for his or her services, and then use the rest to pay your debts.

Jeff Kelly: How can you avoid the calamity of losing your home in chapter 7, but still eliminate debt hanging over your head? Well, the answer is ding ding ding chapter 13.

Jeff Kelly: For the chapter 13 to be successful, we must create a plan that will pay the same amount of money to all unsecured creditors as they would have received if chapter 7 had been the chosen course of action. This is called the bankruptcy liquidation test. All chapter 13 bankruptcies must pass the liquidation test.

Jeff Kelly: Here’s an example of where chapter 13 could work. Let’s say a person has a house with $20,000 in exposed equity, assuming no car Debt, Tax Debt or any other type of security priority debt. This person will be looking at chapter 13 payment of around $450 per month. What if they owed $200,000 in medical debt, this person is under the median income limit on the Means Test, the payment will still be $450 a month. What are they owed $500,000. In medical debt? Well, again, if the person is under the median income limit, the payment will still be $450 a month, the payment will still be $450 per month because the driver in the case is the exposed equity and not the total amount of debt. In this specific case, $450 per month takes care of it.

Jeff Kelly: Here’s an example where a chapter 13 payment would never work, let’s change the facts and say the exposed equity is $100,000. If the person owes $200,000 in medical debt, credit card debt or other type of unsecured debt, we have to pay back $100,000 in the chapter 13 case, and the longest that chapter 13 case can go is 60 months. So in this specific case, the payment would be around $1900 a month. What if this person cannot afford to pay $1900 per month to protect the house? Well, the answer is don’t file chapter 13. Because it won’t be feasible. It’s not going to work.

Jeff Kelly: What do families do who are caught with huge amounts of debt, but have too much equity in their house to file a Chapter 13? The harsh truth is that they’re gonna have to sell the house and pay the debt. Where do they go after selling the house? This is an awful dilemma right now, because rents are rising beyond reach of many people. In addition, many people who lost their jobs because of COVID are finding new jobs that don’t pay as much as the previous job. borrowing against the equity is not possible for many people because of the decreased income. What is a solution? I have one, I think the Georgia legislature should raise the equity limits to $100,000 for a single person, and $150,000 for a married couple. Furthermore, I believe I believe the Georgia housing exemption should be adjusted yearly, according to the consumer price index, so that the mount keeps pace with inflation.

Jeff Kelly: If you’d like to set up a free consultation with my office, please call me at 770-637-1756 the consult is free but the information you receive could relieve you of a ton of stress and save your house. Also, please go to my website www.Kellycanhelp.com download a free copy of a book that I wrote on Chapter Chapter 13 and chapter 7. And I thank you guys for tuning into my podcast here and I hope you have a great day and call soon again. That number is 770-637-1756 Thank you

Intro Speaker: It’s time for KellyCanHelp hosted by Jeff Kelly, Attorney at Law with the Law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly. And now here’s Jeff Kelly.

Jeff Kelly: Okay. Welcome to the show today. Thank you, Mr. JD Houvener really appreciate you being here. I’m looking forward to talking to you about patents and helping my my listeners and former clients learn all about it. So JD, could you tell us a little bit about yourself?

JD Houvener: Absolutely. Yeah. And, Jeff, thank you for having me on the show. This is a it’s a pleasure. I’m a patent attorney, and I’m the owner here at Bold Patents Law Firm. We’re based out of Mountlake Terrace, which is just north of Seattle, Washington. And we help inventors get patents, we were pretty passionate about working with solo and small inventors, small businesses that is, and really, without regard to any kind of technology. So you name it from your, as seen on TV type gadgets, you know, to high powered software apps, were really kind of across the board.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent, excellent. So how many years have you been in practice?

JD Houvener: Just over five years.

Jeff Kelly: Okay, where’d you go to law school,

JD Houvener: went to Seattle, you just right here in South Seattle, and went ahead and got my MBA as well from there is great institution.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. How about your undergrad?

JD Houvener: University, Washington, graduated with an industrial engineering degree from there and kind of a funny story you got went off and chase that engineering dream for a bit, I worked for 10 years at Boeing aerospace company, you may have heard of them. They’ve been in the news lately. Mostly bad news. But I think they’re on the rebound. I helped design their 787 Dreamliner fiberglass wing technology worked there for 10 years as a systems engineer. And you know, it was a fantastic company to work for, I just kind of knew I was destined for I can own my own company or on my own business somehow. And Boeing was actually the the company kind enough to put me to school to get my MBA at Seattle U. And that’s when I started, you know, planted the seed toward business ownership, and thought about being leveraged by engineering, a technical background into patent law. And so I’ve been kind of launched into that. Helping inventors from the technical side, you know, argue with examiners about getting their patents granted, fell in love with it and started a company around it.

Jeff Kelly: Well, so like, what point did you realize, hey, I want to go to law school. I think I want to do this.

JD Houvener: Well, so I as part of the MBA curriculum, the last you know, course you take is a business plan competition. And I was the only one of the whole school to my business plan was to start a law firm. And it was I was really saddened by the fact that didn’t get into the final round, because it just the judges, like no one really cares about a lot. Like, no, everyone has kind of these hockey stick, you know, you know, started out, you know, SAP startups or new product whiz bang gadget type companies. I really liked it, because I was kind of in love with the show Shark Tank. And I think a lot of people were when it first launched in the early, mid 2000s.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. Show? Absolutely.

JD Houvener: Yeah. And they always ask, Hey, awesome gadget, is it patented? Right? Do you have IP protection? That question always come up still does. And because it means a lot, it means this novel and means no one else can rip you off, you’ve got a limited monopoly, you can, you know, have 20 years of run ahead of anybody else. So I said, Well, what does it take to become a patent attorney? I know you have to have an engineering or science degree. Okay, check. You have to go to law school. Okay, well, that’s still yet to be done. And then you’re a patent attorney, you’ve got this sort of special status that I thought that’d be kind of a fun way to, to come up with some credentials, and it creates some niche in terms of joining a, you know, a new services field like law. And, yeah, I decided that I’m right. Then at the end of that competition, I’ve tried to kind of work the numbers and wanted to own my own firm, straight out of law school. So that’s what I did.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. So you mentioned that you know, a lot of your clients are small and vendors What is your Who is your typical client?

JD Houvener: It’s it’s a gasps it’s well, typical, I would say, you know, it’s it’s someone who has a has a day job, okay, someone who works you know, kind of a nine to five or a 40 plus if they’re our job, but has got something they’re working on on the moonlight, right, some passion project, some dream they’re chasing. Maybe they’re further along, maybe they’re, you know, have, you know, one foot out the door where they’re part time with their day job and they’re with someone else partnered up, they’ve got a prototype and this is it. This is they want to change the world make a dent? And go for it. Right. Be bold. That’s our typical. I mean, we have a little avatar, right, someone who’s about 35 to 50. And it’s got it’s got some working capital knows how to take something seriously. is investing their time seriously into that we help secure their IP rights, introduce them to those on the business end. And maybe it’s restructuring, right? Maybe it’s sending them off to bankruptcy to kind of get their finances in order before they make a jump. And so we really help help our clients there, because it’s, it’s the big firms that just can’t reach, right, they just they can’t relate. They’re structured to help big companies, they really aren’t positioned to hear stories, to be able to lend that hand down and help someone else up that’s just getting started, it needs some education, before they really you know, spend the big bucks. So I’ve made that part of my mission. And so if you hopped on YouTube, or go to our website, you’d see I’ve done a lot of YouTube videos, just what is a patent? What’s the difference between that and a trademark? You know, how long are they lasting? Right? What is the difference between a design and a utility? It’s information that shouldn’t be secret, you shouldn’t have to pay 500 bucks an hour to learn about so. I’ve got tons of info there. And it’s been really helpful.

Jeff Kelly: You do trademark as well.

JD Houvener: We do. We do? Yeah, I mean, advertise you know, patents. But it’s, it’s really common that a lot of inventors will get, you know, filed in those that period where you’re waiting to hear back from the examiner, and they’re ready to get going, they want to launch they want to do a Kickstarter, or, you know, partner up and start talking to third parties. And you got to protect your brand too. So it’s a real natural fit to lock down the trademark. So we do help with research in the application filing as well.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. Excellent. So what do you think is your your greatest strength as an attorney? What what separates you from the pack?

JD Houvener: Well, you know, me personally, doing the legal work is, in most cases, actually not the best fit. Okay. And I say that, honestly, I have a unbelievably talented team of patent attorneys, their experience exceeds my own. My personal best in number I can help a client the most is kind of doing what we’re doing now. And it’s networking, it’s been noticed to make a really good referral to help an inventor client be successful. The hardest thing is to launch a new product and to actually be successful, right to make money. It’s not easy, I 10 million patents issued. I think the last stat I saw was like 4% of all patents want to actually, you know, read, you know, net net profit, actually bring in some money. So I try to I try every day to change that. Change that stat and to give the inventors the best chance possible to make money and connect with individuals to be truly successful.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. So you can represent somebody anywhere in the United States.

JD Houvener: Yeah, that’s it’s a federal practice. And same with trademarks. Right. So we have inventors from 41 different states. I just had to Sent my CPA, actually. So yeah, I mean, we’re almost everywhere. Our attorneys are kind of sprinkled across the country. We have six and we’re not gigantic firm yet. But we have six attorneys that are full time dedicated, work with inventors all over. Like I said, we do make sure that in you know if they’re going to launch a company, start a company write contracts, negotiate deals, that we make those introductions to state specific attorneys that know the state law. And so we built a really, really neat, close referral network that way. Or if someone’s in, you know, Louisiana, if someone’s in, you know, Miami, we’ve got at least one or two attorneys we can send their way. Send them to rather to help make sure they’ve got to get home base, because we’re really kind of more like the nice specialists, right? You got to make sure they’ve got a primary physician, you know, to go to for their everyday needs.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. Excellent. Excellent. So tell us a little bit about your personal life. You got you got a family. You got kids?

JD Houvener: Yeah, I do. I do. I mean, just outside that door. I think we’re all work from our home office these days, right? But yeah, I’ve got three beautiful kids. Stella is six years old. Emma is four and Hamilton is two and a half. And yeah, it’s busy. We’re doing some homeschooling and you know, kind of being conservative with the COVID stuff. So but it’s been a really neat time to spend time with each other and we wouldn’t have been this close if it hadn’t been for that. So there’s a lot of a lot of cool blessings there. We’re actually we’re living up in Lake Stevens for anybody that’s familiar with that area. And we love it up here. It’s nice. It’s far enough away from the city. Great people up here. Like

Jeff Kelly: one of one. How did you meet your wife?

JD Houvener: We met at University of Washington actually freshman year, way back in 2003. When we weren’t we actually were you know, we were dating different people what we stayed in touch and we were actually was on one of the only COED floors. And when these dorms and way back in, in oh three. And yeah, we stayed in touch and started dating about three years after that. And we’ve married now for over 10 years.

Jeff Kelly: Awesome. That’s fantastic. So Yeah, you know, I want to ask you, you know, in the patent world, do you ever have clients? Do they meet with you? And then you say to yourself, man, I really wish you had done fill in blank fill in the blank before you came to meet me. You know, what kind of pitfalls Do you see clients fall into that they could otherwise avoid? If they had just come to you center?

JD Houvener: Yeah, the heartbreak stories are, hey, I’ve got this amazing invention, I really need your help getting this protected. Here’s the link to my website, and Amazon page where I’ve been selling it and ask very carefully, how long have you been selling. And if they tell me more than a year, I have to just I had to break it to them that it’s not eligible for filing club. If you’ve published or sold your invention for more than a year, you can’t file it’s not right. It’s just not gonna fit the patent office will reject it. Even if you were to file and lie, they’ll find out or anybody you try to sue would would find that hole. So it’s it’s a tough one. I try to get that message out as much as I can. I wrote a book about it. You know, it’s right behind me. I guess I’ll pitch the book a little bit bold ideas and vendors guide to patents. That’s a quick hour read. We’ve got a free pdf download on our bold IP comm contact page. And yeah, I mean, it’s, that’s the number ones Yeah. It’s like,

Jeff Kelly: Oh, no, don’t tell me that.

JD Houvener: You know, and it’s just there are ways to help. Certainly, you know, those folks, because sometimes they’re they’re on there, they’re already selling, we can help them give them an opinion on how to avoid infringing someone else’s patent. But in terms of securing their own rights, it’s by that time too far gone.

Jeff Kelly: Yep. Oh, man, that’s brutal. Yeah, yeah. often does that happen?

JD Houvener: You know, it’s probably one out of 30 one out of 40 potential clients come in. And they’ve had a Kickstarter up and there’s different flavors, you know, sometimes, you know, they sold, you know, widget a, but in the back, they’ve been working on version two. Yeah, net version two is different enough. You bet. We can look into filing and securing what’s different, what’s improved. But in almost every case, it’s like, it’s kind of marginal, right. It’s it’s incremental, as opposed to what what could have been?

Jeff Kelly: Wow, that is some good information right there. That’s power. I can totally see somebody you know, they get excited they invent something. Hey, let’s see if we can make some money on it. Wow. And a year ago, and they think I don’t need to get a patent. Wow.

JD Houvener: Yeah, yeah. I know. So we if we can catch them you know, before that year is up, we usually recommend doing a what’s called a provisional, provisional will secure your rights for up to a year. And then that your that’s when you want to do your testing, get your market research, make the improvements, and then follow the the full non provisional.

Jeff Kelly: So

JD Houvener: within a year,

Jeff Kelly: you mentioned your website. Is that how most clients contact you?

JD Houvener: We get a lot of press about 60% of our leads come through the website. We’re getting over it. We’re really fortunate now to get a good stream of referrals that are coming in. And we do have some some paid ads as well. So it’s been kind of a mix there.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

JD Houvener: but I think what’s helping people find our website is the the blog articles that I’ve written past couple years in those in those YouTube videos that send us,

Jeff Kelly: boldIP.com

JD Houvener: boldIP.com you got

Jeff Kelly: and you have a YouTube channel as well.

JD Houvener: Yeah, bold patents. Bold patents. Yeah, just right up there. So yeah, you check that out. We’ve got hundreds of videos that the latest ones are published just last month, and I do a weekly bold today show on Wednesday mornings at 9am.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

JD Houvener: it’s kind of like, kind of what you’re doing, Jeff. I mean, it’s kind of like an interview radio show where I bring on inventors, I should clients of ours, that are willing to share their invention that they’re now patent pending with. And I just love it and just sharing what they’ve gotten and inspiring others that are ready to you know, not sure if they want to get started or not. Right. It’s it’s been it’s been pretty cool.

Jeff Kelly: That is exciting. That’s good stuff. So in your local community, what kind of local organizations you’re involved with?

JD Houvener: Goodness, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s hard to say it’s hard. I mean, I guess you could say formally, I am part of the Washington State Bar Association.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

JD Houvener: And also the Washington patent law Association. So WSPLA those are the two biggies. The two things, you know, there’s alumni groups, but it’s it’s been challenging with COVID right. A lot of the stuff required these these really neat in person events. You know, they got to get everyone’s been challenged to kind of, what do we do now? How do we get together? So?

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

JD Houvener: you bet. You bet.

Jeff Kelly: How about history? I mean history now. Do you ever think Favorite historical figure?

JD Houvener: One today top of mine is MLK. I mean, I heard it. I want mentors. Darrin already had a speech he he gave in 1968. He was just unbelievable. Three months before his death.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

JD Houvener: Anyway, he’s just he was like, wow, that man could speak. I mean, wow, just right to your heart. So But yeah, I mean, he’s, uh, he’s top of mind right now, but I’m not huge history. Yeah. How about you, Jeff, who do you Who do you love?

Jeff Kelly: You know, my I drift. You know, I mean, I drift a lot. But, you know, I’m going to say, a guy that I’ve been reading a lot about lately is Gayness Khan. And his story is so fascinating that if I were to tell you Gayness Khan was a space a woman that would be easier to believe, than the real. I mean, it’s amazing. I mean, you know, most of these conquerors, you know, they grow up in these highly educated worlds, and they’re born into privilege. And they had all this extensive training and data. For all intents and purposes, he grew up homeless, and you weren’t even part of a job. And he didn’t even want to, all he wanted to do is get married, have kids and go live in the woods. And somebody made the mistake of coming and stealing his wife. And they stole his wife. And so he had to go become part of a tribe. And he did. And you know, the story, he got his wife back. And that’s the beginning. That’s where it all begins. It’s just

JD Houvener: wow.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

JD Houvener: Okay, we, you have to send me kind of kind of where to start? I mean, if it’s a it’s a documentary, or if it’s a book, send me send me a little piece on that Jeff.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah, sure. Well, absolutely. Got some good stuff. So when you’re not working on patents, and you’re not chasing kids, what do you do for fun?

JD Houvener: Cool. I do like like football. And we’re the weather’s pretty rough right now. But you know, when the weather’s fair,

Jeff Kelly: yeah,

JD Houvener: that’s my jam. That’s my jam, like football. I do like basketball too. And that’s fine. And those are my sports. My go twos. There was a piece of sound Basketball League. I get into.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. You still play?

JD Houvener: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Off the long play a little bit. I mean, I’m not I’m around like, you know, there’s levels I’m on See, right. Not quite D but i’m i’m see. It’s competitive. That’s fine.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah, yeah. Well, man, I so appreciate you taking the time to come on the show. I know you’re super busy. Is there a phone number that my clients could have if they wanted to reach out to you to call you if they’ve got we’re talking about,

JD Houvener: right? I don’t even see that. But 800-849-1913 that’s our that’s our main line. Okay, and you’re gonna get a mirror. You may also if you call apparatus or get our answering service, but the we offer a free screening session. It’s what we call it now. Kind of trained advisors. They’re not attorneys, but they’re, they’re darn, they’re darn good. I trained them myself. And they’ll help tell you, Hey, is patents the right fit right now? I mean, is this the right legal area at all for what you’re doing? And if it is, then they’ll help you schedule a consultation with either myself or Tom. Tom is our managing attorney. So yeah, check out the website. Give us a call. You know, that first step is hard. But you got to be bold, you know, just to see if it’s worth going after right now. Don’t make that mistake, right. Don’t go publishing selling your invention without

Jeff Kelly: trying to lose.

JD Houvener: Exactly, yeah, just just give us a call. It’d be great. Yeah. And any of your your clients, obviously, Jeff would be happy that we’d roll the red carpet out and make sure they felt right at home.

Jeff Kelly: Well, I’ve got a lot of colorful friends and colorful clients. I know somebody out there has got a world famous invention sitting out there somewhere. So then yeah, they need to give you a call. Buddy. I appreciate you coming on here. And

JD Houvener: you know, thanks for having me.

Jeff Kelly: I really appreciate it. Thank you, sir.

Jeff Kelly: Okay, this is Jeff Kelly. And I want to switch gears now that we’ve concluded the first part of the show, and I want to switch gears here now and and talk about bankruptcy, specifically chapter 7. We’ve had a lot of issues here recently with the current housing price. is sometimes can keep people from filing chapter 7 right now, a lot of people don’t realize this, but in the state of Georgia, the the most you’re going to be able to protect for a married couple for equity, the house is $43,000. And, you know, in the past 10 years ago, almost nobody had equity in their house period, because the real estate market was just horrible. But that’s not the case today, I have never in my life seen a real estate market. That is as hot as the current one. And, you know, I’ve got a lot of theories about this. Personally, I think that, you know, we’ve gone almost a decade without any kind of building boom, particularly for houses in the, you know, $100 to $250,000 range, there’s not a lot of those houses being built even now. And so it’s, you know, when you get a shortage of supply, and the demand goes up, that is going to drive prices up. And I’m seeing some of these old homes from the 1960s, that, you know, I would think nobody’s ever going to want to live in nobody would ever buy them, because they’re so old. They sell and they sell quick, because there’s nothing else out there. So another, you know, I want to just emphasize that you have to be careful about filing a chapter 7, because if you’ve got a lot of equity, and there are enough that a chapter 7 trustee is interested in and they make a move to sell your house, you can’t just quit, you can’t just get out of the case, up psych, nevermind, sorry, I filed, get me out. Or this is why it’s so important to meet with a experienced bankruptcy attorney like we have at my law office and have them review your entire situation and look at the tax value. Look at the Zillow value and have an honest conversation with you. Are you willing to risk your house in a chapter 7? And you know, there are some people that say ha, you know, there’s no way you could get x price for my house. And if somebody was going to give me $43,000 and put it in my bank account and sell my house and wipe out all of my debt? I’ll take that trade every day of the week. That kind of person can file chapter 7. But somebody who says absolutely not I’m scared to death, I don’t want to risk I don’t want to roll the dice.

Jeff Kelly: What what are my other options? Well, you could file a Chapter 13. And, you know, one of the differences between chapter 13 and chapter 7 is you can quit a 13 if you don’t like the way things are going. And usually, you know a chapter 13 trustee if we’ve got an appraisal on the house, when we’ve got tax assessor evaluations, Zillow evaluations, and so forth, they’re they’re not going to push hard to kick you out of a case based on the value of your house as long as there’s some good reasons to back it up. Now is a you know, how does that contrast with a chapter 7 trustee aren’t chapter 7 trustees reasonable? The only thing a chapter trustee is going to care about is what the real what his realtor says and if his realtor come by your house and or drive does a drive by and says I, I know this is a hot area, I think I can do it, let’s make it work, houses gone. Not so in a 13 you still have to comply with the code, you’ve still got to produce some proof that the house is worth x value. But you know, another interesting difference between the chapter 13 and the chapter 7 is that you can’t you know, if let’s just make up a number and say there’s, you know, $10,000 of equity that we just can’t get around. Well, you can file a Chapter 13 and you can pay that $10 $10,000 back through a chapter 13 plan and nobody is going to be able to sell or take your house. You’re, you’re good. So another point I want to emphasize is a lot of people think the only way you’re going to wipe out any debt is in chapter 7 in chapter 13. You’re paying all of your debt back. That is not the case. You can wipe debt out in chapter 13. The same way as a chapter 7.

Jeff Kelly: You know, we just have to look at your income, we have to look at your budget, we have to look at the type of debts. We need to look at your assets like your house. And so that’s why it’s so so important to meet with a bankruptcy attorney who has experience who knows the ins and outs of bankruptcy and knows where The traps are, and how they might affect you individually on your specific case. Oftentimes, I’ll have clients that will come meet with me, they’ll say, Well, my friend did such and such. And I know I can do it too. Well, not necessarily, because you may have a set of facts in your case, that is completely different from your friends case. But the good news is, we offer a free consultation, it doesn’t cost you anything, give us a call at 706-295-0030, we’re more than happy to sit down with you. Let us take a look at your situation. Let’s make sure that nobody is going to sneak up on you. And, and we’ll we’ll go over the 13 option, we’ll go over the chapter 7 option. And another good thing is that right now, you can get your case filed, you can actually attend your court hearing without ever leaving your home can all be done virtually. It’s about the only good thing that has come out of this COVID mess. And I anticipate it’s going to be that way for many months to come, you know, until we got this pandemic well behind us. And even then I’m not sure they’re going to change it back. Who knows. I’ve got a lot of good resources on bankruptcy. If you get a chance, go to my website, www.Kelleycanhelp.com and I’ve also got a podcast www.Kelleybankruptcy.com. You can see some of the episodes from you know prior radio show episodes, you can see those where we’ve interviewed attorneys and also where I’ve done, you know, just small podcasting on certain topics like like this. Also, I’ve got a free book on my website. If you scroll down to the bottom of it, you can type in your name, your email address, and we’ll email you a digital copy of it immediately. And if you would like to get a hard copy of the book, you can call us 770 I’m sorry 706-295-0030 and we will send you a hardcopy while supplies last. appreciate everybody tuning in today. And you know again, if you’ve got any questions at all you can shoot us an email at ClientServices@Kellycanhelp.com we’ve got live chat on our website, and you can also call us at that phone number 706-295-0030.

Jeff Kelly: I’d also like to put a quick plug in for my my friend who runs a really great church out in our Mirchi. His name is Sam Bice and if you want to talk to super awesome pastor, get out there and get to know Sam it’s living living waters church. Hwy 27 right off Martha berry highway they are super, super great guys super great group of people.

Jeff Kelly: Again, if you got any questions at all, anything related to bankruptcy, don’t hesitate to give us a shout and I appreciate you guys tuning in today. Thanks so much. Have a go and one more thing I forgot to add. Don’t forget if you know anybody who is behind on house payments, if they are struggling with car payments, they’re worried about the car getting repossessed or they’re worried about their house getting foreclosed. Tell them to call me 7062950030 because we can help. We can stop foreclosures, we can stop garnishments we can stop lawsuits, we can stop car repossessions. So, if you know anybody who is in those situations, it is a free consultation. We are happy to talk to you and see if we can come up with a plan that works to give you a fresh start. Thank you so much.

Outro Speaker: You’ve been listening to KellyCanHelp with Jeff Kelly reached out to the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly today by phone 706-295-0030 in Rome or visit Kellycanhelp.com.

Intro Speaker: It’s time for KellyCanHelp hosted by Jeff Kelly, Attorney at Law with the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly. And now here’s Jeff Kelly.

Jeff Kelly: Okay, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the show today. Today’s guest is Mr. Don Golden. He is a bankruptcy attorney from Tampa, Florida. And he’s got a company called Fresh Start for Life. And it’s something that we actually offer to all of my clients. And so I am looking forward to talking here with Don and hearing more about fresh start for life. Don, welcome to the show.

Don Golden: Thanks for having me, Jeff.

Jeff Kelly: You’re welcome. So tell us a little about yourself. How long have you lived in Tampa?

Don Golden: So I moved here in 1997. I moved here right after I graduated from law school. So it’s been 23 years I’ve lived here

Jeff Kelly: 23 years you’ve been in practice?

Don Golden: No. Well, yeah. So I’ve been a practice in 1998. I had a little family emergency that prevented me from taking the bar exam. My dad died like two weeks before the bar exam in July. And I’m from Maine originally. So I had to go back up north and take care of some business and things. So I delayed taking the bar exam until February. So I didn’t actually start practicing law until February of 1998. That will actually April when I got my license.

Jeff Kelly: Okay. And then throughout your career, you’ve specialized in bankruptcy.

Don Golden: I have actually, except my first year I focused on Social Security Disability work. But after that first year, I started doing almost exclusively consumer bankruptcy work.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. Excellent. Where’d you go to law school?

Don Golden: I went to law school at Thomas Cooley in Lansing, Michigan. Okay, it’s now part of Western Michigan University. But at the time, it was a private school just just a private law school.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. Okay. And where did you undergrad?

Don Golden: you’ve ever seen me? demonstrate?

Jeff Kelly: All right.

Don Golden: Yeah. Excellent. So I went all over, I went from the New England to the Midwest to now, South, South, southeast.

Jeff Kelly: Okay, so tell me about so for those of you who don’t know, I know Don, Don are good friends, I know, we have the same business coach. And that’s how I got to know done. And I think we’re, we’re the first people sign up with you for this fresh start for life. So can you tell us a little bit here? For any of my clients who don’t know, what is fresh start, like, what’s it all about?

Don Golden: Well, so if you remember, our business coach actually gave us a book called lead for God’s sake. And I read that book, and I really felt like I was being led to do more for my clients. And it just helped them get out of debt. And I started putting some thought into it. And I, I like personal finance and things like that. So I really felt like I was being led in a direction to do more for my clients in the way of helping them after the bankruptcy was over with. So we, we want to be their guide that helps them not just get through the bankruptcy, but that helps them rebuild their life after the bankruptcy. And and what I’ve seen over the years, is is that, you know, after 20 years of doing bankruptcy work, sometimes we get repeat business. And, you know, although it’s it’s nice that they think about you when they come back to see you a second time, it breaks my heart to that they’re back again, filing bankruptcy for a second or sometimes even a third time. And I wanted to try to help people avoid getting into that situation. So I came up with a concept of fresh start for life. Because the reason for the name of it is is that when you file bankruptcy, you get a fresh start. But I want it to last a lifetime I want that fresh start to last you a lifetime. And and and that’s why I decided to do this fresh start for life business. And what what it is really it was originally planned to be two courses. The first course is teaching consumers how to rebuild their credit after their bankruptcy is over with. And then the the original plan was to have a second course that was going to be a budget and you know, mainly a budget course. As I was talking to my clients about about the whole idea, people were really really excited about the rebuilding the credit part and they were a little less excited about the budget side of it. So that kind of got put on the backburner even though it’s my passion, my passion is is helping them you know, learn how to budget manage their money going forward so that they don’t find themselves back in the situation. You know that that led them to meet with me in the beginning. But everybody was really interested in the rebuilding the credit portion. So that’s that’s the course that we created. And that’s the one course that we have available right now is it’s called rebuild your credit rebuild your life. And we make that available to all our clients for free after they get their discharge in bankruptcy and I think you do the same thing as well.

Jeff Kelly: Yes We do. Yes, we do. So tell me a little bit about future credit. And, you know, I think I kind of suspect that a lot of my clients don’t understand what difference will it make whether I have a, you know, 720 or 620 or a 520? How does that impact their lives?

Don Golden: Well, so 720 is a good credit score, I mean, it’s not outstanding, but it’s considered very good, it’s a very good credit score, and the interest rates that you’re going to get with a 720 credit score, as opposed to a 600, or 650, or something like that, it’s, it’s a really good difference. You know, if it’s a 1.21, or two point savings on a mortgage, or or car loan, you’re saving 1000s of dollars on the life of your loan. If it’s a mortgage, you’re saving, sometimes 10s, of 1000s of dollars on the life of the loan. So it really is important to get your credit rebuilt after your bankruptcy is discharged, so that you can take advantage of the lower interest rates you get. And that’s just one of the benefits. One of the other things that most consumers don’t realize, and this is one of the things we go over in the course, is is that your credit score actually impacts your auto insurance rates. So if you have a bad credit score, for whatever reason, the auto insurers will charge you more money. I don’t know if they think that is because you’re, you know, thinking about your debt, and as opposed to focus on driving and you’re more likely to get in an accident. I don’t know why. Or maybe it’s just because they can’t. But for whatever reason, if you have a bad credit, you’ll probably pay more and auto insurance than you need to. So getting your credit score rebuilt after your bankruptcy is going to help you in so many ways, including lower interest rates and lower insurance rates, believe it or not.

Jeff Kelly: Wow, so not only is it going to lower your interest rate, but you’re going to get a better insurance on your car as well. Wow.

Don Golden: Most of the time. That’s correct. That is correct.

Jeff Kelly: However, it is the same way with your house house insurance. I’m just curious.

Don Golden: I you know, I don’t think it plays as big a role in homeowners insurance as it does auto insurance.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

Don Golden: that I don’t know for certain.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. What about buying a house, how important is this credit score for buying a house.

Don Golden: So it’s really important for buying a house. You know, as you know, Jeff, FHA, or VA, they’ll guarantee a home mortgage two years after bankruptcy discharge, and there is a certain credit score you need to get in order to qualify for that type of loan. Now, it’s not astronomically high, you don’t need a 720 credit score to qualify for an FHA or VA loan typically. But there again, if you do get that high of a score, it is going to give you a lower interest rates traditionally, and the better your better your credit score, the lower your interest rate, and the less you’re going to be paying for that loan. So saving 1000s and 1000s of dollars that hopefully, if you’re smart, you’ll be investing that in your 401k or you know, some savings, you know, so for your future.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. Yeah. What do you think the biggest thing is that holds people down and keeps them from getting their credit score up after filing a chapter seven.

Don Golden: I think there’s a couple things really, number one, they don’t know how to do it, they don’t know where to start. Most people don’t even check their credit report, after they file bankruptcy, they just assume everything is going to disappear from their credit report. And it’s just going to magically be fixed. And sometimes that happens, you know, sometimes the credit score is fine, and it just automatically starts going up after the bankruptcy. But a lot of times it doesn’t, because not all of the creditors are going to issue updates to the credit reporting bureaus. So that’s the thing that the consumer needs to look for, they need to make sure that following the discharge of their bankruptcy, the credit, the credit report has been updated by their creditors to show that the debt was discharged in bankruptcy. And most people just don’t do it. They just assume it’s going to happen and they don’t do it. So that’s one of the big reasons why people stay bogged down with bad credit, even after a bankruptcy.

Jeff Kelly: we are gonna start doing that we’re going to check the credit reports 90 days after discharge.

Don Golden: That’s exactly what I tell people is 90 days after discharge.

Jeff Kelly: So for my listeners, can you explain what what can potentially happen to a creditor who screws up and fails to report correctly on their credit report?

Don Golden: Yeah. So if if it’s not updated on the credit report, there’s various steps that you should take. But you know, to get it fixed, I don’t recommend you just go out and sue a creditor if they don’t update your credit report right away. But if you take the steps of doing a dispute and things like that, the thing is if you follow the steps that we teach in the course, and they still don’t correct it, after you’ve taken all taken all the steps that we teach in the course, then you have the right to sue them under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, probably because they reporting information that’s not accurate on your credit report, which is a violation of a federal statute, and it’s probably also a violation of the discharge injunction. So you probably have at least two causes of action that you can against the against the debt collector or the creditor that fails to update the credit report.

Jeff Kelly: Wow. What are in? I’m just curious in your area, what what kind of settlements? Do you see for like a low end discharge violation or a Fair Credit Reporting violation?

Don Golden: Well, to be honest with you, we don’t do a whole lot of it. Because, you know, my clients are usually successful in getting their credit reports fixed by doing, you know, the steps that we teach them to take. So, you know, I had one case where it was like, $3500, you know, in settlement money. You know, a lot of that is attorneys fees. There’s a lot of work that goes involved in the filing of the case, you know, 3500, I would say on the low end, and I think we’ve had one that was like, 10,000, on the high end.

Jeff Kelly: Okay. Wow. That’s, that’s good stuff. Good to know. Tell me about so my client gets a discharge, I’m gonna send an email and say, Okay, let’s get you signed up for fresh start for life. What should they expect? Are they going to be reading emails are we going to hear some what’s going to happen?

Don Golden: So what happens is, is they will get in, the way that set out to Jeff is, is your assistant, you probably don’t know this, because you don’t deal with it. But your assistant gets in touch with one of my staff members, my staff member will put their information into our software, and then that’ll generate an automated email to your client, your client will get an email with a login and password information, and a link to the site so they can get started. Now, I’m going to warn you, we just recently updated the course and it moved to a new new platform. And so even your old clients, you may want to tell your old clients about this, Jeff, because the people that you’ve enrolled in the course, their old passwords aren’t going to work right now.

Jeff Kelly: Okay

Don Golden: you might want to send something out to your clients to let them know that they got an email with a new login and password information. In case some of your old clients are trying to access the site. And a lot, I found out just today that a lot of those emails have gone to junk mail, so they may not have seen them. So make sure that they check their junk mail to make sure that they’ve seen any updates that they’ve received from fresh start for life. But anyway, what happens is they get their login, a password, and they log in. And now I haven’t restructured that before, it was just a like eight videos that they would watch and with a little homework assignment after each one. But now we have 19 lessons set up in the system. And after each lesson is a short, short test, you’re not a test, but a little quiz to make sure that they actually, you know, kind of learn the material, he thought I mean, and can apply it and stuff like that. It’s not really it’s not nice, I take that back. It’s not 19 videos, it’s it’s 19 19 assignments, basically, which includes the test. So it’s like five or six question true false test after each after each video lesson, so that we know that they learn the material and they can they can put it to use and they really get benefit from it.

Don Golden: We’ve also included a sample dispute letters, and I have a video that I recorded teaching them exactly how they can go pull all their credit reports for free every single year.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. Excellent. So that quiz, is it kind of like a game?

Don Golden: That’s not a game? It’s just a true false quiz.

Jeff Kelly: Okay, I gotcha. Just want to make sure they get it. All right. Well, that’s good stuff. You You mentioned like, it’s really your heart’s desire to see people, you know, not only get get rid of the dead and move on to a better future and sane and buy a house and whatnot.

Don Golden: Exactly.

Jeff Kelly: What What would you say to people, you know, do you ever run into people, I’ve run into some good bit. Some people just have a mindset of, I just got to get through the storm, and I’m not worried about anything else. What do you think people need to do to move move from one mindset to another?

Don Golden: I think that, you know, after they file bankruptcy, now they’re through the storm, right? And it’s okay to take a minute to say, Okay, I’m through this storm. But after that, after you’ve taken a moment to reflect and take a take a breath, and feel that relief, because now you’re not going through the storm anymore. Now it’s time to focus on the future. And so this is the exciting thing. And it’s really cool that you called me to talk about this today. Because, you know, as I said, earlier, I came up with this idea of doing a second course, you know, that was gonna be around budget and things like that. And I just got stuck, because my clients weren’t all that interested. And I really didn’t know where to take it. But in the last last week or so I’ve had some inspiration. And I’m working on some concepts right now that I don’t know if we’re going to create it into a course or if it will just be an email sequence. But I think what we’re going to do is we’re going to have all the people that are enrolled in fresh start for life. There’ll be like lifetime members and they will continuously get content from us. That will be on the issues about reading After after you’ve rebuilt your credit what do you do you know. And you remember Mike McCalla Wits the book we read to fix this next with by Mike McCalla, it’s a business book, and he had the mass Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Well, I’ve kind of I’ve taken that. And I’ve applied it to personal finance. So I have like, five levels of personal finance hierarchy of needs. And I’m going to start doing some some content based on the five levels of personal personal finance needs. And I really hope will help people, you know, get to the point of financial freedom, because that’s what I think my mission is my mission is to take people from being broke, broken, bankrupt, to financial freedom, and and that’s what I hope they get out of filing bankruptcy, and going through the fresh start for Life program.

Jeff Kelly: What would you say to somebody who, who just has this attitude of, you know, I’m just, I’m paycheck to paycheck? I’m stuck. I’m never gonna get to like, I mean, financial freedom, that’s just a pipe dream. I mean, sometimes I want to shake people to come on and get a dream with me, what? What would you say to someone like that?

Don Golden: Sorry about that. Um, excuse me.

Jeff Kelly: You’re good.

Don Golden: So, I’m going to tell you, Jeff, that you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them drink, right? So not everybody is going to share our vision for their life, you know what I mean? And if they don’t, that’s okay. You know, maybe they’ll get there someday, maybe they won’t, maybe they’re just be satisfied with the status quo. And, and I can’t, you know, I want to help them, and I will help them as best I can. But if if they’re not willing to change, then there’s really not much we can do to help them. You know, you have to have it in your heart, that you want something more than where you’re at right now. And if you take a step back, and you think I just went through one of the worst experiences of my life of bankruptcy, you know, there’s very few things that are more difficult for people to go through. I mean, it’s not bad. I mean, at the end of the day, they’re very happy because they have a sense of relief. But in their mind, they’ve gone through something traumatic, which is financial hardship, and a bankruptcy. And my hope, and my prayer is, is that people will absolutely not want to suffer through that again, and will look back and say, What did I do wrong? What can I do better? And how can I get to the point where I’m not living paycheck to paycheck, where I actually have an emergency fund, you know, so that I don’t have to rely on using your credit card, if I need to send in new tires, you know, that’s the thing that I’m focusing on from here on out, is teaching people how to how to rebuild your credit, but then how not to need it. You know, that’s my goal for people. That’s because debt, although you need to have access to it. debt is what prevents people from reaching financial freedom. And without debt, it Well, let me let me say it this way, if you have debt, I think you will almost never reach financial freedom, you have to get rid of your debt in order to get there. And if you go into bankruptcy, and you come out of it with a discharge, and you go right back into debt, and you don’t change your mindset, you’re never going to get there. But if you do change your mindset, and your heart says, I want more for myself and my family. I don’t want to live paycheck to paycheck anymore. You can do it. It’s there for you. There’s simple steps to take.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Don Golden: And that’s one of the things that we’re going to be providing to my clients and your clients, because they’re, they’re part of our fresh start for life family.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Don Golden: So that they will get the information that I hope they need and want to live a better financial life.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah, you know, I, along this topic, I read something by Jay Henderson, this past week. And you know, along the lines of you know, where are you going? Where are you going to be 10 years from now. And he had written something on Facebook about how when he was younger, he asked his father, you know, where do you think I’m going to be 10 years from now. And his dad looked at him and said, Son, 10 years now you’re going to be wherever you visualize yourself being today, 10 years from now. And I may have like worried that he were way better way said it. But, you know, it really hit me that, Hey, where are you going to be 10 years from now? is where you visualize yourself. If there’s no vision, there’s no goal. There’s no nothing, you know, you aim for nothing. You’re gonna hit nothing.

Don Golden: Yep. And I agree with that. It reminds me of our friend Blaine Alcorn, who has the saying, what you think about you bring about right from thinking grow rich. You know, if you if you think that if you start to think that I am rich, and you start to think about that every single day, and you tell yourself that every single day through self affirmation, you can get there. But you know, you have to you have to believe it. And you have to tell yourself every day and you have to picture it and visualize it. You’re saying, and you absolutely can get there, you just do it step by step day by day. And it’s doable. I don’t care. If you make $15 an hour, you know, you can do it. But you just have to change your mindset about what makes you happy and what you need in life, is it? Is it having a, you know, a car payment all the time? Is that what makes you happy? Or is it having money in your bank account so that you’re secure, and you know that you’re going to be able to keep the lights on in the house, and keep your car on the road? If you have an emergency, you know, things like that. So it’s just little things. And I’m not saying that you can’t live a happy life. And I’m not saying you can’t spend any money. That’s absolutely not what I’m talking about at all. I want people to live a full and healthy happy life, including, you know, recreational activities and stuff like that. But I just want people to think about what your priority is. Is it having this meal at this restaurant tonight? Is that what’s most important to me? Yeah. Or is it more important to me to have this money in my in my savings account for my retirement, you know, or something. So that’s, that’s kind of where it’s at. But it’s finding that happy mix of spending the right amount of amount of money on your joy and your entertainment, but still having enough leftover to invest in your retirement fund, because I meet so many people that say, I just can’t afford to put money into my retirement account, but I look at their budget, and they’re just spending money on things that they really don’t need to be spending money on. Like, like Starbucks and things. Now, I’m not saying you can’t go to Starbucks, either, you know, you there’s a place for that and a budget. But going to Starbucks two or three times a day, you know, it’s just not reasonable. And that money would be better spent, you know, in a retirement account. So anyway, that’s, that’s my theory on things I want. I want to be able to leave something for my children, when I die. That’s the legacy level of the hierarchy of needs, personal finance hierarchy, hierarchy of needs. That’s my goal, his legacy level. But But financial freedom to me is not having to work anymore, when you get to the point where you can sustain your lifestyle, and you don’t have to work anymore. And that’s what I want, I want to be able to get to the point where I have enough money in the bank to live off of it and not have to work anymore at some point. And that’s that, to me, that’s financial freedom.

Jeff Kelly: So that’s a great goal. You’re talking about budgeting there. And I don’t know about you, but the issue that comes up a lot in North Georgia, is Harley Davidson

Don Golden: believe that, yeah,

Jeff Kelly: I am not getting rid of my Harley. I haven’t had one guy look at his wife. Instead, I’ll get rid of her before I get rid of them. There’s no way I’m getting for the Harley. Yes, but what if you could have some financial freedom? You know, what if you could have you know, that emergency fund saved up so that when the car is going to break, and it’s guaranteed the car is going to break?

Don Golden: Absolutely

Jeff Kelly: You’re going to have $2,000 worth of tires or something to do with that car? How are you going to pay for it? And, you know,

Don Golden: think, Jeff, I want people to have their Harley, if they want to have the Harley, but I want them to do it without breaking their back financially with a high payment, you know, paying a lot of interest and things like that. So why don’t we come up with a plan to get that Harley, but let’s save enough money so that we can put like 50% down, you know, or something, so that we are not breaking our bank every single month making that Harley Davidson payment? These are the kinds of things that I want people to think about, instead of getting my Harley with zero down 100%, finance, you know, 15 16% interest, how about I save up enough and I buy a used one, and I put at least half of it down in cash after I’ve saved up? You know, that’s the kind of choices that I’m hoping people will make going forward that will make an infinite difference in their financial future.

Jeff Kelly: And I couldn’t agree with you more amazing, amazing stuff. Well, hey, Don, I appreciate you talking to me today. I’m looking forward to getting this out to all my clients and all the clients as well. And let’s get him signed up. And let’s get him all pointed in a new direction for financial freedom. I love it.

Don Golden: Man, thank Thanks for having me. I love talking about this. I don’t know if you can tell that I’m fired up about it is my passion. And I’m excited. I’m excited for my clients feature and I’m excited for your clients features too.

Jeff Kelly: All right, well, thank you so much Don.

Don Golden: Thanks.

Outro Speaker: You’ve been listening to KellyCanHelp with Jeff Kelly reached out to the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly today by phone 706-295-0030 in Rome or visit Kellycanhelp.com.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly. And in today’s episode, I want to talk more about pride and bankruptcy. I recently met with a client, and when we were just getting ready to file our case, she looked at me and she said, You know, I should have done this years ago, but my pride just wouldn’t let me. She had ignored her problems for years and years, tried to make the minimum payments, and eventually, the debt just grew so large that the creditor started filing garnishment actions. And that’s what motor motivated her to finally pull the trigger. She just got the point where she had to pride or no pride. And after she signed the court papers, she said, You know, I just feel like this huge burden has been taken off my shoulders.

Why do so many people wait longer than they should to file bankruptcy? I believe the answer to that question is one-word pride and I get it. Because I suffer from it as well. Is all pride bad? Well, no. I mean, it’s, it’s I think it’s a good idea to take pride in your work and try to work hard and produce the best you can. You know, I don’t know if any you’ve ever seen the movie Cool Runnings. But you know, I love that scene where the one bobsled guy is trying to encourage the other guy who’s maybe kind of suffering from some self-doubt. He’s like, I look at you, I see pride. I see power. And then bleep bleep bleep. But anyway, that’s a really good movie, by the way. That’s good pride. You know, courage people stand up. But there’s a bad side of pride. And when you think about it, you know, ask yourself this question. How many divorces do you think are caused by pride? I bet it’s a lot. Why can’t people just say they’re Sorry? When they know they did wrong? Oh, I bet it’s because of pride. Why can’t people forgive and just let things go? I think it’s because of pride. Where does that kind of pride lead? Not a very good place.

I recently had an experience myself with pride episode. I had this great idea. So I thought of getting into the Ottawa River river up around Neil’s landing and kayaking with my daughter down to Rome. Now, apparently, there’s a warning sign there that we completely missed. And as soon as we got in the water, my daughter looks at me, she goes, Dad, I really hate this. This is bad idea. Let’s just turn around, we can make it. Let’s just paddle back and get out of here. And I should listen to her. I really thought she would like it. It was her first time kayaking. She had absolutely hated it right from the start. And, you know, I hate to admit that I’m wrong. Why is that? Well, pride. So, and you know, I didn’t want to be a quitter. So I’m like, I just, you know, come on, I looked at the map, and it really isn’t that far between Rome and Cartersville. How long could it possibly take? And the river? We’re in kayaks? I mean, you know, I did the math in my head, I thought, well, cars will maybe about 20 miles away. And, you know, halfway is 10 miles surely won’t take a couple hours in the river. Right? We’ve got a current, wrong wrong. Man, I was so wrong. My poor daughter, she kept asking me how much further how much further Oh, just another hour, just another hour? Well, after about four hours of paddling, we came across this nice gentleman who was on the side of the river sit and kind of high up on a bank. And I asked him, I said, Hey, buddy, do you know how much further it is to Rome? And he looked at us with a sympathetic look, said, you know, it’s about six more hours of paddling. And right then and there. I should have gotten out of the river, I should have said, Oh, sir, I should I should have begged and pleaded you know, let me call my wife to come get us and I didn’t do it.

Why not? Well, because of pride. So instead, we paddled on for a few more hours, until we finally came to a nice young man named Joel and his girlfriend who were fishing on the side of the river and where he lived, he had he had a little dock there. And I asked if it was any way we could get out of the river there and have my wife come get us and he very graciously helped to fish us out of the river and saved us from total misery. I will be happy grateful Thank you, Joel from the River Bend area, you saved us. And my wife was able to come get us, he was so nice. He opened up a fence to his pasture, and we were able to get down there and get the kayaks out of there. And we made it, we made it. And, you know, all in all, my daughter was a pretty darn good sport about the entire thing. So I’m very grateful to her. Very grateful to my wife. But it really got me thinking, Wow, we could have got in trouble. And you know, in fact, there was one point in the trip, or, we were going to try to climb out of this one area, and it was too steep. And it was really muddy. And I slipped and I fell. And looking back on it, I could have broken my neck, I could have broke my back. I did fall, and I fell on top of the kayak and my daughter got a good laugh out of that. That could have ended badly because of pride. So think about it. How far will you go to protect your pride? How far are you willing to paddle to protect your pride? How much suffering Are you willing to make your family endure? Because of your pride? Oh, man, those are tough questions for all of us.

You know, when it comes to bankruptcy, a lot of people will go to great lengths to protect their pride. And I see people every year who will clean out their 401k. And you know, money that was meant for retirement just disappears and gone because they use it to pay debts that we could have wiped out in bankruptcy. And you know, 401k is or a protected asset that creditors can’t touch. But man, if they can talk you into pulling that money out to pay them, they’re sure gonna do it. And pride is a creditors best friend. You know, a lot of people will borrow money from family, knowing they’re never going to be able to pay it back to try to avoid bankruptcy. It’s a sad, it’s a bad move. It’s a sad move. Can you put $1 amount on the cost of pride? How much does pride cost? Well, now I can’t put an actual dollar amount on it. But you could it would probably be a lot. And sometimes it’s a lot more than your 401k it’s a lot more than money, you might relatives that you’re trying to bail you out in a short-term jam. Sometimes the cost of your pride is your marriage, or some other important relationship. Sometimes it’s a loss of a lot of time. You know, unfortunately, pride can also cost you your health. You know, anxiety is it’s real, it’s hurt, it’s bad, it’s bad for your heart, bad for your blood pressure. It’s bad on so many levels.

So, in conclusion, don’t let your pride blind you to the reality of math. Don’t let pride blind you to the fact that we all need grace at some point. That That’s just a fact. Take advantage of a free consultation, give me a call 770-881-8449 don’t cost anything to come meet with us. Let us evaluate the situation. I’ve got a great I really do have a great staff or got a great team of people you can you can see the proof in our our Google reviews. And you know we’ve got a lot of resources on my website to go to Kellycanhelp.com and scroll down to the bottom I’ve written a book on chapter 13 and chapter 7. Educate yourself learn about your options.

I’ve also written you know a lot of different blog posts on various topics of bankruptcy, you can go into the search box up top and you can search there and see him also got some podcasts and those are located at KellyCanHelp.com I’m sorry KellyBankruptcy.com. And that’s where all the other podcasts are. You can see past episodes of radio shows and a whole bunch of stuff on there. Got a lot of free resources and I really encourage you to take advantage of them. And again, please give us a call 7708818449 It’s a free consultation doesn’t cost you anything. You don’t have to come to the office. We can do everything over the phone right now. It’s one of the few benefits of of this COVID mess is there there we can file the case without going to court your your court hearing can actually be done over the phone. We can review everything with you without you having to come in. Give us a call. Thank you so much for tuning in today. Have a good one.

Intro Speaker: It’s time for KellyCanHelp hosted by Jeff Kelly, Attorney at Law with the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly. And now here’s Jeff Kelly.

Jeff Kelly: Hello, this is Jeff Kelly. And in today’s episode, I want to answer the question, is it possible to lose your home in a chapter 7 bankruptcy case? And the answer is yes. You know, this current real estate market is unbelievable. I’ve, I’ve been in practice since 1998. And I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve never seen a real estate market where somebody in Rome, Georgia can put a house on the market and it sells within a week. So, because of that real estate values have become very problematic for chapter 7 clients. Let me give you an example. Let’s say you have somebody who, you know, 10 years ago, they bought a house for $100,000. And today, the tax assessor says it’s worth 120 Well, that wouldn’t be a problem. In in Georgia, a single person can exempt $21,500, a married couple can exempt $40-43,000. So when when could it become a problem?

Jeff Kelly: Well, for one thing, even though the tax assessor says the house might be worth 120,000, it’s possible that it’s worth more, and a chapter 7 trustee. They are not bound by what the tax assessor says they’re not bound by what Zillow says, you know, honestly, they’re not even bound by what an appraiser says, a chapter 7 trustee has a strong incentive to sell your house if they can make money off of it. That’s, that’s how chapter 7 trustees generate extra income for themselves as by selling assets and paying debts in chapter 7 cases. So they usually work closely with a real estate agent. And that real estate agent has a right to drive by your house, if you’re in the middle of a chapter 7 case. And that agent may look at it and say, Hey, you know what, I know, the tax assessor says it’s worth 120. I think I can get 150 for it. So let’s say, you know, a single person is filing a case under these facts. Well, hypothetically, if that real estate agent puts that house on the market, and sells it for 150, it’s gone. Now the person who filed chapter 7 will get a check for $21,500. Because that’s the amount that we’ve exempted in this hypothetical. So they it’s not like they lose their house and have nothing. But many people who consider chapter 7 say, hey, look, if I, you know, if I wipe out all of my debts, but end up losing my house, and yeah, if I got $21,500 in my bank account, at the end of the day, that’s not a win for me, because I can’t lose this house, I don’t want to lose this house, I love this house. We’ve been here, you know, 10 years, whatever.

Jeff Kelly: You know, if that’s your situation, then you don’t want to file a Chapter 7, you just don’t, because another thing that kind of sneaks up on people that a lot of people just don’t quite get is that if you’re in the middle of a chapter 7 case, and you don’t like the way things are going, you can’t just bail out. You can’t just quit when a chapter 7 trustee has a contract on your house. It’s going going gone. Now, I’ve had a lot of clients asked me before, you know, surely this can’t possibly be real, you know, lose your house in the middle of a chapter 7 bankruptcy case. They can’t take it away. I know they can’t. Oh, yes, they can. Welcome to the State of Georgia. Oh, personally, I think we need to increase those exemption amounts.

Jeff Kelly: And I think they probably will in the in the coming years. But currently, it’s $21,500 for an individual $43,000 for a couple. So I was just talking to a guy the other day who had a similar set of circumstances here and you know, we went through it Hey, option one. You you roll the dice 10 you you file chapter 7, and you see if the trustee thinks he can get enough for your house to cover your debt. Option number two, you could You could file a Chapter 13. And whatever we figure out the value of the house truly is, then the key is there’s this legal concept called the liquidation test. And if you do a chapter 13, and you pay back your creditors the same amount of money that they would have gotten if you had filed chapter 7, then you pass the liquidation test and all chapter 13 plans must pass the liquidation test.

Jeff Kelly: That’s the rule. So for example, hypothetically, again, let’s say this guy, how would this work in a real life situation? Let’s say this fella owes $50,000 in credit card debt house is worth 150. We only owe 100, we’ve exempted 21,500. So we’re going to take that 50,000, deduct 21,500, we’re going to use that balance in chapter 13. And that is the amount of money that we would have to pay over a five year period to the creditors to protect his equity in the house. Now we can deduct out amounts for how much would real estate commission be that that does get to be allowed to be deducted out as well. And typically will take somewhere around 10% of the sales price for the deduction. So it’s possible in this scenario, so we got $50,000 of equity, we deduct 21,500. And we add on another 15. And you know, we’re not paying the full balance of the credit cards back, we’re only paying back the amount of money that is needed to pass the liquidation test.

Jeff Kelly: So another option, you know, again, is, you know it another thing that I want to emphasize about chapter 13, that a lot of people like is that if you do get in the middle of chapter 13, and you decide you don’t like the way things are going, you get a big pay raise you you you don’t want to be in it anymore, you can voluntarily dismiss a chapter 13 whereas you can’t with a 7, you can with a chapter 13, you can quit that case anytime you want.

Jeff Kelly: Now, another thing about chapter 13, I want to emphasize in the show today is if you are behind on car payments, and you are worried about your car getting repossessed, give us a call, let’s talk because chapter 13 stops the repossession of your vehicle. Basically, what we can do is take the entire balance and spread it out over five years and see what kind of plan payment we can come up with. For a lot of people, they have really high high interest rates on some car notes. As a general rule, we can knock it down to somewhere between 5 and 6%. Right now in a chapter 13 plan. So if you’re behind on car payments, don’t let your car get repossessed, give us a call, let’s talk, let’s come up with a plan that works for you. That takes care of all your debts. And chapter 13 does that chapter 13 is a consolidation of all your debts, if you’re behind on mortgage payments, we can stop the foreclosure of your home with a chapter 13 whatever your arrears are, we’re going to spread those out over a five year period. We can eliminate credit card debt and medical debt, things like that. And in some chapter 13 plans, again, it’s going to depend on your set of facts. It’s going to depend on how much money you make is going to depend on what type of assets Do you have, like we talked about earlier in the show about the house? You know, do you have equity, how much equity, there’s a lot of factors that go into your payment. But you you really should take advantage of a free consultation and call my office at 706-295-0030.

Jeff Kelly: What we would like to do is set up an appointment with you. And again, we want to go through all your assets, all your debts, all your income, all your budget, and then at the end, come up with a plan that works for you if chapter 7 is the best option, we’ll explain to you why. If it’s not We will also explain to you why it’s not. We don’t cover all your options. And you know, honestly, it’s sometimes in some cases, it might be better to talk to them a banker about getting a equity loan out of the house because with an equity loan, you can spread the debt out between 15 and 30 years. So we’ll we will look at it we will go over things with you. We will give you our honest assessment. If you get a chance. I want you to check out my website, www.Kellycanhelp.com we’ve got a lot of blogs written on there about a lot of different topics in there, searchbar up there.

Jeff Kelly: I’ve also written a book on chapter 13 and chapter 7, and you can get a free copy of it. Just go to my website, scroll down to the bottom. And if you’ll fill it out, we’ll email you a copy if you would like a hardcopy, call my office and we will mail on to you while supplies last. And I also want to talk about a I have a podcasting website, Kellybankruptcy.com. So if you get a chance, please check out either one of those resources. If you want, if you need to email us, you can shoot us an email at ClientServices@Kellycanhelp.com. Again, that’s ClientServices@Kellycanhelp.com. k-e-l-l-y-c-a-n-h-e-l-p.com. Again, main office number 706-295-0030.

Jeff Kelly: So I want to talk a little bit more about the process of actually getting your case filed very quickly. Right now about the only the only good thing that has come out of this COVID-19 mess that I see is the courts will now allow us to file your case without you leaving your home. And even your court hearing can be done without you leaving your home. So what what we do, you know, after you call us, we go through your first initial appointment, if you decide you’re going to move forward, then we’re going to want to get a copy of your credit report, put all the pertinent information into a bankruptcy petition. And then we can call you on the phone and we can go over the petition with you page by page, we can mail it to you, you can sign it and mail it back to us. Or we can use a program called zoom, where we do a screen share meeting with you. And we can go through it every page that way. And we can use a DocuSign type of service that will allow you to sign it electronically. And again, your court hearings right now are done remotely over the phone I I anticipate it’s going to be this way for at least the next six months.

Jeff Kelly: Because you know with COVID number shooting up in the current state that we’re in, but Gosh, I hope we get through this COVID mess. Soon. I, have you had enough of it. So I want to finish out here with a quick devotion. I like to do that at the end of each podcast that I’m doing by myself. And this week, some verses that were really, you know, kind of heavy on my heart is you know, with with everything going on with the election and the uncertainty and the mess that on the Capitol.

Jeff Kelly: These are scary times. Really scary. I never in my life thought that I would live to see the day in America where a large company like parlour I mean, it’s like half a billion dollar company could literally get wiped off the map in one day. It’s it’s some interesting times about free speech, interesting times about politics, and scary times with this COVID and the numbers going up and the effect on the economy and the shutdowns.

Jeff Kelly: And I really felt like God laid this verse on my heart, Proverbs three, five and six. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight. Trust I’m gonna read again and Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding in all your ways. acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight.

Jeff Kelly: And I’ll be honest, I’m not a pastor. I’m not a super Christian. I’m just an average Joe. I’m an I’m an attorney. I’m a good bankruptcy attorney. I’m not a I’m not a pastor. I am a Christian, I do feel obligated to share what I believe, to the world to help to help people to help love people. And I hope that this message today will help some people out there who are really worried who are scared because God can help us get through it. God is in control and it’s kind of funny, I was praying this week. You know, Lord, I’m scared about 2021 I can’t make it through without you. I really felt like God kind of laid it on my heart that the real hard truth is that I’ve never been able to make it through any year without him. And he’s always come through. And 2021 looks scary. I’ll be honest, it does. But God will come through he will get us through it. And if if if we put our faith in material things, it’s not going to work out. If we put our faith in our bank account, it’s not going to work out, we put our faith in our job, you know, you you could potentially lose your job.

Jeff Kelly: I think. I think that we’ve got to rely on this verse. Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean, not on your own understanding, in all your ways. acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight. If anybody out there, if you do not know Jesus Christ, I just encourage you to get down on your knees in prayer prayer that goes something like this. Lord Jesus, I want you to be my Savior. I quit. I give up. I want to give all the control to you. I want to follow you. I want to learn your ways. I want your peace as fast as all comprehension. Thank you, Lord, for the gift of your salvation. accept the gift and receive it in Jesus name. Amen.

Jeff Kelly: And if you need to talk further about anything Christian Christianity was related. I want to encourage you to check out living waters church, got a good friend there. His name is Sam Bice and he is awesome and his phone number is 706-234-7363. And his church is located in our marching at 26 little Texas Valley Road. super great guy really knows the scripture well and really can help you come to know Christ. Thanks again for tuning in today. Really appreciate you guys. Hope you have a great week. Thank you.

Outro Speaker: You’ve been listening to KellyCanHelp with Jeff Kelly reached out to the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly today by phone 706-295-0030 in Rome or visit Kellycanhelp.com

Intro Speaker: It’s time for Kelly Can Help hosted by Jeff Kelly, Attorney at Law with the Law Office of Jeffrey B Kelly. And now here’s Jeff Kelly.

Jeff Kelly: Hello, this is Jeff Kelly. And here we are on January 6 2021, is the date of this recording. And today, what I would like to talk about is the current state of bankruptcy, some changes that may be coming down the pipe. So as a consequence of the elections, it does look like the democrats are going to have control over the Senate, and there is some Bankruptcy Reform that is most likely going to come down the pipe and looks like it may pass. And I don’t have all of the details yet. But one of the biggest things that is coming is that student loans are going to be dischargeable in bankruptcy, that’s going to be huge. And that’s that’s going to create a flood of cases.

Jeff Kelly: So what does this mean for people who are in debt right now? Well, one of the biggest mistakes that I see people make about filing is they just put it off too long. And it can create a lot of problems waiting too long. It and there’s no sense in doing that. It’s a free consultation to call us.

Jeff Kelly: Let me give you an example of people who wait too long they get in to fix they have some debt hanging over their head. And and they they could qualify right now today, they could wipe the debt out and get a fresh start and move on with life. But a lot of people will wait. And some things happen. People get new job, they start making good money, and then they want to file. Well, we might not be able to wipe out as much debt if you have gotten, you know, a new job a new income. And I’m seeing that a lot where people’s income has passed, picked up in the past couple months, a lot of people working overtime and so forth, that can affect us on the Means Test.

Jeff Kelly: Will there still be a means test? Once the new bankruptcy form reform laws go into place? I don’t know. When Will those laws go into place? I don’t know. So you know, the bottom line is if you need to file now is a good time. If you have a bunch of student loans hanging over your head, it potentially might be better to wait, we’ll see. I don’t know how the new law is going to impact old cases are we gonna to be able to discharge student loans in cases that were filed before the law changed? I, again, I don’t know there’s a lot of things are up in the air. But if you are in a situation where you’ve got debt hanging over your head, you need to take action. Because in Georgia, if you mess around and wait, and your creditor gets a judgment against you, they can take 25% of your net check. They can also clean out your checking account. They can also put liens on your house.

Jeff Kelly: Is it ever too late to file bankruptcy? No, it’s not. It’s not too late. But you definitely don’t want to do things like empty out your 401k and I and I get it. I’m I’m human, I’m the same way as everybody else you. You want to put off doing difficult things, I understand that. But now is a really good time to file if you’re if you’re behind on house payments, and you’re being threatened with foreclosure. In chapter 13, You can take all of those past due payments and put them into a plan and stop the foreclosure. If you’ve got a car that you wanted to keep, and you fell behind a little bit because it COVID Hey, we can catch those car payments up in the chapter 13 plan.

Jeff Kelly: So the bottom line is it’s, you know, another good reason to not wait is I’m expecting once this new law goes into effect. And again, I don’t know when it’s going to happen. But when it does, there is going to be a tidal wave and there’s going to be a long line of people filing. And I think some people are going to have to wait when that happens. So why not just if you if you know if you know you’re struggling Now, why continue the pain? Why not take care of the problem today. So give us a call 706-295-0030 my office my main office is in Rome. And we have offices all over North Georgia. We’re in Dalton cartersville Dallas, Kennesaw Marietta. My Rome office is catty corner from the clock tower.

Jeff Kelly: And another neat thing right now is you can actually file chapter 13 or chapter 7, without ever leaving your house, you can even your court hearing and can be done remotely over the phone. So the way it works is we can do an initial consultation with you over the phone, if you’re worried about COVID if you want to meet live, I am meeting people live as well. But we meet, we go over your income, we go over your budget, let’s take a look at the whole situation what what’s going on, then, you know, we get your we get all of your information ready for a court file. And the next step would be to set up a you know, approximately a two hour meeting that we can also do virtually over the phone over zoom. And during this appointment, we’re going to go through every single page of your petition together to make sure that it is absolutely perfect. And that nothing is missing, we want you to get the best freshstart possible. I’ve got really good staff, you can check out our reviews on Google, we’ve gotten some good ones, a lot of good ones. And thank you to all my former clients that have written those for us, I really do appreciate it.

Jeff Kelly: And one more thing I want to say right now, the current real estate market is unbelievable. And I’ve never seen people get such high prices for their homes. And so you know, a lot of people who who wait till the last possible second come in and want to file and sometimes they find out they can’t because their house is worth too much. So Zillow is a good guide, a good indicator, Zillow is not the be all end all. But it will give you a good estimate of what your house is worth. But the main thing that I want to emphasize to anybody who is thinking about filing a chapter 7 is just because Zillow says Your house is worth something or a tax assessor says Your house is worth something doesn’t mean that the chapter 7 trustee is bound by it, they have a right to, to look at your house, and they have a right to evaluate it themselves. And when you do file a Chapter 7, you’re you’re in I mean, you’re once you make that call, you’re stuck, you can’t get out of it, if a chapter 7 trustee finds a buyer for your house, and it’s going to be more than the amount that we can protect, then you can get in a big mess.

Jeff Kelly: Currently, in Georgia, we can protect about $43,000 of equity in your home for a married couple 21,500 for a single person. You know, you also want to factor in things like what’s the cost of sale, and so forth. Things like that. So if your house is you know, borderline if it is over the amount that can be protected. You know, the other option is you can file a Chapter 13. And you can still wipe that out and a chapter 13 the same way you can and a 7. But you know the differences for somebody that’s got an expensive house with a lot of equity, we would want to pay back enough in the chapter 13 plan to protect the house. And so that is crucial. The legal term for that it’s called the liquidation test. Got to make sure we pass the liquidation test. And again, it doesn’t cost anything to come into our office, sit down with us. Let’s review your situation. Let’s find out. What is the best option for you. And that’s pretty much all I have to say about chapter 13 and chapter 7.

Jeff Kelly: And in today’s episode, and I want to just spend the rest of the time talking about my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ real quick. I’ve talked to a lot of people who are stressed, who are worried. I get it, I feel it too. These are some really scary scary times that we’re in. And we we just have to trust God and I want to encourage you if you’re struggling right now, and you’re worried take a look at Psalm 91. It’s, it’s really good. And you know, the basic gist of it is, God is your protector. We’re going to get through these tough times we’re going to get through these scary changes that are going on in our country. I get it. I know it’s difficult, but you know, personally, I’m 50 years old now. And I probably think about eternity more than I’ve ever thought about before. And this, this life that we live here is just temporary, our permanent home is forever with God. And I would encourage anybody out there who’s listening to this, if you have never made a decision to give your life to Jesus Christ, I want to encourage you to do it. And it’s a simple prayer. Lord, I come before you, I want to give my life to you, I want to accept you as my Lord and Savior. Please show me the way and I believe he will. And if you need to meet with a pastor, who can really explain it and just fantastic way better than I can go see my buddy Sam Bice, out at living waters church, soft Martha Berry, super great guy, he’s the real deal. And he can talk to you about it more and point you in the right direction. Get a Bible, read your Bible every day. Don’t let a day go by without doing it. It’s I know, these are scary times. I know it’s it’s rough. But this will pass. And my encouragement to all my friends is try not to look at the news. Try not to get on Facebook. Just try to live each day, one day at a time. Let’s do our best. Let’s make this world a better place. Let’s love each other while we can during these these tough COVID times. And I’m just hoping and praying, Lord, please help us get through it. I’m hoping it’ll be over by the end of this year. And pray for all of your friends and family who work in the medical community, the heroes, the people on the frontline. Wear your mask, wash your hands, do everything you can to catch this thing. And so we can all stay away from the hospitals to give these people a break. And that’s all have in this episode. I hope you guys have a great week. And we’ll be back on again. Next Saturday. Have a good one. Thank you.

Outro Speaker: You’ve been listening to Kelly Can Help with Jeff Kelly reached out to the Law Office of Jeffrey B Kelly today by phone 7062950030 in Rome or visit Kellycanhelp.com.

Intro Speaker: It’s time for Kelly Can Help hosted by Jeff Kelly, Attorney at Law with the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly. And now here’s Jeff Kelly.

Jeff Kelly: Okay, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining me on the radio show today I got a special guest, Andres Mejer. He is an immigration attorney from New Jersey. I’ve known him for years. One of the great things about immigration is you can hire him if you’d like. So I’m gonna let Andres tell us a little bit about his practice. And super great guy. Go ahead, undress.

Andres Mejer: Thank you, Jeff, thank you for having us on on the show. I really appreciate the opportunity. And yes, immigration is federal, we now have clients in 15 different states. So I’m headquartered in New Jersey. But as I was telling you, before we come on the show, out of the three clients that hired me today, not a single one was in New Jersey. You know, our practice has really changed dramatically because of COVID.

Andres Mejer: But a little little Look, I don’t usually talk about myself, but a little bit about my backstory. I was born in Santiago, Chile, I know you and I have talked about that a number of times you’d love to your time in

Jeff Kelly: cheap labor country.

Andres Mejer: It’s a great place to be. So I was born in Chile, my mother was from Chile and my father’s from Argentina. But they met and married in Israel. So I lived twice and cheela, twice in Israel, twice in the US. I came to this country, not speaking English. And then I moved to Israel as an adult, not speaking Hebrew. And then I left my family there and came back to keep to get to keep my green card in state. So any part of an immigrant journey short of being in jail? That one has had, I’ve done it at least once.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. That is awesome. How many years have you been in practice?

Andres Mejer: So I’ve been in practice now. 16 years, I’ve been working in the law for 20 years when I was when I was in law school. I was working full time at a law firm. I was trying to figure out what what kind of law did I want to be and your laugh, but I thought I was going to be in real estate.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

Andres Mejer: real estate development is what interested me. And I thought I was going to be transactional. And like I’m not I’m not going to go to court. I’m like, fight for people. What No, that’s, that’s crazy. But the first law firm job I had, because I’m a fluent Spanish speaker, I was working with Spanish clients doing things that a law clerk normally does, because no one else could speak to them. And they were getting screwed. And the more I saw how they were being treated, just because they didn’t speak the language, and they didn’t understand their rights. The more I got involved with the immigrant community, and what their needs were, and I’ve done it all, whether it’s wills, a personal injury litigation, criminal litigation, I actually built my immigration practice on defending DUI clients. I went to court the first time for a traffic violation. My movers were bringing in my obviously my office furniture to my new office, I just opened up shop. And one of them had a girlfriend that had a traffic violation didn’t speak English. I’m like, How hard can it be? I mean, I’d never been in traffic court. So I pulled out the rule book, I looked at the statutes. I knew what I was doing. Because I spent two days preparing, I show up to court. There’s individual there doesn’t speak a word of English. There was no translator judges getting frustrated. I said, Your Your Honor, I’m happy to translate. I walked out of that courtroom with three clients. And every single time that judge saw me, he said, you know, so about 10 back in 2012. I don’t know if your listeners remember, there was miners that were trapped and cheated. Yeah. So the judge would see me and say we have a very own a Chilean citizen attorney here, and he would talk about me for 10 minutes. And I would walk out with more clients to do he was awesome.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. How about that? Yeah, there’s a great movie on that, by the way,

Andres Mejer: there is 100%. And he would always say and listen. They were successful because of the Pennsylvania miners from the US that went and helped them. So he would tell that story every time. And it was it was very interesting. But as I got busier there, my clients were asking me Well, what how does this affect me on immigration?

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

Andres Mejer: so we started going into immigration consequences. And then it was well, rather than just the consequences, how about helping you avoid those things in the outset and today, although as a firm, we still do criminal defense 75% of what we do is immigration, the criminal defense is actually by a partner of mine, I don’t do it anymore, I get to focus on what I love, which is helping people come to us legally, if they’re, if they’re not here legally, to stay legally if they can. And for me, it’s the most rewarding thing I could do. When you give someone a green card, their life changes, they can get instead of having three jobs, they can have one, they can spend more time with their family, they can travel to maybe see their parents that they haven’t seen for 30 years, or 15 years or for a long period of time, maybe introduce their kids to their grandparents, who they’ve not been able to see before. You know, helping somebody defeat beat a DUI does not change their life, helping them get justice and economic results from a from an accident or an injury to it could be life changing, but for the most part it isn’t. But getting somebody helped to stay in the United States legally, to get their their their citizenship so that they can vote that changes their life.

Jeff Kelly: Wow. Good stuff. So where’d you go to law school? Where did you do your undergrad?

Andres Mejer: So I did I did my undergrad? Well, I did a I started at Rutgers University in New Jersey. Then I studied at Tel Aviv University. Then I then I came back and finished in Rutgers. And I went to law school in Brooklyn law school because I wanted to be a New York Attorney. I turned down Tulane, I turned down a full ride from Tulane. Because I was just convinced I had to be a New York City Attorney. And within a year of graduation, I was gone. I could not wait to leave New York.

Jeff Kelly: How about that?

Andres Mejer: I’m sorry, those new New Yorkers, if you love it, that’s great. It’s a great place to visit. There’s a lot of great things. But I missed my suburbia. I just did not like it.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah, I understand. I went to college in New York City, so I know.

Andres Mejer: Oh, where’d you go? I know you told me But

Jeff Kelly: yeah, I went to Columbia. Law.

Andres Mejer: My wife went there. She got she got her master’s from Columbia.

Jeff Kelly: Wonderful, wonderful.

Andres Mejer: My life partner and business partner is my wife. We met in law school. And she’s she’s we have two beautiful kids. And she still tells people the biggest mistake she ever did was go to law school.

Jeff Kelly: That’s funny.

Andres Mejer: So funny, but that’s how we met. She’s like, I know. So we work together at you know, at home, and then we raised you know, two wonderful kids that when we’re not at work,

Jeff Kelly: that’s awesome that it did you tell me once she’s from South Carolina, is that right?

Andres Mejer: She is. She was born in Scranton, in Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania, and then moved to South Carolina when she was eight.

Jeff Kelly: How about that? How about that? So when did you know you wanted to be an attorney?

Andres Mejer: I always knew I always wanted to help people. And, you know, Night Court when I was a kid, really, I found fascinating. I don’t know why. And then later, I actually went to Night Court. And it was terrible, because I didn’t want to be there at six and seven, eight o’clock, and also then have to go to court in the morning at 7am. So I didn’t like Night Court so much. But growing up, it was either law school, or business school.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Andres Mejer: And when I started Rutgers, I was in a five year program, which was a joint Master’s in business and an undergraduate in business. But then, when my parents split up, and my father moved to Israel, it’s a happy ending. We moved back to Israel, my parents are are still happily while they’re still married today, happily is a different matter. But they’re still together. You know, so I left that program. I left a full scholarship so that my family could be together.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Andres Mejer: And when I came back, see, I was only a green card holder. So I had to come back every 11 months of 29 days, or risk losing my status and I grew up here. I didn’t want to, you know, kill me when I was six. I was then 21-22. I did not want to lose. I didn’t know whether I’d be in Israel forever or not. But I certainly didn’t want to lose the opportunity to come back to the US.

Jeff Kelly: Sure, sure.

Andres Mejer: And when I came back after two years as this was now my second trip I decided to stay because the schools that the program As I got into Israel is a very different, it’s more of a European model, you apply to a department, not to a school. And they made me redo certain examinations in Hebrew, which I didn’t speak at the time. So I had to learn. You know, they made me they wanted me to start from scratch, I would have had two years for an associate three years of military service. Two more years for my undergraduate. So that’s seven years total.

Jeff Kelly: Wow.

Andres Mejer: And when I came back to the States, and I was explaining this to my mom’s friend, so he’s Israeli she is she had a friend at the Evans she’s like, wait a minute, doesn’t make any sense. Didn’t you ever think that you could just finish your two years here, you can get permission from the military to do that. It didn’t occur to me. when when when she put me in touch with the her friend who was at the Israeli embassy, I went, I had a conversation with them. They gave me permission to come back to school. And I did, and I came here literally $300 and a duffel bag for the clothes. And I said, it’s crazy to go back and spend seven years when I could be here for two.

Jeff Kelly: Sure. Sure.

Andres Mejer: So I came here. I went for two, I called my parents and I said, I’m gonna be here for a little bit longer. Mom, dad is sure how much longer I said a couple of years. All you heard was silence. They were like, are you on drugs? What’s wrong with you? But yeah,

Jeff Kelly: so you speak English, Spanish and Hebrew?

Andres Mejer: That’s correct.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. That’s awesome. So you mentioned that, you know, 75% of your your clients are related to immigration practice.

Andres Mejer: Yeah.

Jeff Kelly: What What is the typical situation that your immigration client is in? How Why do they need your services? How do you mean,

Andres Mejer: I’m glad that you asked. Now that we’re, again, nationwide, and we have clients in over 15 states, we are seeing a variety of different types of cases from a variety of different communities. So historically, the majority of our clients were Spanish speaking. Now, we have a lot of Caribbean clients, Cubans. Eastern Europe, it not so much agents, although there is a community there. And we have a couple of clients, but the majority are really the change has been Caribbean. And so that’s where they’re from, obviously, they’re here and they want to stay here. And they come from different experiences, but we put them through the same process. I call it the 953 process. So I wrote a book, do you qualify for us legal status, the second edition is about to come out now. And in it, we talk about the nine principle paths to legal status. So every console has three fundamental questions. So Jeff, do you one have a path for legal status? If you do, and there are nine principle ones? If you do, is there anything in your past as question number two, that might disqualify you? It could be criminal conduct. It could be multiple entries. It could be prior allegations of fraud, whatever, there are five different major categories that could disqualify you from achieving legal status. So question one is, do you have a path if you don’t stop there? If you do have a path? Well, let’s look at your past anything that might disqualify you or prevent you from achieving your goal? And if you have one of those five, then it’s question number three, can we fix it? So it might be a waiver, it might be an order of removal, we have to reopen, it might be a criminal conviction that we have to overturn or challenge. And often now, we’re partnering with criminal defense attorneys in other states.

Andres Mejer: So earlier today, I was speaking to a criminal defense attorney in Minnesota, he’s representing a client of mine for a DUI, my client wants to get citizenship. And this attorney looks like he wanted to plead guilty. And I had to explain to him, Well, yeah, you could do that. But he might be placed in removal proceedings, because it’s not his first criminal conviction. And his he wants to become a US citizen. If he’s convicted, that’s not happening. So instead, they’re not going to trial. Because the the the assessment was, well, if you’re going to go to trial, are you better off in front of a criminal judge? Or are you better off for another immigration judge? Well, there are more rights and options. Today, in a criminal setting, then there is in an immigration setting. I as an immigration attorney have a lot less control, I’m stuck with the conviction. But if I don’t like if I’m a criminal defense attorney, and I don’t like the conviction, maybe I can appeal it. Maybe there are mistakes that can be found. But if I just go and plead guilty, my ability to change that outcome is very limited. So in the initial consultation we call a green card planning session. There are nine principal ways to achieve a green card and we look at the equality What are those nine? And if so, is it something that disqualifies you? And if so, can we fix it? If you have nothing that disqualifies you, fantastic, then we focus on achieving your goals.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. Excellent. Now, you’ve mentioned here, you’ve got a national practice, you speak three different languages. You’ve been down every friggin path that anybody on the immigration process could go, you’ve you’ve been down that path.

Andres Mejer: It’s true.

Jeff Kelly: Anything else? Do you think that that separates you from other immigration attorneys? What’s your greatest strength?

Andres Mejer: So we believe that an informed client is the best client. We’ve I’ve given at least 100 immigration seminars, where I go to churches, nonprofits, organizations, pretty much everyone that will have me, and I will go and speak to their audience. And it’s usually a version of the Do you qualify? So I speak about the nine different paths. And then I answer questions. We have a YouTube channel with a strong support, where we talk, we have a live show every single week, where we talk about what’s going on in immigration. I had a radio show for three years, under, you know, Hispanic Christian radio. But so two years into it, we added, we started streaming it live on Facebook. And we realize that our audience and our comments, and our most loyal followers, were all on Facebook, not so much on that radio station, that again, at that time, we were New Jersey specific, and most of their audience were outside of New Jersey. Now today, given where we are, maybe it makes sense to go back to that radio station. But we moved on to a Facebook Live, which we’ve now been doing for over two years. And those videos then get presented on YouTube.

Jeff Kelly: Wow.

Andres Mejer: So we have books that we’ve written, I’ve written three, the Do you qualify for US immigration legal status that I that I spoke about? How to defend your DUI case. And the how to defend a criminal case in New Jersey. But again, all of those are in English and Spanish, and they’re from the perspective of if you’re in if you’re an immigrant, well, a conviction to something sort of give a perfect example, shoplifting. Let’s say I go to Walmart, and I accidentally take something that’s $5, maybe not excellent. Maybe I did it intentionally. And I’m caught. So you know, in New Jersey, that’s a non indictable offense, otherwise known as a misdemeanor, you go you pay a small fine, it goes away. But that’s a crime of moral turpitude. And for immigration purposes, that has a much an outsized effect, that you wouldn’t think if you’re new to the country, you’re accused of a crime and someone tells you you pay 100 bucks, you don’t go to jail, it all goes away, you’ll pay the $100. And client after client has done that. And we’ve then gone and reopened it. 510 15 years later, now more than five years, it’s difficult to do anywhere. We’ve done it on occasion.

Andres Mejer: You know, I can’t remember the question you asked me, I’m sorry.

Jeff Kelly: Oh, you’re fine. I was asked you what is your greatest strengths?

Andres Mejer: It’s, we, we believe in educating the client. That’s why we wrote the book. That’s why we have the weekly live show. That’s why I take the time. I mean, I can’t tell how many clients have told me it’s, you know, I spoke to three other attorneys before. They usually tell me they can’t help me, or they don’t have time for me. I’m done. After 10 minutes. No one ever sits there and explains to me what I qualify for why I do or don’t qualify, what can disqualify me and how to fix it. That 123 step is simple but powerful. And no one does it. Yeah. To me, it’s, it’s how I would want to be treated. I can’t imagine doing anything different. Don’t let others know. Please. Don’t Don’t let out the secret.

Jeff Kelly: So your What if my clients want your books? How much do they cost? Where are they going?

Andres Mejer: So they can they can find it on Amazon and 2995. They can find it out our website. It’s Andres Mejer law. I don’t know if you can read it. But it’s my first name, last name and law. We’ll share all the information and anybody that wants it. I’m happy to send it at no cost.

Jeff Kelly: Wow.

Andres Mejer: You go to my website, you can request it, you contact me. You call us you want our book, you just say hey, I saw you at Jeff Jeff Kelly’s program. I will send it to you at no cost.

Jeff Kelly: Okay. Now, you know you just mentioned that. You don’t want to have somebody plead guilty to some small Ridiculous crime mess up their their immigration status. Are there any other pitfalls? I mean, do you ever have any other times where you a client come in comes in to meet with you and you say to them? Gosh, I really wish you had not done fill in the blank before you came in.

Andres Mejer: I’m gonna tell you a story. Client married to a US citizen has two US citizen children been in the US for 20 years. wife can file for him. Does it without an attorney goes to goes to the interview. The marriage is legitimate. There’s no sham. officer says, you know, I’m inclined to approve your case. I believe this is legitimate marriage. You entered here legally. You have two kids. I just have one question for you. Oh, what is it officer? It seems here that you were arrested in 2004. for possessing documents. And the charges were dismissed, correct? Yes, they were. Can you tell me what happened? Oh, sure. And my, this is not my client, but is the person that came to ask us for advice, says, well, when in 2004. I bought documents from a Puerto Rican man. And I use those documents. I said I was Jeff Kelly. Because Jeff Kelly’s Puerto Rican, right. So I he, he went to the DMV, he submitted documents saying he was Jeff Kelly in order to register a vehicle and to get a driver’s license. I was arrested and the charges were ultimately dismissed. Great. Thank you very much. I appreciate your honesty. Can you just write Can you just write that down? So the typed up an affidavit is true? Yes. He signed it. He said, Thank you very much. I appreciate your honesty. Now I’m going to put you into removal proceedings. And I’m sorry to say I’m going to deny your case and you’re going to be deported. he just made a he admitted to a false claim to US citizenship.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Andres Mejer: All he had to say was and if he had an attorney there, this is what would have happened. Officer the charges were dismissed. Yeah. But I’d like to know off. So the charges were dismissed. Period, end of story. My client is not going to talk about it. He’s not going to make any he admitted he admitted made factual admissions that would have allowed a judge to say you’re guilty because of that. Immigration can say, well, it says if you were guilty, so the fact that was dismissed is irrelevant, because you admitted to doing the crime.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Andres Mejer: And I’ve seen different versions of that. But none more egregious as that was, you know, a simple consultation would have solved that.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Andres Mejer: Again, for every one of our clients, we have the 953 process. We do full background search, FBI motor vehicle, well, it motor vehicle systems a little harder depending on what state you’re in. But we do a motor vehicle search, and we order your your documents from immigration. So before you have that interview, we don’t have any surprises. So sometimes there’s someone entered the country was apprehended at the border, maybe let’s say he was from Guatemala. And he said he’s Mexican. So he could be sent back to Mexico to try again. Because if you send back to Guatemala, it’s via plane. And it’s maybe weeks until he gets back there. And it’s much more expensive.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Andres Mejer: So he was apprehended at the border, he was sent back, then he came in, and he wasn’t apprehended. And now he has a legitimate path to legal status. But he committed fraud. He lied about it. And now in some circumstances, it can be waived, we can fix it. But you got to be honest about it, you got to come clean. So if you don’t talk about it, and you don’t file for a waiver, and you assume immigration is not going to know it, because well, I gave a different name. They have fingerprints. And so your attorney does it know what happened to you. But immigration does, because you were fingerprinted. And they’re gonna have all that information, and your attorney is not going to be prepared to help you. So when when a client is not honest with their attorney, look, sometimes it is 20 years ago, sometimes people forget, yes, I was apprehended but I didn’t remember that I gave a wrong name. Or I was a kid, I was under age. Well, if you’re under age, there’s no consequences. But if you lie in an application today, Well, today you’re an adult, and that’s fraud unless they think it was an innocent misrepresentation. But again, but the more of these we have to explain, the harder the case becomes.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

Andres Mejer: not that we can’t do it, but you’re putting the barrier higher and higher.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah, got it.

Andres Mejer: So be honest with your attorney, because everything you tell them is confidential.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Andres Mejer: And if they don’t know, they can’t help you prepare now and not admitting things. So going, particularly now, in the past four years, anybody that goes to an interview with a US immigration officer, and does not have an attorney is asking for trouble.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

Andres Mejer: I’ve had officers pulled me aside and tell me, please tell your clients do not come alone. They are looking for any procedural or substantive reason to deny the laws. So this is a misunderstanding. People think, oh, Trump has changed the laws? No, he has changed a procedure. considerably, he has not been able to change the laws, because well, neither, even though he had control it the part, you know, to change the law, you need a bill to be approved by the House of Representatives by the Senate and signed by the President. And for whatever reason, he has not been able to do that. But he did change. So laws create laws are enacted, and then are enforced by agencies like US CIS, and Customs and Border Patrol, and ice. And DHS, those rules have changed dramatically. But the biggest change is the mindset.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

Andres Mejer: USCIS that’s United States citizen Immigration Services has gone from How can I help you achieve your goal? Assuming you qualify? To How can I deny you your goal, by any means possible? So the mentality has changed?

Jeff Kelly: Wow. Do you do you think that’s gonna change? Now we’ve got, you know, a new administration coming in in January?

Andres Mejer: I do think it will, but it’s gonna take time.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Andres Mejer: Trump didn’t do it overnight, Biden won’t be able to either. Now, look, if Congress comes together. If Democrats and Republicans actually start to solve our problems, the way you know, in a democracy should happen. If they start solving problems, and there is in there is some kind of reform? Yeah, a lot of these things can be addressed. If it’s going to be done from the agency alone? Well, they have to, they have to submit a proposed rules, there has to be a common period, then they have to submit the final rules, and then there’s an implementation date. So even if you know exactly what you’re going to do on January 20, you’re talking six months or longer until you go through that process.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Andres Mejer: So it’s good there. So Trump has President Trump has changed over 400 regulations that affect immigration.

Jeff Kelly: Wow,

Andres Mejer: by all agencies, it really was a concerted effort to change the rules. That does not change overnight.

Jeff Kelly: Wow. Well, I want to give a my quick testimony for Andres, and I want to thank you for coming on to the show. But I’ve done

Andres Mejer: my pleasure

Jeff Kelly: years. And I can tell all my clients Look, if you want somebody who is razor sharp, Razor smart, and has a fantastic organization that’s got systems, good systems, and to get you a good result. This is the guy you need to hire or if you know anybody who needs immigration, help with their green card or anything related to immigration. You need to go to what’s what’s website again.

Andres Mejer: So it’s AndresMejerlaw.com A-N-D-R-E-S-M-E-J-E-R-L-A-W.COM, we’ll send you the information so you can put it on the show notes.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent.

Andres Mejer: If you’re willing.

Jeff Kelly: Absolutely. Absolutely. I am. Alright, Andres, thank you so much

Andres Mejer: as KellyCanHelp.

Jeff Kelly: That’s right. Have a good one.

Andres Mejer: Thank you very much for your time.

Outro Speaker: You’ve been listening to KellyCanHelp with Jeff Kelly reached out to the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly today by phone 7062950030 in Rome or visit Kellycanhelp.com

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly. Today is January the 29th 2021. And in today’s podcast, I want to answer the question, how will filing bankruptcy affect your cosigner? The short answer is you filing bankruptcy will damage your co signers credit, how much damage? The answer is, you’re not going to know until after you file.

Most bankruptcy attorneys are not going to answer this question for you. I recently engaged in a Facebook conversation on this topic with fellow consumer bankruptcy attorneys from all parts of the United States and I received some really good feedback. And I really appreciate the very open and honest answers I got from a lot of people. And, you know, one attorney explained that they just avoided this topic altogether with their clients by asking by stating that, hey, look, I only represent you and I don’t represent your cosigner, I’m not going to talk about it. And the reason they do that is they’re trying to basically avoid the subject. Because a lot of people if they knew the truth, that it was going to hurt their cosigner, they, they either might not file bankruptcy at that time, or might try to work something out.

Now, personally, I believe honesty is the best policy. When a client comes in and meets with me or one of my associates, we are upfront we tell the truth. It is a core value of this law firm. And I believe it’s something that really separates us from a lot of others if you don’t need to file bankruptcy.

Number one, we’re going to tell you that and then we’re going to go into some detail with you to explain why you don’t need to file I think it’s much better to be honest and open about the truth, you’re going to get much happier people you have a much happier life. And I’ve got the Google reviews to back it up, check it out. So uh, you know, another attorney said that he would, you know, point to a car out in his parking lot. And so Oh, wow, look at that car. And basically just, you know, again, try to avoid it. And I just, I just think it’s a terrible, terrible idea to sweep this issue under the rug before you file because in most consumer bankruptcy cases, the cosigner is almost always a relative, or a super close friend. Can you imagine how upset a cosigner relative friend is going to be when they go to buy a new car, and they get the big denial? Because their credit score was unexpectedly lowered? And then they figure out it was because you filed a chapter 13 and didn’t tell them anything about it? Yeah, this kind of surprised always ends with someone getting upset, and it could severely damage a close relationship. Personally, I think it’s much much much better to warn the cosigner before the case is filed. So is there anything that a cosigner can do to avoid the damage to their credit score?

Well, you know, the answer is yes, but it’s probably not gonna happen. Number one is pay off the debt, the cosigner can pay off the debt before the bankruptcy case gets filed, they won’t get damaged. Well, a lot of times people don’t have cash for that kind of thing. The other thing they maybe they could do the cosigner could refinance the entire debt in their name 100% their name only. And you know, again, this is unlikely because most creditors love having their claws into two people and not just one. So are you required to tell your cosigner about the bankruptcy? Well Technically Yes, the bankruptcy code requires you to list the name and address of the cosigner in the petition. The cosigner will get a notice of the bankruptcy filing. 20 years ago, I still remember this guy from Gainesville, Georgia who was quite a character. And he told me that he was not going to tell his girlfriend ahead of time, and we just wait until later. He’s gonna sweep it under the rug and I told him bad idea. Well, we had a list or we had to list her address and so you know, of course, eventually she finds out and we did have to file his case pretty quickly because we were trying to stop a repossession. So, what happened? Well, as you can imagine, the girlfriend went ape, absolutely nuts, angry, furious. And, you know, he ended up back in my office crying, crying his eyes out, please. You got to fix it. You got to fix it. Once the damage is there. I mean There’s no undoing it. There was nothing we could do. I’m not sure how it worked out with that guy long term with his girlfriend, his case worked out well. But bottom line is, whoever came out that phrase that forgiveness is easier than permission should be violently slapped.

Because it’s not true. Yeah, it you know, it’s not true. It’s just be honest, just be open. In a chapter 13 bankruptcy case, we can use the cosigner protection provision to protect a cosigner from harassment and from lawsuits when we pay the cosign debt at 100 cents on the dollar along with applicable interest. Now, a lot of people get really confused because they hear cosigner protection provision, and they think that that’s going to protect the Cosigners credit rating and it is not. Again, how much damage is it going to do the cosigner after a file? We really don’t know. It varies, it depends. We don’t really know. So to the cosign of the of the world people who cosign and get really upset about this kind of thing I would like to speak to you. Number one, please don’t end a friendship or ruin a family relationship because you made the decision to cosign on a loan.

Number two, if the debt gets fully paid in a chapter 13 case, consider yourself lucky that the only damage is is to your credit score. No one made your cosign You didn’t have to do it. But you did. Life happens 99% of the bankruptcy cases that get filed are because something happened that was out of that person’s control. COVID-19 is not their fault. Millions of people have lost their jobs because of it. When a spouse leaves someone with a big pile of debts and a bunch of kids to raise it’s not their fault. When they get cancer and run up huge amounts of medical bills. It’s not their fault. Life happens. Be merciful. James chapter 2 verse 13, states judgment will be merciless to the one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment. Cobra Kai people are going to be in big trouble on Judgement Day. If you haven’t watched Cobra Kai on Netflix. It’s pretty good show. I love it. I was big fan of The Karate Kid when I was younger.

Lastly, just don’t cosign for anybody in your life ever, ever, ever. It’s always a bad idea. When the car dealer says Well, we could sell you the car. But you know, if you don’t cosign we just can’t do the deal. Just run. I mean, just just run fast. And you know, again, if if you have questions about bankruptcy, if you know somebody who’s facing foreclosure, car repossessions, garnishments, anything like that, tell him to call us, we are going to be 100% honest.

I do believe in God. And I believe someday I’m going to have to stand before him and give an account for things I’ve done in my past. And I’m not going to have to give an account for not telling the clients the truth about the cosigner protection provision. We tell the truth, honesty is a big deal to me. I believe in God, I believe we’re going to have to answer to him. I’ve already got stuff I got an answer for I’m not going to add to it. Check out my please check out our reviews. If you get a chance. I’ve got blog post at Kellycanhelp.com. And, you know we’ve also got a free book there I’ve written on chapter 13 and chapter 7. If you’ll call my office, we will send you a hardcopy while supplies last. And we’ll always be able to send you a digital version to your email. We work some evenings we work some weekends, we try to accommodate our clients as best we can. Right now, everything in bankruptcy can be done virtually you can actually file without ever leaving your house. You can actually go to court without ever leaving your house. Everything is done virtually right now because of COVID. I don’t see that changing anytime soon. I’m sure it will eventually. But again, give us a call 7708818449 Thank you for tuning in. And we really appreciate you thank you so much.

Intro Speaker: It’s time for KellyCanHelp hosted by Jeff Kelly, Attorney at Law with the Law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly. And now here’s Jeff Kelly.

Jeff Kelly: Go Alright, ladies and gentlemen, we’ve got a fun guest today on the radio show. Lee Treadaway, somebody I used to work with many many many years ago. And Lee I just love that story. many months ago when I used to work at Fuller McKay. And and before I ever met you, I felt like I knew you because Ken Fuller would say that he’d go shopping for groceries at the old Piggly Wiggly that was over there behind what is now Stanley’s. And I used kana have got hired this boy when he gets out of law school named Lee Treadaway. Every time he went grocery shopping your mother was your fan brother. You got a good mother, don’t you?

Lee Treadaway: Absolutely. Absolutely. She. Yes, she stayed after Ken until he really had no choice. But for McKay, those were some fun times. They were they were fun. We all work together.

Jeff Kelly: So So now you’re you’re doing elder law. Is that right?

Lee Treadaway: Well, I’m doing I’m doing some wills and estates and Okay, trying to focus on Elder Law within that, and also a little bit on special needs trust as well.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Lee Treadaway: What there’s a lot of overlap in that.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. Excellent.

Jeff Kelly: So how many years? How many years you’ve been practicing now? It’s been a while?

Lee Treadaway: Yeah, let’s see. Um, gosh, I

Lee Treadaway: I became a member of the bar in 2004. So 16 years. It goes by quickly, man does it ever good grief it that goes by quick. So where’d you do? Where’d you do your undergrad? Yeah, so I went to University of Georgia and got a business degree from undergrad it didn’t actually worked for about 10 years and then went back to Samford University and got my law degree ever in Birmingham.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent.

Lee Treadaway: Yeah, undergrad was at UGA.

Jeff Kelly: Alright, so that’s why you’re a diehard Georgia Bulldog fan still?

Lee Treadaway: Absolutely. Roughly can last weekend, but

Jeff Kelly: I know college can be rough.

Lee Treadaway: Can they can I know. And I’ll admit it. I’m still a fan. You haven’t had it easy. The last few years.

Jeff Kelly: It’s been more than a decade. I think it’s been rough. It’s been rough. I don’t think they’ve been good since. Since we worked at fuller McKay. Unbelievable. It’s been a long time.

Jeff Kelly: Well, so now you

Lee Treadaway: don’t happen to to a nicer

Jeff Kelly: no mercy, huh. No Mercy right away. So tell me about you didn’t go straight from undergrad to law school. Right. You work a little bit in between there.

Lee Treadaway: Yeah, I had about, I said to about nine years of working in between there.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. Excellent. Where’d you work?

Lee Treadaway: So for most of that time, I worked for a company in Calhoun, Georgia at the company was in good woven textiles. So I was started out with the entry position in their product development area of all things, which is really not my background. But I did have a little bit of manufacturing management background from college and moved into like, supervision there. And I always knew that I wanted to continue my education and do something. Do something else.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. When did you realize hey, I want to be a lawyer.

Lee Treadaway: Well, actually, so I finished my undergrad in Gosh, this does seem like a long time now. 91. And about two years out of out of college, after my undergrad I decided to apply and and try to get back then, and just the timing was not right. And, you know, my grades first year undergrad were not probably what they needed to be scores were good, but wasn’t able to go then and but sort of always had that in the back of my mind to do. I was just, you know, I always had an interest in being a lawyer and learning more about the law. And so I took the LSAT again.

Lee Treadaway: And Gosh, I guess it was 99-2000 and started back to law school and in the fall 2000.

Jeff Kelly: All right. Very good. Yeah. So So now you’re doing, you know, estate planning, wills, estates, Elder Law planning? What Tell me about your, your typical client, what what kind of needs do they have? And how do you how do you meet those needs?

Lee Treadaway: Well, the there are two areas. Right now that that I’m trying to focus on, one is for older clients who want to plan for the possibility that they may need long term care. And, you know, obviously, nobody hopes to do this, but wants to plan wants to plan in the event that they had to go into a nursing home. And so there are some things that we can do with trusts that would allow them to have assets held in trust.

Lee Treadaway: And, you know, that could go to their beneficiaries at their death and be used for their benefit, if they were in nursing home care. But but at the same time would not disqualify them from for instance, the the Medicaid Nursing Home program. So it’s, it’s a way to help folks not really become impoverished if they, like, so many folks end up having to go into a nursing home.

Jeff Kelly: So like, Can you tell me like, what’s the worst case scenario, somebody does no planning nothing, they go into a nursing home, and then what happens?

Lee Treadaway: So so the, if someone goes into a nursing home, and, you know, if they’re, if they’re self paying, in other words, if they’re just paying the total cost out of pocket, you know, you’re looking at minimal right now around 7000 a month. Medicaid has a nursing home program. In other words, Medicaid will pay for a portion of, of someone’s nursing home bill every month. But the asset limits that somebody can have a really low, so for instance, as a single person. So if you have a single person that goes into a nursing home, or a widow or widower, that person can only have $2,000, in, in financial assets, so anything over that they’re not going to qualify for Medicaid.

Lee Treadaway: And so, you know, most people aren’t going to have at that age aren’t going to have seven $8,000 a month in income that would pay for it. So right, you can you can become impoverished pretty quickly.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah, I mean, I’ve seen where a lot of these nursing homes, they’re, they’re not gonna you correct me if I’m wrong here, but they’re not just going to accept anybody into their home. And oftentimes, they require a joint signature of one of the children. And, you know, those bills can add up fast.

Lee Treadaway: Yeah, and that’s a good point you bring up sometimes, you know, an adult child of someone going into the nursing home, is going to be they’re going to be the person that’s going to is going to make sure the parent gets gets into the facility and will often be the person that has to sign paperwork and all that and, and those folks often think that by signing, you know, they’re just signing to have their parent admitted, but it’s not unusual for them to unknowingly be signing to also be responsible themselves as well as the parents. In the advocates right now, Our Lady I’m working with who, you know, her father passed away and, and not only is his estate liable, you know, to pay any money or assets that he had, she’s also personally responsible as well, and, you know, obviously, you know, his It was his care. So, you know, it’s fine that his assets are having to pay for that, but but hers ours? Well, they’re just so many things that, that people just don’t know. And honestly, I think that most of the time, the social workers and and the other staff people at nursing homes are trying to do as well as I can. But But these folks, they’re not able to know all of the applicable rules and laws concerning this as well. So, you know, sometimes in helping a client plan.

Lee Treadaway: You know, we also will have to help educate some of the, the staff in whatever nursing home is helping, it’s helping them as well. Not always, but sometimes, yeah, can help with that.

Jeff Kelly: So the bottom line is, if you’ve got a parent who needs to go into a nursing home, you do not want to sign anything like nothing, am I right?

Lee Treadaway: Well, you certainly, you certainly want to know what you’re signing, you know, it, it may be necessary for, for an adult child to, for instance, sign on behalf of the parent, you know, it’s not unusual for someone to have appointed their son or daughter as their agent under a power of attorney. So it’s fine to sign if you’re appointed. That person’s guardian and conservator through the court, or if you’re appointed an agent under a power of attorney, you can sign on their behalf. But you know, you really need to know what you’re doing before you’re signing personally.

Jeff Kelly: Right?

Lee Treadaway: In other words, you want to make sure you’re not personally guaranteeing someone essentially someone else’s debt.

Jeff Kelly: Right. I’ve seen a few cases where people have had to file bankruptcy because of this.

Lee Treadaway: Certainly.

Jeff Kelly: And it’s sad, because, you know, the parent never in their right mind would have intended to put their child in a situation where they would end up bankrupt for their bill from a nursing home. And you know, you can’t help but wonder, wow, maybe if they’d gone to see somebody like Lee Treadaway beforehand, years beforehand, maybe that could have been avoided.

Lee Treadaway: Right. And, you know, it’s important that folks know, and remember, too, that we have a lot more, we have a lot more options and a lot more flexibility. If planning is done before someone, you know, falls into bad health or you know, and is looking at maybe having to go into a facility in the near future.

Lee Treadaway: You know, it’s hard to we don’t our options are very limited once somebody is headed that way already in the facility. So it’s important to, to look at the opportunities for planning, you know, well, in advance of something like that happening.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. Yeah.

Lee Treadaway: So

Jeff Kelly: yeah, I’m sure you probably see this. I know, I see it where you have an older client who’s like, Hey, I’m in great shape, I’m fine. I do not need that mess. I’m never gonna need it. That’s what everybody says, right?

Lee Treadaway: Well, you know, we all think we all know, have a sense that this could happen, but you know, it’s never gonna happen to me.

Jeff Kelly: Right?

Lee Treadaway: We all want to think that you know, and I think the biggest thing that most people have trouble with is often this planning involves placing assets in what’s called an irrevocable trust. And when you do that, you’re gonna generally need to appoint someone else. It’s usually going to be a family member doesn’t have to be they can be a trust company or an accountant or somebody like that, but you’re gonna have to appoint someone else to be the trustee.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

Lee Treadaway: And you know, wow. assets, you know, wow, your trust owns these assets, you can’t just go and take them back out.

Jeff Kelly: All right.

Lee Treadaway: And so there’s some there are ways to undo to undo that if if something unexpected happens, but you know, people don’t want to give up or lose control. And sometimes that means we strike a balance between protecting certain assets that we know we want to protect and keeping some assets out of a trust, that we think we might either want to be able to have direct control on us or need, say,

Jeff Kelly: yeah,

Lee Treadaway: some of it is we just don’t want to give up, you know, turn over control to somebody. And unfortunately, what often happens is, if we don’t plan for it, then a family member or somebody like that has to go through the court system, a much more complicated process, to get appointed to take care of things,

Jeff Kelly: and more expensive too right?

Lee Treadaway: is more expensive, and it’s, you know, there, you’ve got a court proceeding, there’s going to be oversight for that appointed person, you know, from the court. So it gets a little more complicated, and, and a lot more expensive.

Jeff Kelly: I’ll bet so I mean, it’s just so important to plan plan plan. Let me ask you something. Do you ever have clients come in and meet with you? I mean, other than not planning, but do you ever meet with a client and you say to yourself, dang, I wish this person had come met with me sooner, I would have told them to do blank. And we could have avoided this huge giant mess. Like, for example, I meet with clients all the time, and they’ll tell me, yeah, I’ve been, you know, making the minimum payments on my credit card out of my 401k money for the last five years, and it’s just like, no, 401k, it’s a protected asset, don’t touch it, you do run into that, you run into that with elder Elder Law planning.

Lee Treadaway: you know, all the time. You know, it’s fairly typical that I’ll get a call, usually from a family member, sometimes from the person themselves, you know, they’ve got a debilitating illness, they can’t stay at home. Most common thing that I see now, and really, during my time, in this practice, have been things like dementia and Alzheimer’s, and so it just gets to the point where it’s no longer safe for them to be at the home, the family can’t, he is not able to be there, you know, around the clock.

Lee Treadaway: And somebody calls and you know, their mom or dad or, you know, have just been admitted to a nursing home, or they’re gonna have to go into a nursing home or long term care facility and, and highway, you know, somebody said, we might need to get talked to a lawyer about this. To try to do some, some planning or minimize, the amount of money is going to have to be spent down before they can get some assistance. And at that point, there are things we can do, but our options are much more limited. And we just can’t protect the amount of assets we can, but it happens all the time that people come in and, you know, inevitably the conversation, usually, they’ll end up saying, you know, wow, we should have come in five years ago or 10 years ago.

Jeff Kelly: Right. All right. And yes, some planning is key.

Lee Treadaway: It is it is key. And you know, I can just tell you there there’s just so much and not just in my area but really any practice area. There’s so much we we don’t know if we don’t talk to an attorney or someone else who who knows that area but there’s there’s also so much we don’t know we don’t know.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

Lee Treadaway: if that makes sense. You know, I’ve I’ve learned about so many like I told somebody the other day I you know doing this, I’ve learned about so many things that I didn’t even I didn’t even know were a thing.

Jeff Kelly: Sure. Yeah. So, Lee as an attorney, you know, if I’m telling my clients Hey, you you need to go see Lee Treadaway. Yeah, get your elder elder care planning done. What as an attorney, what do you think your greatest strength is?

Lee Treadaway: Yeah, so, you know, I really tried to listen to my client’s concerns and try to, you know, make a recommendation for a plan and try to explain it to them, you know, in a way that I’d want somebody to explain it to my father or my mother.

Jeff Kelly: Sure,

Lee Treadaway: if they were in this situation. So, you know, I think, I don’t know if it’s a strength, but it certainly is,

Jeff Kelly: absolutely.

Lee Treadaway: is a goal of mine. You know, I, I want to create a, you know, good rapport with my clients, and, and, you know, make sure I meet their needs as best I can. But also, I want them to feel comfortable that that being done.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. Yeah, you know, I can testify having worked with you for years that you are easy to talk to. And that is definitely a huge strength, because there are some lawyers out there, but let’s face it, they’re just not nice, no bedside manner at all. And that is definitely not the case with you. clients have always loved you. And I think I think you’re in a great area to do that. So I’m

Lee Treadaway: so you’re saying that Thank you.

Jeff Kelly: You’re welcome. So you’re, you’re from Rome, right? You went to Model Model high schools.

Lee Treadaway: I grew up I grew up in Rome, went to model High School. Yeah. And of course, still, obviously, still live here. My wife also grew up in Rome. Interestingly, we went to the same schools, but she was about four years younger than me. So we were not in high school. At the same time. I did not meet my wife until, you know, years after we graduated. But she was in my sister’s graduating class, and they knew each other growing up.

Jeff Kelly: So how about that?

Lee Treadaway: It so that’s interesting. And we’ve got four children, ranging in age from the youngest is five, and then our oldest is 12. So

Jeff Kelly: that’s wonderful.

Lee Treadaway: That we’re you know how that is having a house full of kids Jeff.

Jeff Kelly: I know how that is. I’ve got you know. Yeah, I’ve had five total now. Yeah, so I

Lee Treadaway: That’s right.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. And it goes quick, man. Golly, it goes so quick. I mean, a lot of those years just blow by so fast. And, and you grew up in North broad Baptist. Is that right?

Lee Treadaway: Right. Yeah. Gosh, I think my family joined Northbrook Baptist. You know, when I was about eight, we left the church we were going to and I’vebeen there ever since. That’s,

Jeff Kelly: how about that. That’s where you guys still go now?

Lee Treadaway: Yep. I’ve seen I gathered down and one of my folks do still get there as well.

Jeff Kelly: Wonderful.

Lee Treadaway: I haven’t actually gotten go there in several months, just like everybody else.

Jeff Kelly: But I know this covered forward

Lee Treadaway: to being able to do that again.

Jeff Kelly: This covered mess. It stinks. It stinks. Are they? Are they gonna do the live nativity scene this year? Maybe not?

Lee Treadaway: gonna, Yeah, we, we stopped doing that. I think about a year or so ago. Now. It was just a lot of work, done it for many years. And people enjoyed it. But you know, we just made a decision that we were going to kind of focus on doing some, some other things and

Jeff Kelly: yeah,

Lee Treadaway: you know, I think there’s a time for everything. And unfortunately, or I won’t say unfortunately, but you know, it was just time to do something to do something different.

Jeff Kelly: Sure. Sure. So Lee when you’re not working, what do you do for fun? I know you like to fish. What else?

Lee Treadaway: Oh, I do like to fish. I haven’t fished it a long time. You know, normally we’re honestly if we’re if we’re not at work, usually. We’re taking kids somewhere or spending time with them. My my nine year old son, he played football for the first time this year and

Jeff Kelly: all right,

Lee Treadaway: yeah hits his season. Their last game was last night into that app and he’s had a lot of fun with that. And it’s it’s been really fun. You know, watching him learn to play learn the game and

Jeff Kelly: yeah,

Lee Treadaway: practice and stuff. So that’s good enough. That’s been great. I’ve got a got a five year old girl coming up. I think she’s gonna she seems to be really interested in basketball in soccer and seems like she’s gonna have some ability there and wonder can a ballet dancer we enjoy watching her when when she has her recitals. Well,

Jeff Kelly: that’s good stuff man. That’s awesome.

Lee Treadaway: Yeah.

Jeff Kelly: Well Lee I appreciate you coming on the show I look forward to taking your message and send it out to all my clients that have if they’ve got anybody that needs a will or estate planning or any type of elder law in the room area to give you a shout, buddy.

Lee Treadaway: Well Jeff, thank you so much for having me on. I’m glad to hear you’re doing this. It’s a it’s a good service you’re doing for the community just you know, letting people know who’s out there that can help in in different areas. So appreciate that.

Jeff Kelly: All right, brother. You have a great evening and you you enjoy those beautiful kids. All right.

Lee Treadaway: You as well. Jeff always good socci Thank you, sir. Have a good one.

Outro Speaker: You been listening to KellyCanHelp with Jeff Kelly reached out to the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly today by phone 706-295-0030 in Rome or visit Kellycanhelp.com.

Intro Speaker: It’s time for Kelly can help hosted by Jeff Kelly, Attorney along with the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly. And now here’s Jeff Kelly.

Jeff Kelly: All right, got David lovebirds our show today. David, what I’d like to do is introduce you to my clients and my listeners. And if you don’t mind, just tell us a little bit about yourself and your practice and your area of specialty.

David Blevins: Well, it’s good to be here, Jeff, it’s good to be here. The I’ve been practicing for 35 years all here in Dalton, I got out of the University of Georgia law school. My practice now consists of really two areas of emphasis. I do car wrecks and personal injury, which is what I’ve traditionally done for 34 years. But in the last five or six years, in particular, I have done a lot of probate and estate work. And I’ve done probate litigation. And you know, I kind of backed into it, you know, I never plan to do this. But my wife, we practice all together. From the 80s. After I first child was born, she was practicing in Chattanooga, but she was the probate lawyer. And I had a large probate practice. And so in cases we go sour, I was doing litigation. So she would say I would just come into the office and and be a file on my desk. And pretty soon I realized that was a probate case and now needed litigation. So that’s kind of how I learned to do it. And I’ve been doing that about 20 years, and then I’ve just gotten into compliance for about five or six years.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. Excellent. And let’s see here. What you where’d you go for undergrad?

David Blevins: I went to Carson College in Jefferson City, Tennessee.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent.

David Blevins: Alabama school up in East Tennessee. But 30 miles above Knoxville.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah, that school good school. So how did you end up from Carson Newman to the University of Georgia?

David Blevins: Well, that’s a good, that’s a good question. I was when I got an undergraduate, I was dead, broke and needed a job. So I was behind a girl sitting behind me in church one Sunday. And she told me she said that her mother was a teacher in the Atlanta area, and encouraged me to apply for a mother was a teacher in the Douglas County School System.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

David Blevins: So I did because I was desperate and you couldn’t buy a job back in 1979. So I applied in the fall of 79. And by God’s great grace and Providence, they had an opening. One of the teachers was one of the history teachers there at Lithia Springs High School was taking a job as a principal at another school. They had an opening and by the grace of God, they hired me. So I started in December of 1979, teaching history and social studies, and wound up teaching history and math, algebra geometry at Lithia Springs High School. So I became an in State student and as a as a poor college student and a poor teacher. I needed a school that I can afford. So I applied and was accepted to the University of Georgia. I’d like to tell you platings, the University of Georgia because I knew it was a great school. I applied because there’s only one I can afford. But it turned out that it wasn’t a great school. And so it was a great experience.

Jeff Kelly: Hoe many years did you teach?

David Blevins: I taught three years I taught math. I was taught well, history, my first year 79-80 school year.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

David Blevins: And then they found out that I had a math minor. So I got drafted to teach geometry and algebra, as well as American history my last two years, so I taught for three years total.

Jeff Kelly: So is your plan all along to go to law school, or?

David Blevins: No, it was it was not so that’s a good question. I did pretty well in the wall classes like common law as an undergraduate. Yeah. And so my advisor and common law teacher Professor encouraged me to go to law school. And so I I finally talked me into it. So I filled out an application and I paid to go take the the the LSAT, the law school interested entrance exam.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

David Blevins: Well, I decided the meantime I really didn’t want to do that because I thought the law would be too tedious. And that was my professors go anyway. So I didn’t study I didn’t do any reviews. I didn’t do anything. The Saturday morning that the LSAT will be offered there on campus in Carson Newman. I woke up early Lucas salen looked at the clock and said, You know if I go to the cafeteria, I can make it and I’ve already paid for it. So I’m Kwan on. So I got out of bed and went and took the LSAT. I didn’t do super well on it. Because I’ve never even taken a practice test yet. But I was able to get into I was accepted. They said, Where do you want to send your grades? And I said, UT was the only place I knew, which is where some good company with wall school. That’s right. That’s right. You You didn’t graduate. So I was accepted to UT Law School. And but I decided not to go, I was too broke to go. I literally was too bright. I didn’t have I didn’t have any way to sustain myself while I was in law school. So I got a teaching job. And I considered being an engineer. I went and interviewed with the folks at Georgia Tech about being an engineer.

Jeff Kelly: Wow.

David Blevins: I interviewed with a few seminaries about doing a PhD in in, in church history. Plot. It was accepted to the graduate program, a Ph. D. program at University of Georgia. And I went over there and a madman decided I wanted to be a college history professor. And Dr. Holmes, the chairman, the department, when he told me he’d be glad for me to come and they offered me part of the money they offered me. I said, Well, Dr. Holmes, do you think I’ll be able to get a job doing what you’re doing when I get a PhD from here? And he looked at the floor and said, I must be honest, and they looked at me. So I knew it wouldn’t be good. So on my way back to Douglasville, from Athens, God, and I had to talk in my Volkswagen, about the necessity of eating. And so I didn’t go do the PhD program. I applied to law school the next year and was accepted to the University Georgia law school. And that’s, that’s how I got there.

Jeff Kelly: And that’s how you know the rest of the story.

David Blevins: That’s right.

Jeff Kelly: How’d you meet your wife?

David Blevins: Well, my first my second year in law school. Well, my first year in law school, I joined Christian legal society, and it worked in Christian legal society a lot. And they elected my best friend, john lewis, to be the president of Christian legal society. A second year, the Office of Christian legal society, we’re always second years. The third years, we’re too sorry to do anything. So you know, they’re just like Haskell seniors, plus, we had the bar back in those days. You took the bar year and February of your last year. So the first semester you study for the bar, the second semester, you weren’t, we’re shooting. So in the first year, don’t know what’s going on. So the second years, we’re always officers. So john was elected president. I was like the vice president. And so when we had the Christian legal social in the fall, a really, really, really pretty girl named Sherry Henson showed up and one of them was interested in coming to Christian legal society. So I just I said, I check that out. And I’ve been checking that out ever since.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. All right. Well, and you’re in your practice now. Who is your typical client? Now?

David Blevins: The typical client now is it depends on but that’s a great question. On the probate side, it’s mainly just middle class folks.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

David Blevins: I do some of the larger estates. But typically, it’s somebody that’s leaving a house and got three kids and a dog and a 401 K and two vehicles. And they’ll come in to eat or the family will come in to probate, the will or the estate, or they will come in to do their wills and do their estate plans. So on that side, that would be typically I just, I represent Middle America, just I really just common folks. And then on the car wreck sad. It’s anybody. Or you have to be in a car wreck and somebody run a red light and hit you.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

David Blevins: so some of those are that they run the range from people that are that do not have any means at all to folks that are very wealthy.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. All right. Um, you know, I have a lot of clients who they just really put off getting a will at you. What do you tell my clients? What happens to them when somebody dies? And there is no Will, why do they need to get one?

David Blevins: Um, very often it’s a mess. And this is this is why I’ll start with the young folks. Young people often think they don’t need wills. They don’t need wills, because I don’t have a whole lot. The bank is, you know, I’ve got a house, I’ve got a car, but it is mortgage. So don’t, you know? Well, first of all, hopefully, your life insurance is going to take care of that. But you have two reasons why, when you’re young, you needed to have a will. First, if you have children. And let’s say you and your spouse are killed in a car. If that happens, typically, the mother’s family and the dads family get both want the child. So you’re going to have a judge, you want to have a 45 minute hearing. And they’re going to decide who’s going to take care of your child for the rest of their lives. You know, that, you know, who should take care of your child far better than the judge does. And the judge will be very relieved if you took that burden away. And so it may not even be, it might not be one of your in laws, they might not be the best fit. They may be because of their age or their circumstance. They might not be even a family member. But it but if it is, the parents of that child need to set that out because that’s their responsibility.

David Blevins: And the second is people think young people think that if I die, then what I have what we’ve worked for goes to my wife, not necessarily. Georgia law says that a surviving spouse gets a child’s part of the estate. First, they get all these state if there’s no children, but if there’s any children, they get a child’s part but least but at least a third. So let’s say that you’ve got two minor children, if you got two children, and they can be ages two, and five, and your dad, then your wife, or your husband doesn’t own that house, they own a third of that house. And maybe they need to move, maybe they need to change, relocate for a job, whatever the case might be, well, they haven’t gotten they’ve got a problem. So in the house, because they own it with their children. And then the proceeds of that house, instead of going to, to take care of the family necessity, if you want to have a put into conservatorship accounts for the children. And the truth is the surviving spouse can probably spend that money for the kids and maintain a home better than a court can do with supervision.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

David Blevins: but if you don’t mind for all of us, that’s that’s what happens. Now, for the older people with folks that are, let’s say in their 30s 40s and 50s. What happens, especially if you’ve got families, children by different marriages, well, if you let’s say, you’re married, and to a lady that has a small child, and you raise that child, you may want that child to share in your state, if something happens to you and your wife, especially if you work through it together, if you if you leave a will, you can do that. If you don’t leave a will that child gets nothing. And so often happens is that once spouse survives the and has to share that with children grown children, which may or may not be good. And then or they may get the surviving spouse may get it also will but then that will leave one set of children out. So a well thought out we’ll use is really vital to long term family harmony. You know what I do is I I take care of families. I’m not taking care of property.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah, yeah,

David Blevins: really. But we’re taking care of people.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

David Blevins: wills and probate is a people business. It’s not a paper business. Most folks in law school think it’s a paper business. But if you do your will right and take care of your family, right. What you can do is keep down a lot of conflict and hard feelings and heartache among your children as brothers and sisters, between your stepchildren and their mother. All that can be well managed with a well thought out will

Jeff Kelly: about when people do get into a fight over an estate. Would you say that the cost of you know litigating in a state where there is no will is going to greatly exceed the cost of doing the will if somebody just thought ahead.

David Blevins: Oh, absolutely. We’ll take We’ll package here starts at about $750 and goes up to about 2000. Unless you need some some complicated tax stuff. And I quoted a state litigation the other day at 15 to 20,000.

Jeff Kelly: Wow. That’s a huge difference. Wow. What am I waiting for? give me any clients where you plan for, you know, maybe they’ve got a spouse, a child who’s not so great with with money, and maybe they might need somebody to manage that money for them. So they don’t inherit it and just kind of run off and blow it. Do you do trust and things like that?

David Blevins: Yes, we do. We do a testamentary trust, we do some inter vivos trust here, that means that while in life, but often, most of the time, those are testamentary trusts. And that comes up in two ways, often is age, you know, dumping a few $100,000 or an 18 year old is just not a good thing to do. You’re better off to put the money in a pile and burn it. Because you will do more harm to the child most of the time, then you’ll do good.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

David Blevins: And that’s, that’s why testamentary trust, well thought out testamentary trust. And one of the things that people don’t think about so much. They think about who they trust is a trustee. But they also need to think about who the beneficiary trust. Often letting an older sibling be the trustee of a trust is a bad idea because it creates bad blood between the siblings.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

David Blevins: that’s one reason that it helps to have an experienced estate lawyer is because I’ve been doing this I’ve been litigating in states for Well, 25 or 30 years. So I see what what works and what doesn’t, and what what causes damage in the family. And so we can try to help folks avoid that. I can try to help folks avoid that. And we do that a lot with trust. And then there’s a lot to talk about. Sometimes you have somebody that uses substances or as a spendthrift, right. That’s That’s the difference. The first one is kind of easy. We get folks to double that money out, when you wind up with children that have can’t manage money when they’re older, or either because of substance abuse or because of poor judgment. That’s that’s a delicate situation. But unfortunately, a lot of people don’t want to face that. And they leave behind a mess and heartache and they don’t do their children any favors.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. Do you think it’s too harsh to say that, hey, if you care anything about your children, you will get a well done? Why do you think so many people will just put it off or just don’t want to even contemplate it?

David Blevins: Well, there there there are two primary reasons for that. First, to do will, you have to think about dying. And some folks don’t want to do that. Yeah. Um, and while I’m not morbid, thinking about dying on occasion is a healthy thing. First, it makes you contemplate the destiny of your soul.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

David Blevins: And a lot of times I ask will clients or people sign up a will, where will you be when this will is probated. And there’s really only two options. Okay, folks, either be in heaven, or there’ll be in hell. And that that decision that prep, the preparation for the soul will spin is more important than where your money was spent. A little bit of reflection on a little bit of reflection on the fact that we won’t live forever is a good thing, spiritually. And also is a is a good thing for your family. Yeah. The second reason people don’t want to do wills is they want to face their family. They’ve got kids that are fussing and fighting, or might have or they’ve got some hard feelings or a spouse that there’s some tough decisions have to be made. And frankly, they don’t have the guts to face it.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

David Blevins: So what they do is nothing in that. And then the family is in a real mess. And that is actually pretty selfish. Now I hate to be harsh, but it’s the truth.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah.

David Blevins: Somebody is going to have somebody who’s going to have to do your will. Somebody has to have to dispose your property. And you’re gonna you need to look the kids in the eye and say, this is where I want it to be. Not leave the brothers or sisters just to fight over.

Jeff Kelly: How often do you think people should get their wills redone We had a client come in and he had a will from 1984.

David Blevins: Well, at for too long because suffering wills came in in Georgia 95 you need to have your wills done. And by the way, Georgia has really good will law as most states go. So you need to change your will. When you have substantial life changing life circumstance. I have a lot of folks come in come in and the wills were drawn when the kids were little, they probably ought to name one of their children is their executor. Now that you know they’ve got a child as a CPA in 35, you probably don’t need Uncle Joe, who may not or may not still be alive to be the executor of the will. So you need to change it on life circumstances as your children advance. You might not need trust provisions, you may may be simpler. You also need if you have substantial circumstance changes. If you have a situation where you can come into or have a lot of anticipated money, then you may want to, you may want to include a charity, you may want to divide your money, if you’ve got there certain tax deferred instruments like 401K’s that if they grow to a certain level, you may want to, especially if your children are too young, to see through trust. So if you have your eye, you need to check with a lawyer if your life circumstances change substantially. If you get married or divorced, you really need to have your will looked into. People don’t realize it. But if you have a will and remarry, what you’ve done is revoke a third of your will. That causes a lot of heartache. Because the Georgia statute just says that the spouses portion, the will is not not good as to the spouses portion. And to the spouses portion, your will is revoked. Now, may be the lawyer and probate judge just scratched their head. Exactly what does that mean? What does it mean to revoke a third of your will, but it means it’s a mess. And it didn’t have to be, you could come into a lawyer. And also I recommend if you’ve got older couples, you got folks in their 60s or 70s that have some assets. a prenuptial agreements are good idea. And people think it’s not and I’m okay why it’s a good idea. It keeps your children the adult children of the people who are getting married from fighting with each other over who’s going in here at mom and dad stuff. If you have a prenuptial agreement that sets out who’s to get won, then the children the adult children are less likely to tear apart the letter in life marriage. I’ve seen that happen many times and it’s tragic. But a prenuptial agreement or in the alternative of goodwill, and just show it to the kids. Okay, Mary’s leaving every all of her stuff is going to her kids after the last of us to die. And all of my stuff is going to you guys after the last of us to die. And that’s the way it’s gonna be leave us alone. And wait, there you go.

Jeff Kelly: What happens when somebody passes and nobody can find the will is well any good at all? Anybody?

David Blevins: Well, that’s that can be a real problem if there is a conformed copy, and you can explain the absence of the original. If everybody agrees it sometimes doesn’t take too much explaining to to convince the probate court, you can and I’ve got two will well one we’ll right now that I’m about to file that conformed copy for 1992 or three and a nother will It’s already in process. So we can work with copies sometimes. But that’s that’s a heartburn that we really don’t need to have. So we have a little speech about where you should put your will. And you can put them in your safety deposit box. If you have any doubt is there’s gonna be any fussing and fighting or any questions or any any strife about your will. I recommend filing it with a probate court for safekeeping. It costs $15. It lasts a lifetime. The probate court will not read your will, they will put your name on it and give it a number and follow it and I found fireproof filing cabinet saw provided a statute. No one can come and get your will unless it’s you and you can prove your identity or they show up with your death certificate and prove there. Then they can get a copy That way is locked up. And nobody has to wonder what dad’s will was. Because it’s right there in the probate court already.

Jeff Kelly: That’s a neat, neat thing to know.

David Blevins: Well, people don’t very few folks know that. And it does keep that a lot of fussing and fighting. And we probably, I found at least one with a probate court a month. You can also keep it in a fireproof box at your house. But the safety deposit box or safekeeping with the probate court is by far, the best way to do it. And you need to let somebody know where it is. And your papers, just keep a receipt, the $15 seats at the probate court gives you that you will file and I go that found the wills probate court a and you don’t write down and and the probate court will not give them the wil, but the probate court will give them a copy. If they present a death certificate to show you you’re not around and proof that you are an heir or beneficiary under the will.

Jeff Kelly: How about that’s a that’s good. Good to know. What do you ever have clients come in and meet with you, you know, to do a will or a personal injury where you say to yourself, gosh, I wish I’m talking I wish you had known this I wish you hadn’t done fill in the blank. Like, you know, for me, I have clients come in and they’ll spend through their 401 K’s, you know, paying debts off that we are going to wipe out anyway. You ever have experienced that? Boy, do I?

David Blevins: And that’s a great question. Jeff, you’re you’re good at this, you know, we need to make you on the light show for lawyers. So yes, we did we do have people that come in and with with their car insurance, sometimes it’s pretty painful that they will do things like not give the hospital their their car insurance information. Because they think the other guy’s lab car insurance to take care of it. Well, when you do that, you’re not taking advantage of the discounts that your your insurance contractually receives from the hospital. Now, medical bills, this is something people don’t think about.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah,

David Blevins: but medical bills are inflated 60 to 75% of what the insurance contractual rights are. So if you go to the hospital, you have a car wreck. And not too much is wrong with you, but they do a good bit of test, you know, put your ominous plan or a neck brace and send you home. It’s not unusual to have a $10,000 bill.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah, yeah.

David Blevins: Well, if you’re current, if you’re a health insurance where you work, pay that bill, their contractual discount would most likely reduce that build or three or $4,000.

Jeff Kelly: Wow.

David Blevins: So if you if the other guys say the other guy’s got a $25,000 automobile policy, and you have a 10 out you have a broken arm, which is not a not a high dollar thing, a broken arm, which is pretty serious injury. And a $10,000 hospital bill is a car insurance. The other guy’s car insurance pays that $10,000 and there’s only $15,000 left in that policy for you. If you’re if your insurance where you work pays the bill, it pays $4,000 then when you collect the $25,000 from other guys, life insurance, car insurance, you pay your insurance company back $4,000. So instead of having $15,000 to work with you get $21,000 to work with. So that you see people come in and they’ve done that. And the bills are been run through sorry and paid. And you just you can scream because they left 5678 910

Jeff Kelly: so frustrating.

David Blevins: It is.

Jeff Kelly: Oh,

David Blevins: I don’t mind people they just don’t know.

Jeff Kelly: Well, David, hey, I thank you so much for coming on the show today. I look forward to getting this out to my clients. I personally have learned some pretty good, pretty good stuff here. And we just really appreciate you.

David Blevins: Well, you’re more than welcome here. It’s good to be here. Thank you so much. Jeff.

Outro Speaker: You’ve been listening to KellyCanHelp with Jeff Kelly reached out to the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly today by phone 7062950030 in Rome or visit Kellycanhelp.com.

Three year old slowly walked away from the Father towards a group of Halloween decorative, which is for sale. And one of the witches had a lifelike size and a button beside it that said, press here. I bet you can guess what happens next. After the curious little boy press the button, which came to life and lent out some terrifying warnings along with some Halloween sound effects. As you can guess the little boys, a little boy belted out some shrill screams. And he was shaking with tears. His good father rush to his side and comfort him. Everything’s gonna be okay, so the good father there which is not real, she can’t hurt you. You’re safe in my arms. And much the same way. Many people are as terrified of bankruptcy as that sweet little boy was of the fake which, in my 22 years as a consumer bankruptcy attorney, I’ve seen some people do some crazy things to try to avoid the inevitable bankruptcy. Personally, I think the worst thing a person can do is drain the 401k retirement account. To make payments on credit card debt until the funds run out. Your 401 k is a protected asset. You get to keep all of it when you file chapter 7 and 99.99% of the cases. It’s frustrating to see people fruitlessly lose their retirement funds in an effort to avoid a clearly inevitable bankruptcy.

Another common bad move to avoid bankruptcy is to pawn the title of a car. When you miss your payments of a title upon the title of your vehicle transfers automatically under Georgia law. And as a consequence of this automatic transfer, Chapter 13 is not going to save you from the clutches of a title pawn creditor.

I want to talk a little bit now about more about this this fear of bankruptcy. My my friend Richard James has a saying that goes like this fear equals false evidence appearing real. And so what I want to address now are the most common fears about bankruptcy that are not real. The most common fear is that lawyers are scary and not easy to talk with. And this is certainly not true about myself, or the bankruptcy attorneys at my law firm. Check out our reviews on Google. And you’ll see this is true. We also have some testimonials as well on our YouTube channel. We understand we’re on your side. Another common fear is that you will never be able to get credit again after you file bankruptcy. Yes, chapter 7 bankruptcy will stay on your credit for 10 years. And Chapter 13 will stay on your credit for seven years. But that doesn’t mean you can’t get any credit during that time period.

The truth is that most people have no problem at all obtaining credit once their bankruptcy case is completed. Just ask your friends almost everyone has some connection to a friend or family member who has filed bankruptcy and recovered. If you are a lender, would you be willing to loan money to somebody who has a huge cloud of debt hanging over them and is going nowhere? Of course not. How about somebody who just completed their chapter 7 bankruptcy, and it was no one. If they had good income, how likely are they to obtain credit? Ask a car finance company because they make loans to people who have just obtained their chapter 7 discharge all the time.

Another irrational fear about bankruptcy is that some people believe the trustee is going to come to their house. I have filed thousands of bankruptcy cases and I have never heard of a trustee go into a person’s house to look at their stuff. There are always exceptions to the rule. But I’m sure it’s a rare case. When Evander Holyfield filed for bankruptcy. He had moved Millions of dollars worth of stuff. In his specific case that trustee had a duty to inventory his household items. In contrast, most people don’t possess anything of real true significant cash value. So what should you be afraid of? Well, personally, if you have financial problems, I think the thing you should fear the most is procrastination. If you put your head in the sand and ignore the problem, in Georgia, your creditors will obtain judgments against you. And in Georgia, they’re going to use these judgments to completely clean out your checking account and take 25% of your paycheck. In addition, if you have a house, they will put a lien on it.

Let’s talk about some other fears. The court hearing, there’s no need to be afraid of a court hearing. Currently, bankruptcy court hearings are virtual. And this reduces a lot of stress. This is about the only good thing I can think of that has come from COVID-19. And this may change once we find a cure for COVID-19 are the infection rate rate drops dramatically. But until then, I think this is the way it’s going to be for the foreseeable future. Even the signing the petition, we can do that virtually with a program called zoom. So you don’t you don’t actually have to ever come to my office. You don’t have to ever actually physically appear in court.

The bottom line is this. If you have financial issues, you should take advantage of a free consultation and talk to a bankruptcy attorney as soon as you can call us today at 770-881-8449.

Thank you!

After it hit, over 40 million people in this country lost their job due to the shutdowns. Well, the stimulus money certainly helped. Lots of people still missed many months of mortgage payments and car payments. But the good news is that chapter 13 can help people catch up on the past due payments. Chapter 13 stops a foreclosure of your home. Chapter 13 stops the repossession of your car. This past week, NBC reported that the unemployment rate has fallen back into the single digits. For the first time since the pandemic began and that over 1.4 million jobs were added to the economy last month. Things seem to be heading in the right direction. The March 2020 shutdowns stopped almost all collection activity in Georgia. And that has now ended. Georgia courts were shut down due to the pandemic. But in mid-September, they’ve almost fully reopened and I suspect there’s about to be a huge deluge, a giant wave of garnishment orders coming down the pipe. Unfortunately, most people are going to wait until the last segment to do anything about a garnishment.

Georgia garnishment law is brutal. Once a creditor obtains a judgment against you, they can take 25% of your net paycheck. The good news is that chapter 13 can stop the garnishment as soon as we get a bankruptcy case number. So I want to go over just like a you know, short example of how chapter 13 can help a family back back bounce back from COVID-19.

So I want to tell the story about a young couple that I recently spoke with. To protect their privacy, I’m going to change around some of the facts. This young couple has three children and before COVID-19 hit. They both worked full time jobs after the pandemic, their local daycare completely shut down.

In addition, their local elementary school also closed and moved everything online. Does this story sound familiar?

With no one to watch the kids, they decided that in their particular situation, it would be best for the wife to quit her job because the husband was earning more.

Then a year ago. Before all this stuff began. They both realized that the minimum credit card payments they were making were slowly slipping out of their reach into their misfortune. They heard about a debt settlement commercial on the radio that promised the moon and the sun. They call the phone number they set up a payment plan and they assumed all as well until the sheriff showed up. A few weeks ago, to their horror and dismay, the local sheriff pulled up into their driveway while they were outside in their front yard and find all their neighbors playing with their children. And this Sheriff served them with a collection lawsuit.

At first they thought there must have been some kind of misunderstanding. Then, they called the debt settlement company only to discover that most of the money they had paid out over the past year went to the fees of the debt settlement company. I hear this exact same story from clients all the time. Furthermore, they learned that the debt settlement company had zero legal means to prevent the collection lawsuit and contrast when a person is in an active chapter 13 case no one can file a lawsuit against you? While this case is going? creditors cannot call garnish or bother you while your case is live. You get great protection from the bankruptcy court. This young couple was free, extremely frustrated to learn that they had essentially wasted a year with a debt settlement company. The good news is we were able to get their house and the cars protected with a solid chapter 13 plan. Also, we were able to eliminate all of their credit card debt. Chapter 13 help this young couple. And I believe it’s going to help thousands of consumers in Georgia bounce back from COVID-19. If you think it might be able to help you, give us a call 7708818449 Thank you

The first restriction was you had to wait five years after graduating before you could discharge student loans. Then the goal line got changed to seven years and then in 1998, the hammer was completely put down. Student Loans could virtually no longer be dischargeable in bankruptcy. As a result, if you want to go find a good summary on the internet about the history of student loans and bankruptcy, you can go to savingforcollege.com backslash article backslash history of student loans bankruptcy discharge the consequences of making student loans non-dischargeable in bankruptcy. Since 1998, the cost the cost of a college education has more than doubled in real dollar terms. Think about that doubled.

When I went to college, the vast majority of college housing was extremely Spartan, shall we say? Today, most college dorms look similar to a resort, so that colleges can attract students lower them into huge amounts of federally backed debt and make millions. Most colleges now have bloated bureaucracies due to the lack of real market forces. The connection between the true economic value of a college education has been disconnected from the value that said education will produce because of the restrictions on dischargeability in bankruptcy. Many people have been sold on the idea you cannot have a successful life unless you have a college degree. It’s becoming increasingly it’s becoming an increasingly popular choice for many young adults to forego college completely because of the high risk that they will never be able to repay the loans. As a result, someone who should go to college may never develop their full potential because of this artificially inflated price. Currently, the federal government keeps footing the bill for unpaid student loans, colleges get their money from the federal government whether or not a student loan a student ever repays them. Where’s the incentive to keep costs down and connected to the reality of whether or not the loan will ever be repaid?

Now my argument for bankruptcy.

Many famous people in US history have filed bankruptcy and gone on to do great things for the world. Henry Ford’s first automobile company did not make it. Can you imagine a world without Henry Ford? Thank goodness he was able to file bankruptcy, recover and get a fresh start. What about Walt Disney? Can you imagine a world with no Disney? No Mickey Mouse, no disney world? Thank goodness while Disney was able to file bankruptcy, recover and get a fresh start. Because of the current non-dischargeability of student loans, many college graduates who have tons of student loans have never been able to recover from the debt load. What a horrible shame. How many marriages never took place? How many children were never born? How many houses were never built? How many businesses were never started because of the dark cloud of excessive balances on student loans. Any answer to these questions is pure conjecture. But I think it is safe to say that if we could estimate it, the answer would be in the millions.

Nerdwallet reports that 5.2 million student loans are currently in default. Keeping these loans non-dischargeable in bankruptcy does not result in them magically being reimbursed by the students who borrowed 99% of these loans will still never get paid. Bankruptcy has made the United States the best country in history. If you want more detail on that, go to my website, www.kellycanhelp.com and type that in. I’ve got a link to it also on my blog.

Giving people a second chance make sense in so many ways. Remember, there but for the grace of God go you. Bankruptcy is not some magic button people press to make all their debts go away. To file bankruptcy, the debtor must submit documentation under oath to a court of law showing that they are in fact bankrupt. People who attempt to abuse the system end up in jail. The lawyers who work for the United States bankruptcy trustees take their jobs super seriously. And they will zealously enforce the law. My point is that when someone can afford to pay their student loans, they should continue to pay their student loans, even if the loans become dischargeable once again. In conclusion, our bankruptcy system should be allowed to determine who should and should not repay their student loans. Thank you for tuning in.

Earlier this year, I met with an elderly lady who for purposes of this illustration, we’re going to call her Marjorie Okay, now Marjorie, was about five feet tall, about 95 pounds, married to the same husband for over like 40 years. Supersweet lady worked so hard. And at one point in her life, she had probably at least $300,000 saved up in her 401k when her husband passed away, he had an insurance policy. But what neither one of them ever anticipated, was just the exorbitant through the roof cost of medical treatment. And he had a huge, long battle with cancer and ended up leaving behind this overwhelming mountain of debt. Now what did the sweet lady do? She did honestly what most people do, and she made payments for years and years, until there was no more money left from the 401k and no more money from the life insurance proceeds. This is tragic and horrible on so many levels. Because all of that life insurance and all of that 401k money should have been protected from her husband’s medical bills, she was not legally obligated to make those payments.

We see this happen a lot and so don’t feel bad if it’s you because you’re just like everybody else if if you’ve done this, but, you know, most people delay talking to a bankruptcy attorney until like way after they need to, which is, you know, again, double ironic and tragic because we offer a free consultation, it doesn’t cost anything to come talk to us if at any point. I’ve been practicing consumer bankruptcy for over 22 years And believe me, I have seen it all. You know, again, you would not believe how many people will needlessly spend their way into bankruptcy trying to pay somebody else’s bills that they’re not legally liable for. So what should a person do? What in the perfect world you lose your spouse, somebody you love your, your your other half? What a terrible traumatic event to go through. And as a consequence of the emotional toll, it’s also the absolute worst time to make major financial decisions.

So step one, I think everybody should meet with a wills and estates attorney. And, you know, I don’t practice in this area, but I know many great attorneys around here who do and I am happy to help you find one give me a call 7708818449. I’ll help you if you’re in the situation. And the purpose of meeting with an estate attorney is to determine you know whether or not the estate needs to be probated, are there any assets that do need to be used to pay any leftover medical bills. Is there an estate at all? Very important to get those questions answered. As soon as somebody passes away, was there a will?

The next step, I think, is that people should meet with a financial planner and plan out what what does the future look like without this other spouse. And then worst case scenario, there’s just a ton of debt that’s left and it’s not going anywhere. I think you need to meet with a bankruptcy attorney, and again, is a free consultation. And what we would do is we would sit down with you and go over your income go over your budget, and we would take a good hard look at a at coming up with a plan for the future. If you’ve got money in 401k, leave it there. If you have just inherited some life insurance money, don’t touch it. Meet with us first. You know, before you start throwing it towards debt. Again, it’s a free consultation. Why not take advantage of this? If you don’t, you could end up getting suckered by debt collectors. And these debt collectors are extremely skilled at guilting people into paying debts that they legally otherwise don’t have to, particularly medical bills where the surviving spouse has no legal liability. Debt collectors also have this amazing supernatural ability to call right after our life insurance check hit your mailbox. So again, in most cases, life insurance proceeds are not exposed to a deceased spouse’s debts, but again, meet with an estate planning attorney and get answers to those questions for sure.

So what’s the magic question to ask when Somebody says, Hey, you owe me money. That magic question is, can you show me a contract where I signed and agreed to be liable for this debt, if they cannot produce any proof of your signature on a guarantee, you are not liable in the state of Georgia. Right now with all this COVID-19 mess going on, we are conducting virtual appointments. I do some live ones as well. I mean, if you really want to, but most people are opting for the virtual appointment, we can do it over the phone. And I also like to use this program called zoom. I’ve got a camera hooked up at my desk so you can see me talk if you want. We can do a computer screen share if we need to. The worst thing that you can do is to just ignore the problem. Don’t do that. Give me a call. It’s free. It won’t cost you anything. The problem is not going to go away by itself. So please give me Call 7708818449. I’ve also written a book on chapter 13 and chapter 7 and I want you to get a free copy. So go to my website www.kellycanhelp.com. And you can download a copy for free. If you live in the state of Georgia. I’ll mail you a hardcopy if while supplies last. Again, call us 7708818449. I hope you have a great day. Thank you for tuning in. Bye-bye.

Hello, this is bankruptcy attorney Jeff Kelly Today is August 3, 2020. And today I’m going to be talking about how you can currently file bankruptcy without ever leaving your home.

One of the few good things that has come out as a result of the covid-19 pandemic is that you can now file bankruptcy without ever leaving your house. You can even attend your court hearing via telephone now from the comfort and safety of your home. Before COVID-19 hit, you had to physically appear in one of our offices, and a bankruptcy attorney had to see you physically sign the documents. And for many people who have to juggle busy work schedules and family schedules, it was difficult at times to physically get into the office. Traffic delays used to wreak havoc on some of our sign appointments. Now because of the shelter in place concerns, the bankruptcy court allows us to file your case without you ever having to come to one of our offices.

Here’s how the process works.

Step one, we conduct your free initial consultation with you by phone. During this conference, we want to review all of your debts, lawsuits, assets, income and expenses with you. Our goal is to get a feel for your entire situation. At the end of this free consultation, we will clearly explain to you why chapter 13 or chapter 7 bankruptcy is or is not a good option for you. Unlike many other bankruptcy law firms, you will be able to talk directly to an experienced bankruptcy attorney who will closely analyze the specific facts of your case. In addition, we will answer all of your questions. If you decide to move forward with either chapter 13 or chapter 7 bankruptcy. We will need you to give us your social security number and your birthdate so that we can pull your credit card for processing your bankruptcy petition. If you have received any lawsuits or other bills that you’d like for us to include in your case, you can take a picture of the documents and email them to us. If you have access to a scanner, that’s even better, it might be a lot easier for you to send them to us that way.

Step two, the sign appointment during this appointment, which will take about two hours on average, we will do a screen share with you so that you can go through each page of the bankruptcy petition to make sure it’s absolutely perfect. We currently use zoom to make this happen. We will also when we’re finished use a program called DocuSign so that you can electronically sign the court required signature pages. We can file your chapter 13 or chapter 7 bankruptcy case shortly after your sign appointment, so your court protection will begin immediately. We will mail you a hard copy of the bankruptcy petition after your case is filed, then we will need you to sign it with a pin and mail the documents back to us.

Until October 2020, all bankruptcy court hearings will be conducted virtually over the telephone. And this is great news because this means you can currently attend your court hearing without leaving your house without having to risk any COVID-19 have been around crowds of people. You know, before COVID-19, you would have to appear physically in court for 341 meetings. You’d have to stand in line, sometimes a long line and then you’d have to get scanned by the security officers and then you would have to in the past, go sit in a crowded room where they do Roll Call and then they call the names of everyone, per hour for the hearing. Thank goodness, you don’t have to do that right now. And I, I think this is really great. And personally, I’m hoping that all the changes that have been made to our bankruptcy system as a consequence of COVID-19 will become permanent.

So if you are considering chapter 13 or chapter 7, please give us a call at 770-881-8449. If you get a chance, go on Google and check our reviews. We’ve got really, really good reviews, and we got a lot of them because I’ve got the best staff on planet Earth. I’ve written a book on chapter 13 and chapter 7, you can go to my main website, www.kellycanhelp.com and you can download a free copy of it or you can call us at 770-881-8449 We’ll send you a hardcopy while supplies last. I look forward to talking with you soon. Thank you

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly and Today is July 23 2020. Today we are going to talk about the five most important questions that you should ask before you decide to hire a bankruptcy attorney. There are some important questions that every consumer should ask before hiring a bankruptcy attorney. Hiring the right attorney will ensure that you get the best Fresh Start possible after completing your case. And after being a senior bankruptcy attorney in Georgia for over 22 years, I think I can offer some advice on this topic.

First of all, you must ask How many years has this attorney practice consumer bankruptcy law. Of course, the longer the time the more training and experience he will have 10 years or more gives you a good probability that he’ll have specific legal knowledge to use in getting you the best outcome for your case. This specific knowledge not only relates to knowing the laws but also knowing the other lawyers judges and how they operate and being able to figure out the best strategy for your case.

Secondly, you must ask, does this attorney limit her practice to consumer bankruptcy law? Do you want your attorneys caseload to include legitimising child, criminal law, handling divorces, child custody, real estate, firearms, reading wills and estates, probating estates and throwing for good measure consumer bankruptcy? I think not. Obviously, you would rather be represented by an attorney who limits his or her practice to consumer bankruptcy.

Third, you must ask, how many bankruptcies has he handled? Obviously, you would rather have someone who has tried, has has filed a lot of cases ideally 500 or more. An attorney with that level of experience is gonna be much better at things such as figuring out liquidation issues in your case, you know, do you risk losing your house? Do you risk losing your car? You know, are there other assets? basically keeping keeping you out of hot water. And you certainly don’t want to get someone who just graduated from law school, that’s a disaster waiting to happen.

Something else you want to know is after after reviewing your case, can he or she give you specific issues on the fine details of your bankruptcy case? Like are you going to lose your house? How much is your payment going to be and how is this payment calculated?

Last but not least, you must ask. Will he give you will he explained to you in detail the costs that are involved all of the transaction costs and after an attorney does a thorough job of determining what type of work is needed in your case, if he’s experienced, he should be able to get you these details.

Okay, so you’re probably wondering what my answers would be to the above questions and I will lay it out for you.

As I mentioned, I have over 20 years of experience in bankruptcy in Georgia. In other words, I’ve been around the block a few times. Your case would not be my first rodeo. Before I opened my practice in 2005, I worked a few years for some large bankruptcy filers. I’ve handled just about everything you can think of in a consumer bankruptcy case.

My practice is 100% computer consumer bankruptcy. I don’t spend my time fighting over who gets the table and chairs and a divorce. Instead, I spend my time aggressively defending clients in their bankruptcy cases.

Over the years, I have handled several thousand bankruptcy cases.

After reviewing your case, I will tell you upfront the specific issues I believe that are relevant your bankruptcy case, we will discuss all of your debts, all of your assets will go up your income will go up your expenses and we will come up with a plan that works for you.

After you share with me everything I need to know to analyze your case, you will receive a clear explanation of all the costs relating to your case. After all, isn’t that what you’re after to improve your chances of getting the best outcome being kept up to date, knowing what it’ll cost and getting this handled so that you can get on with the rest of your life.

All you have to do now is give me a call at 770-881-8449 and schedule a free appointment. If I’m not available. I have three super experienced attorneys at work for me who will also do a fantastic job.

Thank you very much for tuning in.

Hello! this is Jeff Kelly, today is July the ninth 2020 and today we are going to talk about what is strict compliance in a chapter 13 bankruptcy case. Strict compliance in a chapter 13 bankruptcy is when your case has been placed on a period where if you miss a single chapter 13 payment your case is automatically dismissed without a hearing. Dismiss without a hearing is a bad thing because you have no time to prepare. The second your case is dismissed, the creditors are free to legally take action against you as soon as the law is as soon as the law allows.

So how fast do you think a car creditor is going to come after your car and try to repossess it after your case is dismissed?

Answer, as fast as they humanly can contrast a chapter 13 on strict compliance versus a case where strict compliance does not exist. Normally When a chapter 13 debtor falls behind on payments to the trustee, the hearing is set down with the bankruptcy court which gives them time to come up with the plan to make up for missed payments or in the alternative if you know your bankruptcy case is about to dismiss you could make plans for alternative transportation, when you know your car is about to get repossessed. In contrast, if a case is is on strict compliance, or chapter 13 case will be dismissed shortly after a payment is missed. All bankruptcy protection is lost as soon as the dismissal order is entered.

Thank you, Lord, we do have gracious chapter 13 trustees.

So during this COVID-19 crisis, the chapter 13 trustees have been extremely gracious by not enforcing strict compliance orders. But now that we are months into the crisis and people are back to work, most trustees have resumed enforcing strict compliance orders. So how does someone end up on strict compliance to begin with? Well, in some cases, the debtors attorney might agree with a trustee for a requested period of strict compliance. For example, most chapter 13 cases have what’s called an employment deduction order. That’s where they’re going to take, you know, the chapter 13 payment directly out of your paycheck every single time you get paid. So your whatever your monthly payment is, it gets prorated. You know, like if you get paid weekly, then it would be divided by four and so forth. So, some people do not want a an employment deduction in order at any cost. And because maybe they’re, you know, give an example. Maybe they’re a supervisor and they’re worried. This is going to hurt their chances for promotion. So a trustee might say, okay, fine, you can pay it directly to me every month, on the condition that you agree to one year strict compliance for the first year of the case. This way that you know saves the trustee a lot of trouble if you don’t make your payment, they can just boom automatically dismiss it without having to set it down for a hearing.

So another situation where strict compliance could be added to a chapter 13 bankruptcy case is after a motion to dismiss has been filed. In some cases, you know, people miss work for extended periods, maybe it’s because of surgery, maybe, you know, the plant shut down for a short time, whatever. Your payments, get missed payments gets missed, the trustee files a motion to throw the case out. And we can go to the hearing and say, Okay, we’re back at work. Now we can make payments, and as a condition of allowing you to continue in the chapter 13 case, the trustee might require a period of strict compliance. Sometimes if you’re really far behind, they may say, hey, I want strict compliance for the rest of this case, and so that’s how that works.

If you think your case has been placed on strict compliance or you’re not sure, call us. If you’ve missed some recent payments, call us as soon as you can. Don’t wait for a dismissal order to come in the mail. It’s much better to address the problem ahead of time.

Thank you for tuning in today. Have a good one.

Hello! this is Jeff Kelly, and in this podcast today I’m going to talk a little bit about How to fight a creditor lawsuit.

So, In Georgia, consumers have the right to fight back against creditor lawsuits. In my experience, the people who I have seen have the most successful outcomes are victims of identity theft. Before I get into it, I wanna go something real quick. A lot of people will call me and say “Why in the world am I getting a letter from you just because I’m being sued?”

Well, the answer is. I am a bankruptcy attorney and in my law practice, we send out a ton of direct mail advertisements to people who are getting sued. Often times, our letters will get to people before the sheriff will serve the lawsuit, particularly during this corona time. A lot of sheriff officers are being delayed for obvious reasons and our letter gets there first. So people understandably wanna know when they’re gonna get the information. Usually is about a week or two after our letter hits, but the sheriff is coming he will serve you with a complaint. And it’s very important to make note of the date you are served of the complaint because you have 30 days to respond to it. If you don’t respond, you’re gonna end up with a default judgment against you and that is very very bad because you could lose a lot of important rights.

So, what you do if you’ve got a creditor lawsuit against you and you want to fight it? Well, if we’re talking about a significant amount of money you really need to hire an attorney. I mean it’s kind of crazy to walk into a court of law if you don’t know what you’re doing. But I do understand if it is a small amount of money there are some cases where the amount of money that’s state at stake might be less than what you would pay an attorney.

So, I get it. In Georgia, you have the right to represent yourself without an attorney. I don’t recommend this but I get it. So, you wanna make sure that you respond to the lawsuit within 30 days of you being served. You can go on Google and you can type in “How do I respond to a creditor lawsuit?”. Usually, a small amount are going to be in magistrate court, “How do I respond to magistrate court lawsuit?”. The form is not super complicated, you can possibly do it all in one page. You wanna style the top part just like the complaint that you’ve been served, You’re going to want to, you know, right at the top answer that this is your answer to the complaint.

If you’re a victim of identity theft, you’re probably going to want to say something along the lines of “I am not liable for the debt as alleged in the complaint, I’ve never had a contract with the defendant. Ever! I’d like to have a hearing before the judge”. Something that simple should be enough to get you a hearing. Now, if you do get a hearing before the judge, you’re gonna get notified by mail. And you better show up at the hearing date. Because if you don’t, you know, judges are very powerful people if they wanted to, and I doubt they would do this very often, but if they wanted to, they could issue a bench warrant for your arrest, if there is a hearing that you requested and then you don’t bother to show up for it. So that can be pretty embarrassing for you. So make sure you show up or if you can’t go to court. Make sure you communicate with the court and let them know So assuming that you respond correctly by filing your answer to the complaint and serving said answer on the creditor, you will get the hearing you will get a chance to give your evidence that you do not owe the debt.

Now, what should you do in a case where you, you do have the debt? What should you do? Well, you’ve got three options. Number one, you can call the attorney who filed the lawsuit against you and you can work out a payment plan or number two, you can just ignore the whole thing and let the creditor get a default judgment against you. If you do that, and they garnish your wages, you know, Georgia is pretty brutal, they can take 25% of your wages. So if you’re expecting to see $1,000 in your paycheck, you’re only going to see 750 because they’re gonna take 25% they can do that or they can clean out your checking account up to the amount of the debt.

Some people do take that route because you know, if it’s a small amount, I get it, I understand. But if we’re talking about a significant amount of money, and if you’re in a situation where this is not your only debt, there are plenty of others and they’re just basically gonna start lining up filing lawsuits against you.

Call me, let’s talk about chapter 13 or chapter 7. It is a free consultation. You’re crazy if you don’t take advantage of this. Let’s go over income. Let’s go over your budget. Let’s come up with a plan that works to take care of everything. To give you some peace of mind so you can sleep at night and not stress or worry about any of this stuff. Let’s take care of the big picture.

Give me a call 7708818449 now, anything I’ve said in this podcast, do not rely on it is legal advice. If you want free legal advice about your specific situation, call Call me 7708818449. If you get a chance, check out my main website www.kellycanhelp.com. I’ve got a lot of podcast on there there’s a search bar you can use to find other topics you might be interested in. And I want you to go to my website scroll down to the bottom and type in your email address so I can send you a digital copy of a book that I’ve written on chapter 13 and chapter 7. We will give it to you for free. You can also give us a call at 770-881-8449 and let us know if you prefer to have a hard copy. We will send you one while supplies last. And I want to thank you for tuning in today and wish you the best.

Thank you

So for almost five months, creditors in Georgia have not been able to get orders on the collection lawsuits they filed.

And the deadline has been extended and been extended. And currently it’s going to be extended until about mid July. And this lack of enforcement has created a false sense of security for a lot of people. I, I bet there’s tons of consumers who have just completely forgotten about the lawsuit with all the strange stuff that’s been going on in the world. This is probably not top of mind and this false sense of security is about to get blown away. Once courts are allowed to operate at full capacity in mid July.

So along with the tidal wave, a predictable nightmare is coming for many consumers in Georgia after the courts reopen. Some person is going to get their wages garnished out of the blue. They are going to see twenty five percent of their paycheck disappear. So what does this look like in real life? Someone who is expecting to see 500 hours in their paycheck is only going to get about three seventy five. Someone who has a few thousand dollars in their checking account could potentially see it all disappear depending on the amount of the debt.

What’s this going to lead to?

Rent payments won’t be able to get made. Mortgage payments will not be able to get made. Car payments will not be able to get made. Financial disaster. And I imagine that many people are going to procrastinate and they’re going to be calling us in late July. And I hope this doesn’t happen, but it is possible that they may hear these awful words. I’m so sorry. We’re fully booked out. And I imagine you’re going to hear people say, look, I’m desperate.

Your five months of collection lawsuits are going to hit all at once. We’re not going to be able to help everybody. And I doubt I think there’s gonna be a major shortage of bankruptcy attorneys for the first couple of months. So don’t wait until after the nightmare hits, the tidal wave hits. You know who you are.

You know, if you’re in financial trouble, you know, if you’ve got stuff hanging over your head. Take care of business. Call me today. It is a free consultation. 770-881-8449. Let’s get the ball rolling before everything hit you. Don’t wait until afterwards. It could really compound your headache. So almost every bankruptcy firm that I know of has has been forced to lay off at least half their staff.

So, I mean, not only is there going to be this big, huge tidal wave of collection losses coming, but most bankruptcy firms are downsized and they’re going to stay downsized until things start coming back. Most firms are either going to be in pay off the debt or, you know, replenish the savings mode. There’s not going to be a huge amount of capacity. So it’s just going to compound the problem. So, again, call me today.

It doesn’t cost you anything to explore your options. It takes time to get properly ready for a bankruptcy case. We need to review your paycheck stub. We need to look at your assets. We’re going to tell you if bankruptcy is not a right fit for you.

For some people, it may not be. But we need time to evaluate. So, again, take action. Don’t wait. You know, you are. You need to call me. 770-881-8449. Thank you.

I have heard questions like these hundreds of times. And the answer might shock you. The answer is this. Most people do recover within about two years, one to two years of filing Chapter 7 bankruptcy.

How can that possibly be? You may say, well, first of all, usually by the time the clients come meet with me, the damage has already been done. Most potential clients have stopped paying credit cards. Many months ago, had cars repossessed. Been sued by creditors. Had wages garnished or had their house foreclosed.

Any of these will put a major hit to your credit rating. For most people considering bankruptcy, like I said, the damage is already there. So the question is, what do we want to do going forward? Do you ever get a knot in your stomach when you think about your credit score?

David, just feel sick to your stomach thinking about all that debt and the interest and late fees and just mess that’s hanging over you and it’s not going anywhere. Well, Chapter 7 might help make that pain go away. So the question is, how do we clean it up and how do we how do we clean up the mess from the past and move forward with a better future?

Well, step one is we get the case filed. We stop the immediate pressure from the creditors. You know, as soon as we get the case filed, the phone calls have to stop the lawsuits, stop the harassing letters, stop.

Everything stops. And that’s a wonderful that’s a wonderful, peaceful feeling. And then the second, an important step is through the bankruptcy. We’re going to eliminate all of your debt. So this underlying problem is gone. It’s not coming back on you again. You don’t have to worry about it. And that’s where most bankruptcy attorneys will leave it. And I’m not saying it’s a terrible thing. That’s just the traditional way it’s done. You come in, you meet with the bankers attorney, you get your debts wiped out, you’re out the door.

Well, we do something a little different. We we take it a step further. And there’s a course called Fresh Start for Life.

And in this course, a good friend of mine named Don Golden will teach you how you can rebuild your credit after filing bankruptcy.

Don says that most people can get to a 720 credit score within 12 to 24 months.

And that’s really important because if you go out and get a car loan with a super high interest rate or, you know, more loans, I mean, that history could repeat itself. And like I said earlier, I’ve been doing this as 1998 and I’ve had quite a few clients who have filed more than once. And there’s no shame in that because, I mean, life happens. So don’t ever be afraid to call me again. But if there’s if there’s something we could learn that might be able to prevent us from falling back into a bad spot, I think it’s very worthwhile to take steps and learn from Don, hear what he has to say and see if he can’t help you move on to a better future.

So this course, it costs like nine hundred ninety seven dollars. But my clients get it as part of a package because I have a ball ray, a bulk rate deal with fresh start for life. So all of my clients get the course as soon as their case is discharged. So.

In this course, he’s going to teach you the fastest way to rebuild your credit after bankruptcy. Don promises to teach you, and I quote, how to make the credit card companies pay you to use their cards, have money left in your pocket every month to buy things you want, grow your bank account to the amount you desire. Find money for emergencies like your hot water heater or your air conditioning unit. Car repairs. Get the resources to take vacations you’ve been dreaming about and.

You know, if if you’re thinking about filing Chapter seven, you got a lot of stuff hanging over your head, worried about your credit score. You just need it. You just want a new start. You want to start over.

Give me a call. 770-881-8449. We offer a free consultation to everyone.

It doesn’t hurt to learn about your options.

It does hurt to bury your head in the sand and ignore your options and pretend like the problem is going to go away by itself because it won’t take action today.

Give me a call to get a chance. Check out my Web site, KellycanHelp.com. I’ve got a lot of blog posts there and I have written a book on Chapter 13 and Chapter 7, and I would like for you to get a copy. So go to my Web page. Type in your email address. Download it or give us a call and we’ll send your hardcopy while supplies last. Hope you have a great day. And I look forward to talking to you soon.

Every active chapter 13 debtor should open an account with NDC.org, the cost is free, but the information you see could be worth a lot of money and save you from theft. Having an account with NDC.org will allow you to see every single proof of claim that has been filed in your bankruptcy case and it will also allow you to verify that your chapter 13 payments are being received by the trustee.

Years ago I had a client whose employer took money from her paycheck, but never sent it into the trustee. We caught the error and had to sue the employer to get the money paid. Having an account with NDC.org allows you to catch stuff like this. Proof of claim is a form signed under oath, with supporting documentation that a creditor must file in a bankruptcy case in order to get paid. The proof of claim will tell the trustee the type of claim and the amount owed.

If a creditor fails to file before the deadline in your case, they won’t get paid anything. For example, let’s say you had a car repossessed a few years ago, and owe the car creditor $10,000. If they fail to file a proof of claim on time, you will not have to pay that $10,000.

Let’s change up the facts a little bit. Let’s say you owe the IRS $10,000 of tax credit that we cannot eliminate in bankruptcy. If they don’t file a claim, we may want to file one on their behalf to make sure they get paid in your case. While it is rare, sometimes a creditor will accidentally file a claim in the wrong place. In theory, if no one ever notices a wrong claim, could get paid and cost you a lot of money.

In my bankruptcy firm, we review every single claim filed in our clients case. At the same time, we also encourage all of my clients to open an account with NDC.org and double-check as well. The fact that many bankruptcy claims get sold can create a lot of confusion for clients, and they can be solved while your case is going on. So you may look online and see the claim of a holder that you’ve never heard of before. If this happens, it’s a good idea to call us and we’ll pull the proof of claim for you and make sure that it’s accurate.

If an inaccurate claim is discovered, we will first contact the person that filed it and notify them of their error. If the offending filer ignores us, which usually happens most of the time. We will then file what’s called an objection to the proof of claim, the debtor will then need to attend the hearing with us testify to the judge that this claim is bogus.

NDC.org states that you could open up an account online in less than five minutes. All you need to set up your account is your full legal name, your bankruptcy case number, the last four digits of your social security number, your trustees name, and the list of creditors and your bankruptcy case. The benefits of setting up an NDC account are you get access to your chapter 13 bankruptcy information online. There’s helpful answers to frequent questions. There’s a you get access to a quick glance at the page and save yourself a call to your lawyer provides you with the information you need to stay informed about your bankruptcy case. Keep yourself on track during your payment plan and ensure that you’ll have no surprises. In conclusion, if you’re in a chapter 13 right now, go get your account in NDC.org set up as soon as possible. Thank you.

To obtain permission from the court, we had to set it down for a hearing. We have to notify all the creditors in your case what our intentions are, that we want to buy a new car. At the hearing, the trustee is going to have some questions and may or may not oppose your request to purchase a new car. Your bankruptcy attorney will present your case and then the bankruptcy judge will decide whether or not she wants to sign an order allowing it. Typically, this process takes anywhere between 30 to 45 days. It is a slow process. It is not overnight. If you truly don’t have an alternative source of transportation and the proposed payment interest rate and the amount to be incurred are reasonable, most bankruptcy courts are going to approve the purchase of your new car.

Now, if you’re wanting to get a new car, just because you’re sick and tired of the old one, it’s not fashionable anymore, forget it. You’re in bankruptcy. The court is not going to allow you to purchase a new car for that reason. You’ve got to have an acceptable reason to purchase a new car in an active Chapter 13 case. “My old car won’t run anymore and I need to get back and forth to work”. That’s a good reason. “I want a new car. I’m sick and tired of this old one. It smells”. That’s a bad reason. If you have an extra car listed in your bankruptcy case, a trustee’s going to ask, “why do you need a new one?” So, for example, we have clients all the time, some interesting clients will have three, four and five cars. Those clients, the trustee is going to approve the purchase of a new vehicle, unless there’s some sort of explanation that, “hey, this extra car that we had listed in the case, it no longer runs”.

So I think it’s a good idea to review schedule B and if you have some cars break down, since your case was originally filed, I think it’s a good idea to amend your petition to reflect the new status of those old vehicles. I want to talk real quick about the myth of the “buy here, pay here”. So I have clients all the time say, “well, a ‘buy here pay here’ doesn’t count because that’s what the ‘buy here pay here’ auto salesman told me.” “It doesn’t count because they don’t care about bankruptcy.” “It doesn’t count because well, they don’t report on your credit.” No, no, no. All that is wrong, wrong. The owner of the “buy here pay here” is wrong. You’ve got to have court permission to obtain new consumer debt. It doesn’t matter that they don’t report. It doesn’t matter what the owner of the car lot says. If you violate this rule, your bankruptcy case could be dismissed or in a worst case scenario, you could be sanctioned by the bankruptcy court.

Now, what do you do in the worst case scenario when you’re in a situation where no one will finance you because you’re in an active Chapter 13 case, and you desperately need a new vehicle, or for whatever reason, the judge is not going to approve your purchase of a new vehicle. What do you do? Well, the answer is you can voluntarily dismiss your Chapter 13 bankruptcy case. Now as a general rule, this is a terrible idea because you lose all of your bankruptcy protections. As soon as your case is dismissed, garnishments, foreclosures, and other collection activities can restart. However, some people absolutely must have new transportation or else they lose their jobs. In a base case scenario, the creditors will leave you alone long enough for you to buy another car and then you can refile later down the road if everyone comes piling on top of you again. The bottom line is if you need a new car and you’re in an active bankruptcy case, you need to call your attorney as soon as you can. Thank you.

And usually within about a week of receiving our letter, the sheriff is going to come out to your house and the sheriff is going to serve you what’s called a complaint. Usually these complaints are anywhere between 20 and 30 pages and all the details are going to be in that complaint. Who purchased the debt — A lot of people don’t realize this, but debts get bought and sold a lot by various creditor collection companies. For example, usually if somebody falls behind on credit card debt, typically about six months after they fall behind, the credit card company is going to sell that debt to a debt collector. The debt collector will usually buy it for 5 cents on the dollar. The way the debt collector makes money is they sue you and garnish you and they collect a hundred cents on the dollar. So it’s a very, very profitable industry.

So if you don’t recognize the name of the collection company, that’s probably why. Now, one way you might be able to connect the dots, if you don’t feel comfortable waiting a week for the sheriff to come serve you the complaint is, you can go to annualcreditreport.com and once a year you are entitled to download a free copy of your credit report. Well oftentimes, the name of the debt collection company will be on the credit report and oftentimes, it will show the original creditor as well. So that might help you make some sense of it.

Now, another objection that we often get is people will say, “Hey, this debt that you say I owe, it’s being taken care of by the debt settlement company. I’ve paying them this super high monthly payment for the past year. What’s going on here?” Well, I know this is very upsetting for a lot of people to learn, but there’s a lot of debt settlement companies out there that are complete crooks. They take your money and they don’t pay the creditor what they say they’re going to pay the creditor, and debt settlement companies cannot protect you from lawsuits. The creditors are not bound by this. So the collection companies just end up filing a lawsuit against you at some point and they’re going to try hard to collect. And it’s super important that you don’t ignore the problem because if you just ignore the problem, they’re going to get a default judgment against you. And with that default judgment, they’re either going to garnish 25% of your check until the debt’s paid. Or a lot of people don’t realize this as well, they can come after any checking account that has your name on it; any checking account with your name on it. They can clean out the account balance up to the amount of the debt to get their money. And they are vicious, rough and tough.

Chapter 13 and Chapter 7 stops all that. Chapter 13 and Chapter 7 gets you what’s called the automatic stay and what the automatic stay is, that’s the protection of the bankruptcy court. No one can sue you, no one can call you, no one can harass you. It’s a wonderful tool and that protection you will receive as soon as your case is filed. And anyone who violates the automatic stay gets in big trouble with the bankruptcy court. So take advantage of a free consultation. Give us a call – (770) 881-8449. So here’s how the process works. You give our office a call and during this consult we’re going to go over your income, your budget, your expenses, your assets, all of your debt. At the end of the appointment we’re going to answer all of your questions.

I want to emphasize this. If bankruptcy is not the best option for you, we’re going to tell you and we’re going to tell you why. Honesty is a core value of my law firm. Check out our reviews on Google and you can verify it for yourself. Step two, we will prepare a court filing for you. After this is prepared, we’re going to schedule a two-hour Zoom meeting with you, where from the safety and comfort of your home, you can go through the petition with us page by page. We can make sure that everything is 100% perfect and get you the best fresh start possible. Step three, we file your case and you usually will receive a notice of your hearing within two weeks. And another great thing is right now your court hearing is also over the phone. So believe it or not, you can actually file Chapter 13 and Chapter 7 from the comfort of your home and take care of the court hearing as well. So again, let us help you. It’s a no-brainer. Take advantage of a free consultation with us. Talk to an experienced bankruptcy attorney. Give us a call today – (770) 881-8449. Thank you.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly, and today is May the 25th, 2020 Memorial day. Today’s topic is, do I qualify for bankruptcy? This is probably one of the most common questions we get. The short answer is that almost everyone is going to qualify for some type of bankruptcy relief. But as we get into this, it’s important to understand the different types of bankruptcy. So the first one is one people are usually most interested in, that’s Chapter 7, where you wipe out all your debts. Many people like to refer to Chapter 7 as the fresh start provision or the bankruptcy code. To qualify for Chapter 7, you got to have no money left at the end of your budget after you pay all your monthly living expenses. In other words, at the end of every month, you are on zero. In addition, you got to pass what’s called the means test. To pass the means test, your family must have a monthly income that is lower than the average family of your size in your region as determined by the IRS. These numbers are updated every quarter. As of today, the means test limit for a family size of two, just to give you an example, in the North Georgia area, is $65,007 a year.

So in other words, let’s say you got a family size of two and you’re making a hundred grand a year. You are way over the limit of $65,007. You’re probably not going to qualify for a Chapter 7. However, there are some deductions we get; health insurance, child support, alimony. So some of the stuff may come into play. The bottom line is you need to meet with an attorney and you need to have an attorney who understands how the means test works to give you an idea of whether you qualify or not.

Now, if someone is a good bit over the limit, Chapter 13 is probably going to be the better option. Now let’s talk about Chapter 13. Chapter 13 is often referred to as the “catch your breath” provision of the bankruptcy code. In chapter 13, unsecured debt can be eliminated just like it can in Chapter 7, but it’s over a longer period of time. Chapter 13 is a great tool for catching up arrears on house payments, catching up past due car payments and stopping garnishments. So how much do you have to pay back in a Chapter 13? That’s largely going to depend on how far over the means test you are. Another thing we need to look at that I skipped over a little bit too fast is assets. If you’ve got an asset that’s worth a lot of money that I cannot protect with bankruptcy exemptions, then you don’t want to file Chapter 7 or they’re going to take it. So let me give you an example there.

Married couple can exempt $43,000 equity in a house. Let’s say you’ve got a $100,000 house that’s paid for. You don’t want to file Chapter 7. Do you qualify for Chapter 7? Could you do it? Yes, you could, but they’re going to sell your house, they’re going to pay your exemption amount, they’re going to take the difference and apply it towards your debts. So sometimes people in those situations will also try to make a Chapter 13 work, if at all possible. So again, back to the means test, you know, when you get to the end of the means test, there is a number and you take that number and you multiply it by 60, and that’s the amount you’re going to pay in a Chapter 13 to your unsecured creditors.

Is it possible to have too much debt to qualify for Chapter 7? And the answer is no. You can’t have too much debt and file a Chapter 7 or wipe it all out. The amount of debt is not an issue, but in the Chapter 13, it is an issue. So currently the debt limit for your unsecured debt, credit cards, medical bills, things like that in Chapter 13 is $419,275. The debt limit for secure debt is $1,257,850. Every three years, these debt limits are adjusted based on the consumer price index. Debtors who don’t qualify for a Chapter 13 must file either a Chapter 7 or a Chapter 11. Typically Chapter 11s are big business cases. It’s an entirely different type of practice. I focus on Chapter 13s and Chapter 7s. If you’re struggling with any debt issues, the obvious smart move is to take advantage of a free consultation and explore your options.

So how do you get ready for a consultation? Well, it’s a good idea if you can get your paycheck stubs for the last six months, so we can do the means test for you and give you an idea of where you stand in relation to the means test. It’s also helpful if you go to annualcreditreport.com and you can pull your credit report, you can download it in a PDF and email it to us and we can go through that with you as well. You do not have to come to our office right now to start a bankruptcy. We can do it over the phone. We can do it with Zoom and we use a program called DocuSign. You don’t even have to come to our office to get your bankruptcy case signed. We can do that virtually as well, and currently, as of today, they’re still doing all of the court hearings virtually, meaning you don’t even have to go to court. So you can start the case, review the case, file the case and do your court hearing all without ever leaving your home right now.

So if you’ve got any questions at all about bankruptcy, please give us a call at (770) 809-3099. Look forward to talking to you soon and please check out my main website, www.kellycanhelp.com and download a free book that I’ve written on Chapter 13 and Chapter 7. Just go to the homepage, scroll down to the bottom, fill out your email address and boom, we’ll get it to your inbox, and if you’d like a hard copy, you can call us as well. Again, that number is (770) 809-3099. We’ll send you a hard copy for free, as long as supplies last, and wish you the best. Thank you so much for tuning in today.

But the funny thing is, the people who I meet with, who seem to be most concerned about their credit are people who have already had their credit ruined by garnishments and judgments and I have a client – I’ve had potential clients out – I just can’t do it. I just can’t afford to wreck my credit and I’m looking at it at their credit report and I’m like, “you’ve got to be kidding me. Your score is 550, you have 10 judgments against you. You’re currently being garnished. They’re taking 25% of your income.” So I think what’s going on is a lot of people – it’s very common for people to make decisions that are just based on emotion. And when it comes to whether to file or not to file bankruptcy, emotion really has to go out the window and we’ve got to look at numbers and we’ve got to think logically here. So, if somebody is in a situation where they can avoid bankruptcy altogether and take care of their debts in a reasonable fashion, by all means do it.

But what if your house is at stake? What if they’re about to foreclose on you? No way should you delay filing. You’ve got to save your house. You can rebuild your credit back later. If your car’s about to get repossessed and you’re not going to be able to get back and forth to work, maybe you might even lose your job, file Chapter 13, save the car. There’s a lot — In Georgia, they can garnish up to 25% of your paycheck. I am shocked and stunned at how many people I see who will be garnished for years before they finally come in and meet with me. A lot of people think that some judgment’s just going to eventually disappear and just fall away and sometimes it does happen, but they can renew those judgments. It doesn’t cost much at all. And so, I’ve had clients come in and they’re like, “This debt is from 15 years ago, it can’t be legal.” Well, the reason it’s legal is because they got a judgment and they’ve been renewing it every single time it came up.

So, another common objection I get of why people just don’t want to file bankruptcy is because they’re worried they’re never going to be able to buy a new car. And it’s just not true. People buy cars all the time after they come out of Chapter 7 and Chapter 13. And the reason that someone can file a bankruptcy file a Chapter 7, 90 days later get a discharge and then go buy a new car, the reason people can do that is because their credit slate has been wiped clean. They’re starting over from scratch. The smart car companies know that you can only file a Chapter 7 once every eight years. So they’ve got eight years to potentially take it out of you. They’re smart. They know that. Some clients will come to me and say, “Look, Jeff, you’re telling me that this wrecks my credit? Well, how come my friend claims that they filed and they rebuild their credit so fast? What’s up with that?” Well, I think the best way to look at it is new start. I would never want to tell somebody, “Hey, we’re going to rebuild your credit by following Chapter 7.” I would rather say, “we’re going to get you a new start.” And for a lot of people, starting from zero is way better than having $50,000 of debt hanging over their head that’s never, ever, ever going to go away. If it doesn’t go away, you can’t reestablish credit. You can’t rebuild.

Can you buy a house after filing a Chapter 7? And I’ve seen many, many clients do it. In most cases it’s around two years. But the biggest thing to consider about buying a house, that most people don’t consider, it’s the down payment. You want to be able to put 10% down on your house. It helps with your interest rate. You’ve got equity built in right out of the gate, you’ll get a better interest rate overall. There’s just so many reasons. But Dave Ramsey who’s a financial expert, I’ve heard him say before, if you can’t afford to put 10% down on the house, there is a pretty good chance you can’t afford the house period. You don’t ever want to get into a zero down situation or – you see a lot of these signs on the side of the road where it’ll say, “Hey, just, you know, $5,000 down and we’ll get you into a $200,000 house.”

You’ve got to have cash to be able to fix air conditioners, roof leaks, you definitely have to have your emergency fund established. And if you’re skating into a house on bare zero, it potentially isn’t going to end well for you. Another objection I get a lot about, “Hey, I don’t want to file because I’m worried about my credit score. I’m worried about losing my credit cards because what am I going to do in case of an emergency?” And it’s stunning how many people rely on their credit card as their emergency fund. Your credit card is not your emergency fund. When things go south, when you lose your job, if creditor starts suing you, the very first thing that a credit card company is going to do is cut you off. And they can do that, even if you’ve got a zero balance. They can cut your credit off and they will, as soon as they smell that things have headed south for you.

The emergency fund, that is top priority. Personally, it’s just my personal opinion, but I think everybody needs about $5,000 cash in a emergency account, so that God forbid when you need new tires, when your engine falls out, you’ve got the emergency fund established. Emergency funds should be used for true emergencies only. Somebody’s birthday gift, that’s not an emergency. They’ll live if they don’t get a birthday gift. Same with Christmas, same with anniversary, whatever it is. The emergency fund has to be true, true, true, super, super important emergencies like getting in your car so you can maintain your job, keeping a roof over your head, doing emergency repairs on the house. Check out Dave Ramsey’s website. He’s got a lot of stuff about the emergency fund. That is where you need to go head toward and if you’ve got a big, huge monolithic pile of debt hanging over you, it’s impossible to establish emergency fund, especially if you’re being garnished and they’re taking 25% of your check or worse if they’ve got judgments and they’re completely cleaning out your checking account.

Chapter 13 and chapter seven is a great way to wipe out debt, get back on your feet and get a new start. It is a free consultation with my office. Give us a call at (770) 637-1756. Doesn’t cost you anything to sit down with us. We can go through your income, we can go through your budget and let’s see where you are and explore what your legal rights are. What are your options? It’s good to know and if you don’t want to come into the office, that’s fine. We are doing phone appointments and we are also doing appointments via Zoom. Right now, with this corona virus stuff going on, the court is allowing us to review your bankruptcy petition with you with programs like DocuSign and Zoom. We can go through it one page at a time virtually. So you can do your initial consultation with us from your home.

You can review your paperwork for the bankruptcy case, your petition from home. And even the court hearings now, you can do that from your home as well because currently they are doing them over the telephone. I’m not sure how much longer that’s going to last. I have a feeling that’s probably going to end once things get a lot safer out there. Most creditor attorneys are not fired up about people being able to not show up in court and have their hearing done remotely. But if you’ve got questions, any questions at all, again, call us (770) 637-1756. I’ve got a – my main website is www.kellycanhelp.com. I’ve written a book about Chapter 13 and Chapter 7, I’d love for you to get a free copy of it. You can scroll down to the bottom of the page, type in your email address, and boom, we will get it to your inbox. Thank you very much for tuning in, and if you’ve got any questions that you’d like for me to answer on a podcast, please send them to jeff@kellycanhelp.com. Thank you. Have a great day.

This feature of Chapter 13 is awesome and is particularly wonderful when you have an interest rate of 30% and we’re knocking it down to 6%. What a relief, right? But all this can go out the window, if you have an ex that was involved in the purchase of your car. If an ex is co-signed on the car with you, this is super problematic because if we try to lower the contract interest rate, the creditor will be able to sue the ex for the eliminated portion of the debt. As you can imagine, they will scream and holler to the hilltops. To protect any co-signer from being pursued by a creditor, we can take advantage of the co-sign and protection provision of the bankruptcy code as long as we pay the full contract amount in the Chapter 13 plan. Ugh! Can you imagine trying to pay 30% compound interest in the Chapter 13 plan? That makes the payments go up a lot. It could, in some cases, double somebody’s payments. So that stinks. It doesn’t matter who signed first or who signed second. People always want to point that out to me. “Well, I signed second and I didn’t sign first.” It doesn’t matter. If two people signed it, then two people who can get pursued for 100% of the debt by the creditor. A lot of times people will say, “Well, hey, this car or whatever, the divorce judge said that I had to pay it a 100%. So it’s all on me. It’s not on them.”

No, no, no, no. That doesn’t affect a creditor’s rights. That just means that your ex could sue you if you don’t indemnify them if that’s what the divorce judge ordered. A second, very common way than an ex sneaks on you in your Chapter 13 bankruptcy case, is income taxes. When you sign a joint tax return, you are jointly liable for the taxes. The most common case of this happening is when the ex is self-employed and some shady tax preparer, not a CPA, files the tax returns. I have seen Chapter 13 cases where we get the case filed and the client has a reasonable monthly payment amount. Then a few months later, after the case is filed, the Internal Revenue swoops down from nowhere and files a claim for a $100,000.

This could potentially increase the client’s Chapter 13 payment by an extra $1,793 per month. How can you avoid these nightmare exes from hell scenarios? And the answer, never sign a joint tax return and never co-sign for any person’s car and never ask anyone to co-sign for you. So when the car salesman says, “All you need to do is get your boyfriend or your girlfriend to sign with you and we have a deal.” Run away, run away, run away as fast as you can. If you’ve got any questions, send me an email jeff@kellycanhelp.com or check out my main website www.kellycanhelp.com or you can give us a call at (770) 881-8449. Thank you for tuning in. Have a great day.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly and in this podcast today I want to answer the question, how do you file Chapter 7 and still keep your stuff that you owe money on? And the answer is reaffirmation agreements. So let’s go through some hypotheticals. Let’s say you’ve got somebody, they’ve got a 2010 Honda Accord and they owe about $10,000 on it, payment’s about $350 a month. Interest rate is 12% and they also have $50,000 credit cards and then another $50,000 in medical. What’s going to happen? Well, in a Chapter 7 situation, assuming they qualify, the credit card debt is going to be wiped out, eliminated, gone. Medical debt’s going to be wiped out, eliminated, gone. Why? Because those are unsecured debts. Now, let’s talk about the car. What’s going to happen with that? Could the person in this hypothetical surrender the car to the creditor and wipe out the debt?

Absolutely they could, but if they want to keep it and they’re going to have to keep making the payments and they’re going to have to sign something called a reaffirmation agreement. A reaffirmation agreement is a contract between you and the creditor and basically it says this, “Hey Honda Accord creditor, I could wipe you out, but I’m going to give up all of my Chapter 7 rights and we’re going to treat this debt and treat this debt only as if we have never filed.” Now personally, I’ll be honest with you, I don’t like reaffirmation agreements; I’m extremely cautious about reaffirmation agreements. Once you sign that reaffirmation agreement, you have 60 days to change your mind if the car ends up being a clunker. But, the danger with reaffirmations is this: you can only file Chapter 7 once every eight years. So what happens if you sign a reaffirmation agreement on this car and couple years down the road, the car goes ca-plunk, but you still owe thousands of dollars on it.

Well guess what? You’re going to pay back thousands of dollars on it. You can only file Chapter 7 once every eight years. So you have to be extremely careful about signing a reaffirmation agreement. So for my clients, we’re going to grill you and we’re going to ask you over and over, are you sure you want to reaffirm this car? Are you positive you want to reaffirm this car? Now, what happens if you’ve got some outrageous interest rate, let’s say 35%. There is no way on planet earth we’re going to sign a reaffirmation agreement on that. That is a rip-off. You are just getting gouged. It would not be wise for you to sign a reaffirmation agreement on something like a super high-interest rate like that. Is it possible that a creditor will negotiate and bring the interest rate down? Normally I would tell you that that’s just never going to happen, but it actually did this past week. I did have a creditor that was amazingly reasonable and actually came down from 35% to 12% on this particular client’s car. Honestly, I was shocked. We routinely tell car creditors all the time, forget it, eat, steal, you’re going to have to take the car back because we’re not doing 35% and most of the time they do take it, but this creditor did not.

Now I want to talk about four wheelers for a little bit. Man, the four wheeler. Can you file Chapter 7, wipe out all your debts and keep your four wheeler? It depends; how much is that monthly payment? Is it super high? Is it super small? What’s the interest rate? I hate the idea of signing a reaffirmation agreement on a four wheeler. If the payment’s $200 a month for the next year, okay, maybe. If you owe $8,000 and interest rate is 35%, no way are we going to reaffirm the four wheeler. That is a rip off, but it really gets dicey when the four wheeler is your kid’s favorite toy on planet earth. And every now and then, not too often — I’m usually – unlike most law firms, you get to spend a lot of time with an attorney when you file Chapter 7 with us before the case is filed. Because we want to go through things like this. We want to talk through them, but I’ll be honest with you, sometimes we do talk it through and I’ll say, “Look, this four wheeler is a bad idea. You can’t do it. We’re not going to reaffirm this; $8,000 is too much; 35% is too much; $400 a month for the four wheeler payment, no way.” The client will agree, we sign the case, we get it filed, and then it comes time to give the four wheeler back to the creditor and the client says, “No, forget it. I can’t do it. I just – no, you got to reaffirm it.”

No, we’re not doing it. So that’s why it’s so important to spend time with your attorney and make sure everything is clear. Because there’s — I care about my clients. I don’t want them strapped with an $8,000 debt on a toy when we’re trying to focus on basic necessities and build up a savings so that we’ll never have to borrow again from anyone. I am all about financial freedom for my clients and signing a reaffirmation agreement, it kind of goes in the opposite direction, but hey, I get it. Sometimes the car payment is reasonable, the interest rate is reasonable and you have to have a way to get back and forth to work. But one more thing I want to throw in here is what if you do give the car back and your Chapter 7 finishes out about 90 days after you file, does this mean you’re never ever going to be able to get another car again?

Well, no it does not. In fact, most smart car companies will be happy to sell you a car once your case discharges. And here’s why. You don’t owe anyone after your Chapter 7 is discharged. So if you go buy a car, that car company is your one and only creditor and you can’t refile again for eight years. So when some car company tells you, “Hey, we’re going to do you a special favor by selling you this car.” B.S.! Their goal is to get you into the most expensive car they possibly can because they know they’ve got eight years to take it out of you. Got to be careful; extremely careful. Hey, if you get a chance, subscribe to my podcast here, or I want you to go to my main website, www.kellycanhelp.com and download this book that I wrote on Chapter 13 and Chapter 7. Go down to the bottom of the page, type in your name and your email address and boom, we will get that book to you in your inbox.

If you want a hard copy, call me (770) 881-8449. We’ll mail one to you while supplies last. Take advantage of a free consultation. If you’ve got questions on how the law applies to your specific situation – you can’t do the research on your own and figure this out. You need a qualified bankruptcy attorney to examine your situation. It is a free consult. This is a no brainer. Take advantage of it. Give us a call. Let’s go through your income. Let’s go through your budget. Let’s see if we can come up with a plan that works for you. Give us a call, (770) 881-8449. Thank you.

Hello, this is Georgia bankruptcy attorney Jeff Kelly, and the title of this podcast is Am I Going to Lose my Car if I File a Chapter 7? As of the recording date here, there are over 22 million unemployed people in this country due to no fault of their own. It is just a product of this Corona disaster. It’s expected by the end of April we might have over 40 million people unemployed. And a lot of people have questions about Chapter 7 and one of the most common ones I get as a bankruptcy attorney is am I going to lose my car? And the answer to that question is – almost all legal questions is, it depends. So let’s talk about why 99% of the people who file a Chapter 7, don’t lose their car. Well, let’s go through some hypotheticals. Let’s say you’ve got somebody, they have worked so hard, their car is paid for. Let’s say it’s worth about $5,000. They have tons of medical debt, tons of credit card debt. All that gets eliminated in a Chapter 7 and the car wouldn’t be a problem because in Georgia, there is a $5,000 exemption for cars. So that takes care of hypothetical number one. Let’s change it up a little bit. Hypothetical number two, let’s say the car is worth $10,000. You know what? It’s still not going to be a problem because we also have a $10,000 wildcard exemption. So actually you could bump the value up to $15,000, assuming we don’t have to use that wildcard exemption on other things. So as a general rule, that’s not going to be a problem either.

Now, let’s create a hypothetical just for kicks, where somebody would lose car. Let’s say that car is paid for and it’s worth $30,000. I think you’re going to have a problem filing a Chapter 7 trying to keep that car. Does that mean you have no options at all? Well, what if you owe a $100,000 in credit cards, what are we going to do? Well, are we going to have to pay back a $100,000 in credit cards? The answer, no, we’re not. What we would probably do in that situation is we’d file a Chapter 13 and we would have to pay back to the creditors the same amount of money they would get if you were to file Chapter 7. So let’s say the car’s worth 30,000 and let’s say I can exempt $15,000 of it. That’s going to leave $15,000 exposed equity. And so we could, in theory and I’m just trying to keep the numbers clean here. There’s other you could do here, but just for argument’s sake, we pay back $15,000 to the unsecured creditors in a three to five-year Chapter 13 plan. And we would keep the car in a Chapter 13.

Now if I did Chapter 7 though, let me give you — I want to tell you another story. I had this guy once, a few years back and he came in to meet with me to file Chapter 7. We spent about two hours going through his petition, making sure that it’s perfect. That’s what we do with every petition. I got to know him during that time, but he didn’t feel comfortable with me until the very, very end. He’s like, “I really feel like you’re a good guy. So I guess I might as well tell you.” I looked at him like, “Buddy, I’m your attorney. I’m on your side. You can tell me anything. It’s confidential and you better tell me because I can’t give you legal advice about something that you don’t ask me the question about. So what’s going on?” And he looked at me and he said, “Hey, they can’t take your car, can they?” I said, “Well, it depends. What are we talking about?”

Well, in his specific case, he was talking about a Corvette; a 1964, fully restored Corvette. And the reason he did not want to ask me about it is he was afraid of the answer that he would get. It was a car that he and his dad had worked on for years and restored. His dad had passed away and it was all he really had left of his dad. So can a Chapter 7 trustee take that car? That’s a very compelling story. It’s his last thing he has to remember his dad. Surely they’re not going to take it right? Wrong! All that matters is the value. And that thing was worth like $65,000.

So what did we do in his case? In his situation, there’s no way he could’ve made a Chapter 13 work. We didn’t file the case. I’m not sure how he handled his other debt or what went down. I don’t know if he ended up selling the car and paying some of the debts off. I don’t know, but honesty is a core value of my law firm. We are going to be honest with you. We’re going to shoot straight with you. We’re going to tell you what really will happen in court after we analyze your situation. If you’ve got any questions about how Chapter 7 applies to you, and I want to emphasize this. Don’t hear this podcast and don’t read stuff on the internet and make assumptions about your case.

If you want to know how the law applies to your specific case, take advantage of a free consultation and get free legal advice. It is a no brainer. It is the obvious smart choice. Give us a call – (770) 881-8449 and if you get a chance, check out my website, www.kellycanhelp.com. I’ve written a book on Chapter 13 and Chapter 7, and I would like for you to get a copy of it. So please go to my homepage and scroll down to the very bottom typing your email address and boom! We will get you a copy. If you would rather have a hard copy, give us a call and we’ll try to shoot one out in the mail to you.

Thank you very much for tuning in. Have a great day.

Hello this is bankruptcy attorney Jeff Kelly and Today is April the 24th 2020. Yesterday Bloomberg reported that major credit card companies are lowering credit limits because of this Corona outbreak. And what I want to talk about today in this podcast is why it is so important that you establish an emergency fund of cash for your family and not rely on a credit card to get you through rough times. I’ve heard many many clients say over the years that you know we’re that are filing Chapter 7 wiping out the debts we’re getting them a fresh start, and people will say I just cannot lose my credit card because I need the credit card.

In case of an emergency, and that is a wrong way of thinking, in my opinion. What you need is cash in case of an emergency. Because if you’re relying on a credit card to help get you through a rough time, what are you going to do when the credit card company cuts your limit off and you can no longer use it? Credit cards are not and should never be considered your emergency plan the sole basis of your emergency plan, you need cash. So as we’re going through this tough time here, there are 26 million people who are unemployed today through no fault of their own because of this Coronavirus quarantine.

So, what should a person do who has zero dollars in their emergency fund right now? Well, my advice is, as you do get your as you do get your hands on cash via unemployment payments or working part-time, whatever the sources save that money. I think an average family needs a minimum of about $5,000 in their savings account for an emergency fund. So does it make sense to pay credit card companies the minimum payments when you have no cash? It doesn’t make sense to drain your savings down to zero to make minimum payments on your credit cards? Absolutely not. That makes no sense. You’ve got to be able to have enough money for emergency food for your your utilities. So during this emergency time, food and utilities have to be number one. You’ve got to have money the setback for medicine for your family.

The next line of importance is going to be rent or your mortgage payments. Now, I talked to a lot of clients and honestly, most of us make, including myself, we make a lot of major financial decisions based on emotion. And when you are going through a tough time if you’re unemployed, you have got to throw emotion out the window because the math has to work. Math trumps everything. It makes no mathematical sense to take your desperately needed cash to pay towards debt that you’re most likely going to end up wiping out and eliminating. In a bankruptcy case. If things get bad enough, you have to eat, you have to pay the electricity, you’ve got to pay rent, you’ve got to pay mortgage if you’re getting into a city Were rent and mortgages are not getting paid and things are heading south, then you have to come up with a new plan. There’s got to be a backup plan. And I know a lot of people aren’t going to want to hear this. But, you know, I remember back in the 2008 crisis, I saw a lot of families living in one house, there were quite a few cases where there were three generations in one house. And I hope it doesn’t come to that I hope we have a a fast recovery and people are able to get back to work. But you know, worst comes to worse, we may be seeing a lot of that happen again. And we will get through it just like we got through the last crisis.

It’s very, very important that even as you deal with all this stress, and you know, dealing with the frustration, somehow you got to maintain a positive attitude, you got to stay positive, you got to keep your head up. We’ve got to march forward is the only way we’re going to get through it. And together we can. We are here to help.

If you would like to take advantage of a free consultation, we’ll be happy to talk to you go through your income and your budget and we’ll be more than happy to give you our two cents worth. You can call us at 770-881-8449. More thing I want to mention real quick. Also is community it is very important that you are not isolated as you’re going through a tough economic time. Reach out to family. Don’t if you’re suffering and the math isn’t working. You got to tell people you got to tell your family. You’re not supposed to go through tough times all by yourself. If you don’t have family close by, I advise people you know Reach out to your church. If you don’t have a church, find one, call one. Personally, I go to First Presbyterian, and downtown Rome. It’s a great church. pastors are a wonderful, fantastic resource for life wisdom, they, they help a lot of people get through tough times. And I strongly believe that as we go through this recovery, we’re going to have to lean on each other. We’re going to have to lean on family, we’re going to have to lean on, on churches. But whatever you do, don’t. Don’t be isolated.

If If you want to learn more about chapter 13 and chapter 7, I have written a book on it and I would like to get you a free copy. So go to my main website, www.kellycanhelp.com scroll down to the bottom. Type in your email address and we will get you a copy delivered to your inbox. If you prefer hardcopy. We’ll be happy to mail you one while supplies last. You can reach us at 770-881-8449. Thank you for tuning in today. Have a good one.

Here is a link to the article I refer to in this podcast.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly. And in this podcast, I would like to address a lot of fears that people have about losing their home during this Coronavirus pandemic. Let me just say this, I don’t believe there’s going to be a flood of foreclosures that are going to be caused by this. and I would like to explain why. Number one, the mortgage industry is not super interested in killing the United States real estate market, which is what would happen if every single person who missed a payment in April got foreclosed on. So from talking to clients and from talking to other bankruptcy attorneys, it’s my understanding, then in most cases, the mortgage companies are willing to defer up to about four months of payments. Now the problem and challenges at the end of those four months, they want their money back they want all those payments made. So I’m guessing that when we get to that point, after the pandemic is hopefully over or subsided, or maybe the quarantine will be modified to get most people back to work.

I believe that the mortgage industry is going to be doing a lot of loan modifications. Again, they there don’t want to kill the entire United States real estate industry, which they would do if they foreclosed on everyone. So I think there’s going to be a lot of loan modifications. But for those people who can’t get a loan modification, the people who are truly in a pickle, Chapter 13 might be a good option for catching up those urges.

So, I would like to talk about two different hypothetical here, hypothetical situations here, one where chapter 10 would be a good option and then to give you another illustration of where it would not be a good option.

So let’s start with a good one first. Let’s say you have somebody they’ve been out of work because of Corona. Six months goes by mortgage company is not bending the foreclosure process has started, and this person files chapter 13 because now they’re back at work. Now the key is they’re back at work, and so we can take the six month arrearages and we can spread it out, over, you know, up to a five year period.

Now, contrast that with a different situation. Let’s say somebody’s six months behind on work, and nobody in the household is working, there’s no source of income. Chapter 13 is not going to work to help save that house. You’ve got to have income in order to be able to pay back those arrears to save it. Now, when is it too late? When is the house gone? And the answer is if in Georgia after is illegally foreclosed.

So, I want to talk a little bit about the foreclosure process and how that works. In most cases, a mortgage company is going to send you a certified letter about six weeks before the foreclosure takes place. Under Georgia law, they have to advertise your house for four consecutive weeks before the foreclosure date. Foreclosures in Georgia typically take place on the first Tuesday of every month. So what that means is, for example, Today is April the 20th 2020. So what that means is, if they wanted to start the foreclosure process against you immediately, they’ve already missed advertising for the month of April. So foreclosure in May is out. So what would have to happen is they would advertise your house for the entire month of May, and then foreclose the first Tuesday of June.

If you’ve got any questions about your situation is chapter 13 a good option? Give us a Call at 770-881-8449. It’s a free consultation. It is a no brainer. It is smart to and it’s just the obvious smart choice to explore all of your options. If you get a chance, check out my website, www.kellycanhelp.com. We’ve got a lot of blog posts there. And also I’ve written a book on chapter 13 and chapter 7. And you can get a free copy, just go to my website, scroll down to the bottom, type in your email address and boom, we’ll get that delivered to you in your inbox.

Thank you so much for tuning in.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly and today is March the 4th 2020 and today I would like to talk to you about corona virus and bankruptcy. Now, when you first hear this title, you might be thinking to yourself, what in the world could Corona virus possibly have to do with bankruptcy? How could they be connected in any way, shape or form? And my answer is that our bankruptcy system will be crucial in assisting the citizens of our country in recovering from the economic fallout of the Corona virus. Over the past few weeks we have seen the Dow Industrial drop, about 12% and personally I think it’s going to drop a lot more. I am not a Financial Advisor. I am not giving financial advice to anybody, but I’m just telling it personally, I would not be shocked to see a drop to 16,000 before it’s over.

Now, if you go to my personal Facebook page, you will see actually that I did predict the massive drop right before it happened. And I think this Corona virus crisis is probably one of the most predictable that we have seen in our lifetime. And we have seen it coming and medical experts are saying that if you catch it, it can take as long as three weeks to fully recover. So, how’s that going to impact the average American worker? Well, most average people don’t get a lot of paid sick leave from work. So you know what’s going to happen to the average person that’s out of work for three weeks and they recover and they’re feeling good and then their spouse gets it. Or then, if they have children, a child gets it or an extended family gets it. And I think the bottom line is people are going to miss a lot of work and they are talking about shutting down schools, shutting down mass meetings. This is going to affect people; this is going to affect their jobs. And I do believe we are going to recover. We’re going to get through it. This is not the end of the world. The sky’s not falling. But a lot of people are going to miss mortgage payments and a lot of people are going to miss car payments.

So what happens when you miss mortgage payments and car payments? Well, typically in Georgia, you miss three mortgage payments and mortgage companies are going to start talking about foreclosing on you. The good news is they can’t do it over night. They’ve got to advertise your house in Georgia, in the newspaper for four consecutive weeks before the foreclosure date. So you do get notice; you do get time. Car payments, they can repossess your car if you’re two months behind and they don’t have to give you notice. They just show up in the middle of the night and grab it. But, the good news is that chapter 13 stops foreclosures and stops the car repossessions. We can pay the arrearages on a mortgage through the plan. We can pay a car through the plan. The other big issue that I think that we’re going to see, the other crisis is going to be medical bills. People that don’t have great insurance could be hit with ginormous bills because of this corona virus thing. If you have to go to the hospital for a week, that is expensive and if you don’t have insurance, Whoa. So banks are going to help a lot of people recover from that kind of thing. We can wipe out debt in chapter 13 the same way you can and in chapter 7. The difference is between 13 and seven is that there’s something we’re trying to pay for.

A lot of people like to refer to chapter 13 as the capture breath provision of the bankruptcy code. That’s for people who had gotten some money, they can make payments, they just can’t do it all tomorrow and they need more time. Contrast that with chapter 7. Chapter 7 is where you wipe out all of your debts and you get a new start. The other thing that I haven’t talked about yet is the quarantine idea. You could be perfectly healthy and take all the precautions in the world and not get corona virus and you could still be affected if there was a quarantine in your area and you’re not allowed to move; you’re not allowed to go to work. This is scary. I’m a little nervous about the whole thing, but, the bottom line is, we’re going to get through it and we’re going to have a great future for our country and we absolutely cannot, despair or give up hope.

We’re going to make it. And if there’s anybody out there who needs a free consultation with a bankruptcy attorney, you can reach me at 7708818449. We have office locations in Marietta, Kennesaw, Douglasville, Dalton, Cartersville, and Rome. I’ve got a website with some blog posts on there, kellycanhelp.com. I also have a podcast page, KellyBankruptcy.com, if you’re into podcasting. Again, if you’ve got any questions about bankruptcy, Chapter 13 or Chapter 7, please give me a call 7708818449. Thank you so much for tuning in.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly. And in this podcast I would like to talk about how getting a cheap divorce can set you up for a possible bankruptcy disaster. Okay, the first way that I often see it and it’s usually in almost every case, the wife that’s left with the children is so desperate to get rid of nasty, horrible husband, that she will agree to anything without a lawyer. She signs the papers and literally gives everything to him. I cannot believe how often I see this situation.

Go get an attorney. There are some attorneys who will defend mothers with children and they’ll collect all the attorneys fees from the the ex husband so it’s really tragic sometimes when I you know, I see Women with kids come in and there’s just not enough money to make the mortgage payment not enough money to cover electricity bills. In those situations, you know, honestly, bankruptcy doesn’t help if we’re in a house that you need to stay in and the future mortgage payments are too high. Maybe man, I hate it. And in most cases, it’s almost impossible to go back and undo a bad divorce. It’s much better to get an attorney from the beginning and avoid those rough situations. Another thing that I see that’s often very common is people will, you know, do the no fault divorce, no attorney and one spouse will sign their interest in the house over to the other spouse, and they’ll do it in the form of a quitclaim deed and they’ll date it and they’ll do all the stuff the directions tell them to do but the one thing that They forget or don’t know about is they don’t go and get it recorded in the local courthouse and the deed and the deed records. And that is a potential disaster. And I’ve seen it happen you know, sometimes the divorce order isn’t crystal clear who’s a word of the house. Somebody goes and files chapter seven and chapter seven trustees do what all chapter seven trustee do they search for assets, they do a land search and Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.

They find out that the person who’s in chapter seven has a half interest in a house with a lot of equity. And then, you know, when the other spouse pops up and says, Wait, I’ve got this quitclaim deed sitting right here in my hand. She signed it over to me long ago. Well, hey, you know what, if it’s never recorded, you’re going to have a big fight on your hands with the chapter seven trustee. total disaster and it’s a you know, the quitclaim deeds are a classic case of where being a cheapskate may save you a little bit of money in the short run, but can cost you big time in the long run. Another issue we often see come up in the divorce setting spills over into bank she is cosine lumps. And I it was so common for somebody to come in and meet with me and you know, we’ve got this viable case. But then we’re looking at you know, what is this cosine debt? What, what’s what’s going on here. And people most people who go through divorce think that if the divorce judge orders the other side to pay the cosine debt that relieves them of all civil liability, and that is absolutely not the case. Now, it is true that if the other side doesn’t They could get hauled back into divorce court for contempt for not paying it.

That is true. But that still doesn’t change your creditors right to go after both people who are co signed on the loan, doesn’t matter who’s first doesn’t matter who’s Second, the creditor gets to pick who’s the easiest target and that’s where they’re going to go after. Regardless of what the divorce order says they’re going to go after the easiest place to get the money. So kind of plain divorce and you’ve got a bunch of cosine debt, you need to make sure you understand everything before the order is finalised. Because maybe it might affect how you negotiate it might affect things you request. And a good divorce lawyer who’s trained and has experience can save you so much heartache in the future and keep you from getting set up for you know potential bankruptcy disaster. down the road.

Again, if that quitclaim deed is not recorded, it does. It might as well not even exist. It’s got to be recorded. And the best thing to do is get an attorney who knows what they’re doing to help you with that kind of thing. At my law office, we specialise in chapter 13 and chapter 7. I don’t do divorces at all. And I don’t do any real estate record stuff either. I know a lot of good Divorce Attorneys. If you need me to make a recommendation for you. I’d be happy to do that. But if you have debt hanging over your head and you need some help, give me a call at 770-881-8449 I’ve got office locations and Dalton, Dallas, Georgia, Douglasville Marietta cartersville Kennesaw and if you get a chance, check out my website www.Kellycanhelp.com got a lot of blog posts. They’re also got a podcast at Kellybankruptcy.com and give us a shout. We offer free consultations. And I look forward to talking to you. I’ve got a great team of lawyers here and a really awesome staff.

Thank you very much for tuning in.

Intro Speaker: It’s time for KellyCanHelp hosted by Jeff Kelly, Attorney at Law with the law office of Jeffrey B. Kelly. And now here’s Jeff Kelly.

Jeff Kelly: Okay, people on the radio show today I want to take this opportunity to interview a really awesome attorney. My associate, Will Harper. Mr. Harper, thank you for coming onto the show for this interview. All right,

Will Harper: thank you for having me. I know you had to go down the depth chart to get to me.

Jeff Kelly: Not true. Not true. Okay. So will you specialize in bankruptcy with me? How many years have you been practicing law?

Will Harper: I’ve been practicing law for a total of coming up on six and a half years here, actually. And of the six and a half years about four have been in bankruptcy.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. Excellent. Where did you go to law school?

Will Harper: I actually went to law school at the University of the Pacific in Sacramento, California.

Jeff Kelly: Now, why in the world did you pick California?

Will Harper: Well, I got waitlisted at the University of Georgia ended up not getting in. And I got into Georgia State, but I’m from the countryside and the idea of living in Atlanta for three years. Didn’t seem like a great idea to me. So I applied to other schools around the country. And figured if I got to spend three years somewhere, I might as well be near the redwoods.

Jeff Kelly: Now didn’t didn’t they give you an academic scholarship there as well?

Will Harper: Yeah, kinda. Yeah. That they. They’ve made it worth my while to go out there.

Jeff Kelly: That is impressive. I’m impressed. Yeah. Where’d you go? undergrad?

Will Harper: I went to undergrad right here in Rome, Georgia at Berry College.

Jeff Kelly: Awesome. Awesome. So when At what point in your life did you realize, hey, I want to be a lawyer.

Will Harper: Well, I started out at berry wanted to be a teacher. And I got all the way to the point where I was doing some student teaching or volunteer work at berry Elementary. And I quickly discovered that spending all day with children was a lot different than having your nieces and nephews for an hour or two. my nieces and nephews would misbehave. I can hand them right back to who that was responsible for him and say, No, no, I can’t do that when they’re when they’re there for eight hours. So I got to think and that was a philosophy major that nobody was going to pay me to philosophize. I tried that didn’t work. So I decided when I was 21, I was going to go to law school.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent. Excellent. I think I met you right about that time. You were over at seven hills church with Tyler.

Will Harper: That was right around that time.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. How about that? That’s been a while ago.

Will Harper: I had a I had actually, I had lost a bet and dyed my hair blonde, if you remember.

Jeff Kelly: That is funny. Yeah, you know, I think I do remember that. You dyed your hair blonde. So it’s definitely on here now.

Will Harper: Yeah. I don’t question it anymore. I’m just glad it’s there.

Jeff Kelly: That’s funny. How’d you like being out in California?

Will Harper: So the part of California I was in Northern California is not that different from it’s not like going to a huge city Sacramento is about the size of maybe Jacksonville, Florida. And it was, it was not as bad of a transition as it could have been. I didn’t go to LA that would have been a culture shock for Southern country boy.

Jeff Kelly: So where are you originally from?

Will Harper: I’m originally from a little town on set east of Athens on 78 called rail Georgia. It’s got one little Blinky light. It’s in Wilkes County. But I grew up in Athens after the age of 10.

Jeff Kelly: Excellent, excellent. That’s why you’re a diehard Georgia Bulldog fan.

Will Harper: You used to be didn’t you? And then

Jeff Kelly: you became a Christian and converted

Will Harper: orange looks good on you. I guess.

Jeff Kelly: It’s been a rough decade. I’ll admit it Actually no. More than a decade. It’s been a rough 15

Will Harper: that creamsicle complexion.

Jeff Kelly: It’s been rough man. It’s been rough. But yeah, all my family are diehard Georgia Bulldog fans so it’s a win win for me because if Georgia is playing well they’re happy so I can be happy for him and if George’s in the in the dumps then there they are hilarious with their disappointment, so then I can laugh at him.

Jeff Kelly: But yeah,

Will Harper: but for those who don’t know have quite the decade to get used to it like you

Jeff Kelly: will will like to give me a very hard time about being a Tennessee fan that he’s been known to even change my screensavers to ridicule My poor school. So you have a very cool story about how you met your wife, would you mind telling that story?

Will Harper: Sure, so I was a junior at Berry College, this would be 2009. And I was working for the chaplains office and chapel services, and here in the same dad gum prayer requests every single time. And I got to thinking, you know, if people would try to, like, help people and help answer these, we wouldn’t hear the same ones every time. So I tried to make it my goal for a period of time to answer what I could or help where I could. And one time at one of the services, one of my fellow workers, Dave Thomas stood up and said there was a freshman whose family was going to be evicted from their apartments, unless they were able to catch up in a few months rent. And it was, it wasn’t that much money, really, I think it was about $1500. And I got to thinking, I know, most people at the college if everybody gave like $5, we would easily surpass that. So I went door to door through the dorms, trying to raise money for it. I got most of the way there. And I went back to the chaplains office and said, hey, I’ve got enough money, I think we can help out. And I called the number and told the student, it was a young lady that she could come and pick up the money that we’d raised for. And when she got there, she was really, really beautiful. So I kept her phone number. And it turns out, she needed a ride to the bank to deposit the money into her family’s account. And I don’t remember if I had anything to do, but I quickly found some free time to accommodate that. And we stopped at Shane’s Rib Shack on the way back. And guess sort of the rest is history.

Jeff Kelly: And you married her. I love it, man. That’s an awesome story

Will Harper: did I did

Jeff Kelly: I love that

Will Harper: the what I learned from that is sometimes when you try to be a blessing, you can be blessed. We did long distance for two years. When I was in California, and she was still a very,

Jeff Kelly: yeah, yeah. Wow. And you made it. That’s awesome. That’s an awesome.

Will Harper: you know, well, I had this like I had this little romantic romantic notion about that. Because I was like, you know, in World War Two, all these American men went overseas to fight in that war and some for sometimes for two or three years and all these women waited on them. So long distance isn’t that difficult. And then later, I found out that my grandfather’s first fiance had married someone else when he was in the Pacific kind of shattered my entire.

Jeff Kelly: Oh No, yeah, you’re you’re kind of a for those of those who don’t know, well as a genealogical expert, he can really dig up some cool stuff. And in addition to being a great lawyer, and you like history as well, right? Who’s your favorite historical figure?

Will Harper: Ah, I sort of go through phases, where I like different areas of history. And if I had to pick the person I liked the most. It would be Hannibal Barca. And for those of you who are unfamiliar with that, Hannibal Barca was a general for Carthage and Carthage was the big rival of Rome way before Rome was the empire that most people think of. And the cool thing about Hannibal is by the time he was 27 years old, he had led an army all the way across the Alps. Back in those days, it didn’t have roads, it had to actually walk and killed one out of every four Roman male citizens. It was just unspeakably brilliant what he did by the time he was 27.

Jeff Kelly: You’re kidding. I did not by the time he was 27, he killed 25% of the Roman male population?

Will Harper: Yes, it caused actually demographic and manpower issues with Rome for over 100 years afterwards. He decimated the middle class.

Jeff Kelly: Wow. You know, I’m surprised nobody has made like a really good movie out of that because I love Roman history. And all my kids know that story of of Hannibal taking he took elephants over the Alps, in the middle of winter. is just crazy. You know, invading mainland Rome, guess all odds with elephants But yeah, I love

Will Harper: Georgia. Well, you know, we barely get out here in Georgia, we’d get barely any snow and we can’t even drive cars on the interstate.

Jeff Kelly: There. Can you imagine take an elephant’s over the Alps? It would I think it really would be an incredible movie. I mean, like, like, even carved roads into like rock to change the angle so they could get the elephants over. I mean, it’s just unbelievable story. But yeah, I’m with you on that. He’s a amazing historical figure. Yeah, I could go on forever talking about Hannibal interesting. Well, hey, when you’re not practicing law, what do you like to do for fun?

Will Harper: I’ve got three German Shepherds. And that’s sort of sort of a full time job in and of itself. I ended up getting a German Shepherd when I went out to California so that way, no matter what, I would have someone who would love me. And he is now 10 years old. And he managed to get himself bitten by a brown recluse spider of all things the other day.

Jeff Kelly: Oh, man.

Will Harper: But he decided after I married Dana, that he really didn’t like Dana, that’s my wife. So we got her her own German Shepherd. And then we ended up with a third one that was unexpected. Kind of like my, my adopted dog here, and he’s my teddy bear Gizmo.

Jeff Kelly: That one was my fault. Sorry. Excellent, excellent. Well, hey, before we go here, we’ll You know, a lot of times I’ll have clients come in. And and sometimes I’ll just think, man, if only you had not done that, shoot, like, for example, taking money out of a 401k and paying off credit card debt. Bad move. Can you think of anything off the top of your head that you’d like to warn clients don’t do this if you’re thinking about it?

Will Harper: Yes, title pawns to vehicles. That is unfortunately, the one of the most difficult debts to reorganize. Title pawns have a lot of special privileges under Georgia law. You are better off pawning your kidney pawning a toe. Just don’t pawn your car.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah, you know, I man, that’s a good one. I’m glad you brought that up. Because there’s a reason they’re against the law. And I think 37 states, it’s not legal. But for some reason, they are legal here in Georgia. And you’re right. I hate it when somebody has a title one and we can’t, we can’t help them in a chapter 13. I hate that.

Will Harper: One little, little known fact that big orange tea at the University of Tennessee, it’s because they actually pawn to the university and have it managed to pay it back yet.

Jeff Kelly: I knew you’d have to get a Tennessee joke in there somehow. I knew it had to go. Any any predictions for the college playoffs? What do you think?

Will Harper: You know, this this year has been so weird. The Pac 12 has played what four or five games Ohio State’s played four or five. I think whoever wins this is going to have a big asterisk next to it. But I’m anticipating Alabama versus Clemson for for the bragging rights.

Jeff Kelly: Yeah. Yeah. Excellent. Excellent. All right. Well, well, Hey, thanks for coming on the show today. And I look forward to getting this out to all of our future clients. And you have a good one. We’ll see you buddy.

Will Harper: Take care.

Jeff Kelly: Hello, this is Jeff Kelly. And in the next part of today’s show, I just want to give a few updates about chapter 13 and COVID. And I just want to emphasize to people, anybody out there who is considering filing and you’re worried about COVID we can actually do everything virtually right now, which means that you never have to come to the office. We can review your file. With you With a program called zoom, we can do a screen share. And we can have you sign the documents using a program called DocuSign. And even your court hearing right now Right now they’re all the court hearings are being done virtually as well. And it’s a lot more efficient than the old system. So you can actually get your case filed and attend your court hearing, without ever leaving your house.

Jeff Kelly: So what is chapter 13? Why would somebody want to file it? Well, Chapter 13 is a consolidation of all your debts while you’re in chapter 13. Nobody can sue you. Nobody can call you, nobody can harass you, you get full protection from the court. Chapter 13 is a great tool for stopping garnishments, stopping the foreclosure of your home, stopping the repossession of your car. So here’s how it can possibly work for you.

Jeff Kelly: Let’s sayyou owe six months on your house. And now the mortgage company is saying they’re going to foreclose. Well, Chapter 13 basically says stop or no foreclosure is going to take place here. Instead, we’re going to take this six months that we’re behind on and we’re going to pay them back over time. wonderful tool for stopping a foreclosure is a wonderful tool for somebody who’s been out of work. And now they’re back at work, they just can’t come up with all the money tomorrow. Same thing for a car, you know, if the cars about get about to get repossessed, because we’ve missed so many payments, but now we’re back at work now we would can make payments to the creditor just won’t work with us. Chapter 13 stops the repossession of your car. So it is a great, great, wonderful tool. And, you know, I want to talk real quick about some situations where it might not work. You know, if somebody’s unemployed, and they have no source of income, but they want to stop the foreclosure of their house. Chapter 13 is not going to help, there’s got to be enough income to cover future expenses. Plus pay that little extra to stop the foreclosure. So it’s not really a good tool for unemployed people, usually someone who has no income coming in and they they just need to clear the backs of all their debt. They’re going to file what’s called a chapter 7. And in a chapter 7, we just wipe out everything that’s gone.

Jeff Kelly: I’ve written a book on both chapter 13 and chapter 7. And if you go to my website, www.Kellycanhelp.com, you can download a free copy, we’ll email it to you. And we’ve got some a few hard copies here at the office left. So if you call and you you you’re like one we’ll give you a free one while supplies last.

Jeff Kelly: Another situation that unfortunately, it comes up a lot is you know, can we save a car that has a title pawn on it? And the answer is most of them? No. The reason is because your your title transfers to the title pawn company as soon as you miss your payment. So title pawns are awful, there’s a reason they are outlawed and banned in like 37 different states. I would encourage everybody don’t get a title pawn under any, any any circumstances at all, don’t do it. It’s just not a good idea.

Jeff Kelly: So, to recap, if you’ve got a foreclosure or if you’re facing a repossession, someone’s trying to garnish your wages, give us a call. It’s a free consultation. It doesn’t cost anything to talk to us. Very, very good idea to talk to an attorney to explore your options. Don’t go out and borrow against your 401k to try to get out of a tough spot your 401k is a protected asset. Nobody can touch it, it is protected from your creditors. If you are in a tough situation and you’re thinking about borrowing against your 401k to get out of it. Please come sit down with us first before you do it just to explore your options. never hurts to explore. Yes, so definitely, definitely take advantage of a free consultation know about your rights and download that FREE copy. Thank you guys so much for tuning in today. I want to wish everybody a wonderful Merry Christmas. And but if you need to reach out to set up your free consult, you can give us a call at 706-295-0030. Again, that phone number is 706-295-0030 and please check out my website www.Kellycanhelp.com and if you’d like podcasts. We’ve got some old radio episodes plus some additional materials. At www.Kellybankruptcy.com. Hope you guys have a good one. Thank you.

Jeff Kelly: Hello, this is Jeff Kelly. And in the next part of today’s show, I just want to get a few updates about chapter 13, and COVID. And I just want to emphasize to people, anybody out there who is considering filing and you’re worried about COVID, we can actually do everything virtually right now, which means that you never have to come to the office, we can review your file.

Jeff Kelly:: With you With a program called zoom, we can do a screen share. And we can have you sign the documents using a program called DocuSign. And even your court hearing right, right now they’re all the court hearings are being done virtually as well. And it’s a lot more efficient than the old system. So you can actually get your case filed and attend your court hearing without ever leaving your house. So what is chapter 13? Why would somebody want to file it? Well, Chapter 13 is a consolidation of all your debts while you’re in chapter 13. Nobody can sue you. Nobody can call you. Nobody can harass you, you get full protection from the court. Chapter 13 is a great tool for stopping garnishments, stopping the foreclosure of your home, stopping the repossession of your car. So here’s how it can possibly work for you. Let’s say you owe six months on your house. And now the mortgage company is saying they’re going to foreclose. Well, Chapter 13 basically says stop when No, no foreclosure is going to take place here. Instead, we’re going to take this six months that we’re behind on and we’re going to pay them back over time. wonderful tool for stopping a foreclosure is a wonderful tool for somebody who’s been out of work. And now they’re back at work, they just can’t come up with all the money tomorrow. Same thing for a car, you know, the cars about get about to get repossessed, because we’ve missed so many payments, but now we’re back at work now we would can make payments to the creditor just won’t work with us. Chapter 13 stops the repossession of your car. So it is a great, great, wonderful tool. And, you know, I want to talk real quick about some situations where it might not work. You know, if somebody is unemployed, and they have no source of income, but they want to stop the foreclosure of their house, Chapter 13 is not going to help there’s got to be enough income to cover future expenses. Plus pay that little extra to stop the foreclosure. So it’s not really a good tool for unemployed people, usually someone who has no income coming in and they they just need to clear the backs of all their debt. They’re gonna file what’s called a chapter 7. And in chapter 7, we just wipe out everything that’s gone.

Jeff Kelly: I’d written a book on both chapter 13 and chapter seven. And if you go to my website, www Kellycanhelp.com you can download a free copy, we’ll email it to you and we’ve got some a few hard copies here at the office left. So if you call and you you you’d like one we’ll give you a free one while supplies lasts.

Jeff Kelly: Another situation that unfortunately, it comes up a lot is you know, can we save a car that has a title pawn on it? And the answer is most of the time? No. The reason is because your your title transfers to the title pawn company as soon as you miss your payment. So title pawns are awful. There’s a reason they are outlawed and banned in like 37 different states. I would encourage everybody don’t get a title pawn under any, any any circumstances at all. Don’t do it. It’s just not a good idea.

Jeff Kelly: So, to recap, if you’ve got a foreclosure if you’re facing a repossession, someone’s trying to garnish your wages, give us a call. It’s a free consultation. It doesn’t cost anything to talk to us. Very, very good idea to talk to an attorney to explore your options. Don’t go out and borrow against your 401k to try to get out of a tough spot your 401k is a protected asset. Nobody can touch it, it is protected from your creditors. If you are in a tough situation and you’re thinking about borrowing against your 401k to get out of it, please come sit down with us first before you do it just to explore your options. never hurts to explore.

Jeff Kelly:: Yes, so definitely, definitely take advantage of a free consultation, know about your rights, and download that FREE copy. Thank you guys so much for tuning in today. I want to wish everybody have a wonderful Merry Christmas. And but if you need to reach out to set up your free console, you can give us a call at 706-295-0030 again, that phone number is 706-295-0030 and please check out my website www.Kellycanhelp.com and if you’d like podcasts. We’ve got some old radio episodes plus some additional materials at www.Kellybankruptcy.com. Hope you guys have a good one. Thank you.

Outro Speaker: you been listening to KellyCanHelp with Jeff Kelly reached out to the law office of Jeffrey B Kelly today by phone 706-295-0030 in Rome or visit Kellycanhelp.com.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly bankruptcy attorney. And today I’m going to talk about can you marry someone who is about to file bankruptcy? And the answer is absolutely not. It’s not legal. Just kidding, of course. Just kidding. Just kidding. Relax. I know marriage can be a super scary proposition. You’ve got in-laws on the other side. You’ve got new potentially new brother in law’s and sister-in-laws. And now you’ve got more pressure on Thanksgiving and Christmas, and on and on and on. And then what happens if you also find out oh my gosh, the love of my life is loaded down with tonnes of debt. What should we do? Well, I think the worst thing you can do is to try to talk them out of filing bankruptcy.

I think filing for bankruptcy might be the the best thing you can do to help get your marriage off to a nice fresh start, get rid of that stuff if you can. If you wait until after the wedding takes place, then the income of both spouses will count on the bankruptcy means test. So in other words, if you are a high-income earner, you could end up disqualifying your future spouse from being eligible to file bankruptcy if they need to, if you wait until after the wedding.

However,

if a person has high income, and they need to file bankruptcy, and the person they’re going to marry has no income in that particular case, it might make sense to wait until after the wedding is over. So the person who has no income will be counted as a member of the household in the Means Test. So in a case like this marriage might actually help Someone become eligible to file bankruptcy. Here are some debt issues I think you might want to consider before you get married.

For IRS purposes, if you sign a joint tax return after your marriage, you will be held liable for the joint tax debt. It doesn’t matter if if the other spouse is the one who generates all the taxes. If you sign the joint tax return, your assets are at risk. If you have a joint checking account, and you become married, and your spouse gets sued, and they get a judgment against them, a creditor can take that judgment and they can go after your joint checking account. So imagine you know what that’s like you’re you’re married, things are going great and all sudden Wham o the joint checking account gets completely cleaned out by Some random creditor that sued, not good for a marriage, not good, much better to take care of that stuff.

But for the wedding. Let’s say you buy a house together. And you know, again, some judgment from the past pops up. The judgment creditor can put a lien on your house, if they got a five a, it’s going to attach to the joint owner. Again, that kind of stuff is not good for marriage. Another thing you might want to consider, you know, before marriage is student loans, man, I hate to think of how many marriages have never taken place because of student loans. Side note, student loans should be dischargeable in bankruptcy, just like every other debt, but they’re not because Congress changed the rules back in the 90s. And they created a form of economic slavery by making student loans Non-dischargeable in bankruptcy. So you got to ask yourself how much student loan debt does my spouse? Oh, how many years is it going to take before they pay it off? Do they have a handle on this? Is there is it likely they’re going to be able to pay this amount of debt off? If not, and you’re looking at some astronomical amount today?

Well, compound interest is one of the greatest miracles of the world and it’s great when it’s working in your favor. But when it’s not, man, the the debt doubles, it triples it, you know, over decades quadruples. So again, these are very important things you should consider. I think the smart move is to meet with a qualified bankruptcy attorney before you get married if you have debt, concerns about a spouse, get a review of the entire situation. Naturally, you want to start your marriage off on on solid footing. So why not take advantage of our free consultation? It doesn’t cost you anything.

Come sit down with us. Let’s review everything. We know you can go to annualcreditreport.com you can pull a free credit report for yourself and one for your spouse. There’s also Credit Karma. We have office locations in Marietta, Kennesaw in Douglasville, Dalton, Cartersville, Dallas, Georgia and Rome, Georgia. Give us a call 770818449 it always helps to explore all your options.

Have a great day.

Good Morning!

This January 13th, 2020, This is Bankruptcy attorney Jeff Kelly and today I would like to speak with you about how the 11th Circuit has laid out a roadmap for the rules for Discharge Violations.

So, I want to start off here talking about the stupidity of banks. What kind of creditor is dumb enough to violate bankruptcy laws and send collection letters to a debtor after a debt has clearly been discharged? In a Chapter 13 bankruptcy, answer? Nation Star Mortgage.

In the case of Arlene Roth, she clearly intended to surrender her house under chapter 13 bankruptcy that was filled December 22nd 2010. Roth received a discharge on June 27th 2014. Nation star was notified of the discharged and they received many, many, many letters and they clearly knew about the discharge. About 4 months after entry of discharge, the bank started Roth monthly statements related to her mortgage.

Can you imagine the stress of going to 4 years of a bankruptcy case, fighting to make it work, pull it together, you do, you get your discharge and then? You start receiving collection letters.
I bet this was extremely stressful on miss Roth. Nation Star never foreclosed on the property during the entire time of her Chapter 13. Who is dumb enough to let a house sit for 4 years and rot? Answer?Nation Star Mortgage.

Roth’s attorney contacted Nation Star and was ignored. The statements kept coming. Roth then filed a motion of sanctions in bankruptcy court alleging the statements violated the section 25 24 of the bankruptcy code. She also alleged that there was a civil action that the bank violated the “fair debt collection practices act” and the “Florida consumer collection practices act”.

Nation Star made the very smart move and settled the case. After the litigation was resolved, the bank was dumb enough to send an informational statement. The statement contained the due date and instructions on how to pay Nation Star.

Roth then filed a 2nd civil suit against Nation Star. Another smart move. Nation star settled again. How can a bank be so dumb to send notices to a debtor in a case they settled for sending notices? Why does this happen? My theory is that bad computer programs run a lot of banks and that there’s no human being making the decision whether to send or not to send. That’s just my guess, I don’t have anything to back this up, it’s just a theory I have but if I’m right, that would make sense why people who have filed bankruptcy keep getting notices. And I suspect, again, that many banks have decided that it’s cheaper to just settle a few cases every now and then, than spend the money that it would take to revamp entire computer systems.

So, Roth filed another motion of bankruptcy court seeking sanctions for the 2nd violations but did not succeed on this one. The Court dismissed the motion finding that the statement was not an attempt to collect a debt. The District Court affirmed as did the 11th Circuit. If you would like to read this decision, go to my website Kellycanhelp.com and you can type in the 11th circuit lays out rules for discharge violations in the search bar and it should pull up under my blog.

So, what happened here?

Why did the Court decide this? Well, let’s start with section 5 24 A2. It states that the bankruptcy discharge “operates and injunction the commencement or continuation of an act to collect such debt.. Keyword here is “collect”. And in the Roth case, Judge Brandt found several reasons to conclude that the objective letter was not to collect. Court states, as an initial matter the disclaimer is printed in bold in the first page of the statement and declares it’s for informational purposes only and is not intended as an attempt to collect or assess or recover a discharged debt from you or as a demand for payment from any individual protected by the United States Bankruptcy code”.

Sections 5 24 A2 and 105 A authorize a court to impose several contempts saying sanctions for attempting to collect a discharged debt when there is no objectively reasonable basis for concluding that the creditors conduct might be lawful under the discharge order. C. Taggart V. Lorenzon.

That’s a 2019 supreme court decision.

A court may hold, in that case the court states and I quote: A court may hold creditor in civil contempt for violating a discharge order if there is no fair ground of doubt as to whether the order barred the creditors conduct. Hmmm, no fair ground of doubt, so that’s the new test? What should a person do when they keep receiving letters on debts that were discharged in their Bankruptcy case?

The answer to this question they must see the letter and get it reviewed by their bankruptcy attorney.

Ding ding ding..! Could be worse for somebody? Maybe, maybe not?
Is there a fair ground of doubt as to whether the order barred this creditors conduct?
Need to talk to your Bankruptcy attorney to find out.

If you’ve got any questions, if you want to sit down with me for a free consultation to review whether Chapter 13 or Chapter 7 might be a good option for you, give me a call at 770 8818 449. If you want more information about the bankruptcy process, feel free to go to my website I’ve got a free book on Chapter 13 and 7 we have office locations in Marietta, Kennesaw, Douglasville, Dalton Georgia, Dallas Georgia, Rome and Cartersville.

Thank you very much for Tuning in!
I appreciate you.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly Today is December the 7th 2019. And today I want to talk about automatic payments that come out of your bank account.

You know, I can understand why automatic payments sounds like a great idea. You don’t have to worry about it, just set it and forget it. But for somebody who who’s having debt problems, this is a terrible idea. And the reason why is because the creditors that are are going to push the hardest to get automatic payments coming out of your check are probably the ones that you’re not going to pay if you get into serious trouble. So, you know with things like your mortgage company, house payments, number one, but let me give you an example of one that you really don’t want to have automatic payments on. And that would be your second mortgage. If you get into serious trouble on your first mortgage, they’re going to foreclose on your house, okay? So, first mortgage top priority. Second mortgages, are they going to foreclose on your house? The answer is almost never. And the reason why is because in order for a second mortgage to foreclose on your house, they’ve got to pay the entire balance on the first mortgage first, before they can foreclose. So most situations, second mortgages, you know, we see some money owing maybe, you know, for example, $30,000 on a second mortgage, and $150,000 on the first, well, no bank in their right mind is ever going to spend $150,000 to try to recover 30 it’s just too much of a risk with respect to a house. I mean, there might be a rare situation where there’s just tons and tons of equity. It might make it attractive, but as a general rule, no.

Credit card payments, medical bills, don’t do this stuff on automatic payments, I’m against that. Also, you know, even with your first mortgage, when you’re writing out a check every month or having it sent directly by your bank, you’ve got a rock solid record of a check front and back showing exactly where that money went to. I really personally prefer those. I mean, that is like solid court evidence that just can be submitted on the face. So, as a general rule, when it when we’re talking about automatic payments, it’s really a bad idea.

Another thing, let’s say you, you have an automatic payment set up out of your checking account, and we file bankruptcy and we’re going to wipe this creditor out completely in the bankruptcy but they know your routing number and they know your account number.

Well, you know, technically, they’re not supposed to be yanking money out of your checking account after the bankruptcy cases filed and after you tell them to stop, but you know, what’s going to happen? They’re going to do it anyway. And are you going to spend, you know, 500 to $1,000, paying me or some other attorney to set up a special court hearing to try to get that money back? No, they’re not. They know that. So they’re just going to take it. So if you’re in a situation where you’ve got a ton of automatic payments coming out of your checking account every month and you’re about to file Chapter 13, or Chapter 7, you really need to get a brand new bank account before you file and I know what a nightmare it is to get a brand new bank account, but you gotta do  it anyway. Because you don’t want to get into a situation where you file you think you have everything lined up, and then doggone it right before your rent is due, or your mortgage is due or whatever, some creditor has access to your checking account and they yank money out.

It is so much better to if you’re going to be filing Chapter 13 or Chapter 7, have a bank account set up that nobody knows your routing number or your account number. So that that way, your case can just sell along so much more smoothly.

If you have any questions related to Chapter 13 or Chapter 7, and want to set up a free consultation with my office, just give us a shout at 706-295-0030. I’ve got office locations in Marietta, Kennesaw, Douglasville, Dallas, Georgia, Dalton, cartersville, and Rome. You can also check out my website www.kellycanhelp.com.

I’ve written a book on Chapter 13 and Chapter 7, and you can download a free copy of that from our website. Thank you very much. Have a great weekend.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly and Today is November 21 2019. And today I would like to talk about the topic of the bankruptcy means test. So what is the Means Test? Some people call it the median income test. Basically, this was like the main driver of when the bankruptcy laws were reformed way back in October 2005. I cannot believe it’s been that long ago, it seems like yesterday to me, but I remember that day. And the purpose was that, you know, Congress reformed the bankruptcy laws so that basically if you make more money than an average family of your size, then they don’t want you to be allowed to wipe out all of your debts in a chapter 7. They want you to file chapter 13. Now the philosophy is That there is closer scrutiny in a 13 as opposed to a chapter 7. I don’t know that’s necessarily true. I have found the chapter seven trustees to be just as anal and nitpicky as chapter 13 trustees.

I think they’re they both guard the gate very well. You’re not going to slide anything past a 13 trustee or a chapter 7 trustee. But that was a philosophy is there is this myth out there that all these people were making great incomes and filing chapter 7 when they shouldn’t have been and the poor old credit card companies that are ripping off America by charging 30% interest or more, it was just unfair to them. So they created this thing called the median income test. Now, what I tell all my clients is is this median income test is not a product of logic or sense. It is a product of Congress. So sometimes it makes absolutely no sense, but here’s the gist. The IRS keeps statistics on family sizes, and what’s the average income and how much a average family of a certain size needs for housing and food and clothing and things like that not all of this stuff is part of the median income test. And it’s very common to hear people who potentially need to file chapter 13 or chapter 7, they go online, and they find some online median income test and they plug in their numbers and they say, Oh, crap, I’m not going to be able to do anything. There’s no hope for me whatsoever and that’s totally wrong because they don’t know what they’re doing. The the meaning income test is complicated, the numbers change and so what’s funny is a lot of the numbers that you see online are outdated and you know, the median incomes go up.

As inflation goes up, the median income numbers go up and the IRS they update those at least every, you know, quarter every six months or so our software we have to get it updated to reflect these new numbers. So why not take advantage of a free consultation if you’re have debt issues, do not do not depend on something, you know, tests you found online, because there’s a good chance that it’s not going to be accurate.

It makes sense to come sit down with a bankruptcy attorney. It’s a free consultation if you live in metro Atlanta or anywhere in northwest Georgia. We’ll be happy to sit down with you and and go over it. So what would we need if you think you’re going to be over median income? What do we need? Well, We need to look at your income for the last six month period. Now when I say last six month period, I mean, not the current month, but the month prior and on back. So for example, today is November 21, so if you were filing with me today, I would not need to know the income for November. That’s not what’s going to count. It’s going to be May 1 through the end of October, that is the magic period and so we are going to need to look at your total gross income for that period, everything you earned. And we’re also going to need to know how much did your employer take out for taxes? How much did they take out for health insurance? How much did they take out for a 401k retirement plan? Do you have a 401k loan? And this is one that people typically miss when they’re filling out these online forms is child support.

Do you pay child support because that is deductible on the Means Test? It matters and You know, as much as I like to rag on the Means Test, I will say this, most of the time when it’s filled out accurately and the numbers are truly accurate, whatever number we get out is usually pretty fair. So let me dispel a myth here real quickly. If you think that you’re going to get the median income test and have some amount of data that’s going to be impossible to pay back. No, that’s not correct. If you’re getting an impossible number, you’ve probably put the numbers in incorrectly. So yeah, so we need to get the last six month period. We know what happens if you do get a positive number at the end of the Means Test.

What does that mean? So let me give you an example. Let’s say we do it and you have a number at the very end and it is a positive 500. Okay, so what that means is you’re going to take 500 and you’re going to multiply it by 60 months. That equals 30,000. So what that would mean is somebody with a positive number, they’re going to have to pay back $30,000 to their unsecured creditors in a chapter 13 plan, they’re not going to be able to do chapter seven. Now, what if they unsecured debt is only 15,000? Well, obviously, you’re only going to have to pay back the 15,000. But you’re going to be in a what’s called a 100% chapter 13 plan. Why on earth would you want to be in a 100% chapter 13 plan? Well, they can’t charge any more interest or late fees on unsecured debt. And when you’re talking about high numbers, man, you can save a lot of money even in a 100% chapter 13 plan. Let’s say you owe $100,000 in unsecured debt and credit cards, but the Means Test says you’re gonna have to pay back 30,000 in a chapter 13 plan well, that’s that’s all you’re going to have to pay back.

Assuming that we can make it work on schedule i and j. So There’s a lot of what ifs, there’s a lot of twist. There’s a lot of terms. Typically when a client asked me a question, you know, many times I will fishy facetiously answer. Yes, no kind of sort of not really, it depends. And there’s a lot of truth to that answer. There’s a lot of twists a lot of turns. Yes. If this know if that. The bottom line is, if you’ve got debt issues, you need to meet with a bankruptcy attorney. So call my office (770) 881-8449. I’ve got a free book on my website, www.kellycanhelp.com. Take a look at it. Again, if you got any questions, hopefully we’ll talk to you soon. Thank you Have a great day.

Transcript:

Hello this is bankruptcy attorney, Jeff Kelly, and today is September the 9th 2019 and to this podcast title is, “The Temptation of Title Pawns, Why You Should Resist.” Taking out a title pawn loan is as dangerous to your financial health as meth is to your physical health. There’s a reason that title pawn loans are illegal in 30 states, okay, I want that to sink in. They are illegal in 30 states. Why? Because they’re very, very bad for you.

The American Centers for Addiction states that meth is one of the most damaging and addicting drugs that a person can take. Similarly, taking out a title pawn loan for your car is extremely dangerous to your financial health.

Compound interest is great when it’s working in your favor. It’s made Warren Buffett, one of the richest men in the world. Warren Buffett states, “My wealth has come from a combination of living in America, some lucky genes, and compound interest.” Oh yes, it’s great when it works for you, but what happens when it’s working against you? Terrible, terrible things. When you get a title pawn loan, compound interest is working against you in a very, very bad way. 

Let’s talk about how these loans work. Let’s say you’ve got a car were $5,000 and then it’s completely paid off. Typically, I’ll see potential clients come in, and they’ll owe around $1,000 on this title pawn loan. Well, if they screw up and they let that title pawn loan expire, there’s a deadline when they got to make those payments and they, they miss the payments and violate the contract. Guess what happens? By operation of law, that title is going to transfer to the title pawn company, they own your car. It doesn’t matter the fact that you’re still driving it around, it doesn’t matter. They’ve got your title. They’re the owner of the vehicle. Very, very, very bad. The Georgia Department of law their Consumer Protection Division, states at the interest rate the title pawn company is allowed to charge is capped at 25% monthly, that’s 300% annually. For the first three months and 12.5% per month, that’s 150% annually. This means a combined maximum yearly interest rate of 187.5% interest. Oh my god! That is terrible!

So, what do you do? What should you do when you’re, you’re tempted to get a title pawn? Well, I think you really need to ask yourself, “Do I really need… fill in the blank?” I’ll hear clients come in and say, “Well, the reason I did it was, we were so behind on the four-wheeler and I just didn’t want my child to lose his toy.” Well, you know what, if the choice is your kid loses the four-wheeler, or you’re going to pawn the title to your car, forget about the four-wheeler. You can’t lose your car, people lose their car, they can’t get back and forth to work. I mean, that that is losing a car is one of the most disastrous things that can happen to somebody who’s dependent upon that to get back and forth to work. You can’t get back and forth to work. You are going to lose your job. When you lose your job it just cascades. And for a lot of people I’ve seen it start with a title bond. 

Personally, I think the best thing to do is, if you’re having financial troubles, take advantage of a free consultation and come talk to a bankruptcy attorney to review the entire situation. Not just one debt, but all the debts together. What does the big picture say? Again, if there’s any way you can avoid doing a title pawn loan, I would strongly, strongly urge you to avoid it. 

Now, bankruptcy attorneys absolutely hate title pawn loans. Because of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling in Ray Jonathan Northington. I’m going to cut corners and basically sum up the ruling, but the basic gist of it is, that a chapter 13 is not necessarily going to save you on your title pawn like it used to. In the past with somebody owed a bunch of money to a title pawn company, we would throw it into the Chapter 13 plan and spread that baby out over, as long as five years, and pay the title pawn company back at a reasonable interest rate (not contract of course). But Northington says, no sorry, bankruptcy does not enable you to modify the title pawn rights because the title transfers under state law automatically. Without any hearings, if you don’t pay your title pawn, that title is going to transfer. So, at best, when you file chapter 13, you’ve got 60 days to pay off the entire balance on that loan. If we can’t come up with a plan that does that the title pawn company can come get the car. Now, you know, you’re taking a chance but sometimes the title pawn company will allow a claim to be paid through the chapter 13 plan but, that’s their choice, they don’t have to do that if they don’t want to. 

So, the best thing to do is just avoid getting a title pawn loan altogether. But if you would like to schedule a free consultation with me, please give me a call 7708818449, I’d be happy to sit down and talk to you, if you live in the state of Georgia, about your options, thank you very much. Have a great evening.

Hello, this is bankruptcy attorney Jeff Kelly, and today is August the 27th 2019. Today I’m going to talk about how fast you can file a bankruptcy case. Now, the short answer to this question is that in most cases, we can file a bankruptcy case in about three hours, if the bankruptcy attorney has a prepared client, sitting live in the office in front of them. Now, I’ve been practicing for over 21 years, I’ve got seven offices, five attorneys and about 20 staff members. If there is any law firm on planet Earth, that can move at the speed of light to file a consumer bankruptcy case, it is us. We’ve got the people power, and we’ve got the software to get the job done. 

However, the question behind the question is this. Do you really need to file a bankruptcy fast? Is it really an emergency? I’ll be honest with you, I hate filing emergency bankruptcy cases. Let me tell you why. My goal as a bankruptcy attorney is to do a fabulous job for all of my clients, for them to feel very good about what we do, to feel good about the results that we achieve, and then to go out and send all of their friends and family to us and help make my business even stronger. When you file an emergency case, I think you’re more likely to hit bumps. It’s really good to take time to think about these options to make sure you feel good about filing and that there’s no regrets after your file. So, I like to explore and sit down with somebody go through their income, go through their budget, go through all of their assets, and look for anything that might possibly blow up their case. I get it that when a creditor is coming down on you like a ton of bricks, there’s pressure, and you want the pressure to stop. A lot of people come to the office, and they think they’ve got to get a case number immediately. And the real truth is, they don’t. You know, here’s the most classic example is that a creditor is calling people on the phone, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, saying I’m suing you, I’m suing you, I’m going to take away everything you own, and people are people are like, “My gosh, I’ve got to do something right now!” Well, the truth is, in the state of Georgia, when somebody does file a lawsuit against you, you’ve got 30 days to respond. So it’s not like they can do anything to you tomorrow, or even the next day. You do have time to think about things. And it’s a really good thing to contemplate your options before you pull the trigger on a bankruptcy case.

Let me give you an example of somebody who could make a really huge, ginormous mistake by filing a chapter 7, and that is somebody with a significant amount of equity in their house. Now, under Georgia law, a married couple can exempt a maximum of $43,000 in equity, and a single person can exempt a maximum of 21,500. Now, here we are in 2019 and real estate values have been shooting through the roof and sometimes a lot faster and a lot higher than the owners of these houses realize. So it is possible that you could file a Chapter 7 case and think your house is worth $150,000 and Doggone it, it’s really worth 200, that would be a disaster for anyone because when you get into a chapter 7 situation, you can’t quit the case, if you don’t like the way that things are going, you are stuck. The chapter 7 trustee, if he or she moved to sell your house, they’re going to sell your house. Now you could convert to a chapter 13 to pay all your debts back to keep them from doing that, but that that’s a whole another story. The bottom line is you’re not going to be able to just quit and walk away from the problem that you’ve created by filing chapter 7 without truly looking at the value. 

Now, some people might say, “Well, wait, wait, wait, I’ve got an appraisal. And this appraisal is only a year old. And it says the house is worth x. So go away chapter 7 trustee, you can’t touch me.” Right? Wrong. Chapter 7 trustees have friends in the real estate business. And these friends in the real estate business make money by selling your house. So, if you have a real estate agent that looks at your house, and they think they can sell it for X amount of dollars, and they go find a buyer, that’s the key. And that’s all that matters. If they find a buyer, someone who’s willing to plunk down money, that’s greater than the amount you owe on the house and the amount of equity you can protect, they are going to take your house and they can.So you’ve got to be careful. If you’re filing a chapter 7 and you have a house and you’re on the borderline, as far as equity goes are thinking might be close to it. You really have to have a Clint Eastwood attitude of that, go ahead, make my day, sell my house, I dare you. Now with a chapter 13. If you’re filing an emergency chapter 13 and you don’t like the way things are going in almost every case, you have almost absolute right to just quit the case. But again, this is not to be taken lightly. The way a chapter 13 or chapter 7 case should work (in the ideal situation) is there should be a strong feeling of relief that you hadn’t been pushed into it, that you’ve made this decision, that you feel good about it, about wiping out the credit card debt, about stopping a foreclosure or stopping and garnishments, that you did what needed to be done to take care of the problem. 

And if you’ve got any questions at all, if you would like to sit down with us to review your situation, give us a call at 770-881-8449 we have offices located in Marietta, Kennesaw, Douglasville, Dalton, Carterville, Rome, and Dallas Georgia. I’ve got a lot of blog post on my main website, www.kellycanhelp.com give us a call and we look forward to seeing you soon. Thank you.

Book.

Transcript:

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly and Today is July 1^st, 2019. Today I want to talk about, “is it a sin to file bankruptcy?” We actually got this question from a potential client this past week. I’ve been a bankruptcy attorney for, gosh, over 21 years now. So, do I believe that is a sin to file bankruptcy? Absolutely not. Of course, it’s not. What a lot of people are really shocked to find out is that our entire bankruptcy system was actually inspired by the Bible. If you don’t believe me, go check it out yourself. Deuteronomy chapter 15 talks about this thing called the Jubilee where all the debts got wiped out every seven years. 

Now personally, I believe that God did not want Israel to be a nation of economic slaves. So, there is a safety valve here called the Jubilee. Well, this country was founded by people who did read the Bible and I believe they were inspired to create a bankruptcy system. And they believed in it so strongly that it’s actually written into the United States Constitution. It’s been there since the beginning, because these guys did not want to have a nation of economic slaves. And it makes sense. If you’re going to allow people to charge high interest rates, or if we’re going to allow interest to be charged at all. You got to have a safety valve and that safety valve is the bankruptcy system. Now, a lot of people who complain and moan and groan about our bankruptcy system have no clue how it actually works. They think it’s just some magic wand that somebody just waves or a button they press, and all their debt just magically goes away. Well, that Not the case. Okay. The bankruptcy system is, there’s a lot of checks and balances in this. When someone files bankruptcy, you have to produce your tax return to the trustee for them to verify your income. You also have to produce paycheck stubs showing how much you make, you have to sign court documents listing all of your assets, the value and the debts before you can get a discharge of your debts in bankruptcy. And if somebody has, you know, this huge, ginormous house, and they it’s worth a ton of money are they going to be able to file bankruptcy and wipe out their debts? Well, of course not. In Georgia, the maximum for a married couple, it’s $43,000 of equity. If somebody has more than that they’re not going to be able to wipe it out. So it is a good system because there are checks, there are balances. 

And another point that I want to stress is If we didn’t have a bankruptcy system, what would this country look like? Well, first of all, people would not borrow money, people wouldn’t be willing to take risks to buy houses and business and so forth. That would be very, very bad for this economy. But also, for the for the few who did and got in trouble, their economic lives would be over and that would ruin their productivity forever, and this could potentially be detrimental. Look at our nation’s history and you will see that Abraham Lincoln had to file bankruptcy. Now, had he not been able to who knows what would have happened? Maybe he never would have been president and that would have been terrible. Henry Ford, the first Ford Motor Company did not make it. The second one did. Thank God he was able to recover and get a new Start. Look what happened from the second Ford Motor Company. The assembly line didn’t just revolutionize the auto industry, it revolutionized every industry and it revolutionize the world. What a great thing that came for this country because we have a bankruptcy system. Walt Disney, first Disney Company didn’t make it. Mickey Mouse was not his first creation. Thank God he was able to recover and get a new start. He started a new company he recovered is very successful, and today, it employs millions of people across the world. The whole world benefited. You know, in more recent times, there’s been some sport figures who’ve had to file such as Evander Holyfield, Kim Basinger, and Nicolas Cage. Thank goodness we live in a country where people don’t just get thrown away and they are given a second chance. And, you know, I find it very ironic, that some of the most vocal, visceral opponents, of having even having a bankruptcy system are evangelical Christians. That really surprises me a lot. Because when you look at evangelical Christian doctrine, basically what it says is that every person who was born is spiritually bankrupt, that everyone is born with this sin nature, and that there is no way that the debt for sin could possibly be paid ever without the grace and payment of Jesus Christ. So, it just boggles my mind that people who claim to have received this grace, want to show no grace, or no mercy to people who get stuck in bad times. Is it somebody’s fault when their spouse just skipped town and, leaves with a pile of debt and this household used to have two incomes, and now they only have one? Does that make them a sinner or a bad person? No, that’s ridiculous. What about somebody gets cancer, and they have a ton of bills. Man, that just makes me mad that somebody would point their finger and say, “Well, that’s just a sin. It’s just immoral for them to file bankruptcy.” Ah, makes my blood boil. Now, what about those verses in the Bible that say pay your bills, blah, blah, blah? Well, yeah, if you’ve got money to pay your bills, and the money is in your account, then sure it would be wrong to not pay them. And honestly, did you know that a lot of people who do file chapter 13 pay all of their debt? What happens is sometimes people get in trouble, they become unemployed, and they’re three, four months behind on the mortgage payment and the mortgage company wants to foreclose on them. Chapter 13 allows those types of people to say, “Stop! You’re not going to be able to foreclose, we’re going to take this debt and we’re going to stretch it out, maybe three years, maybe five years, but we’re going to help this person get back on their feet and they and they’re going to pay their debt.” Bankruptcy can be a good option for a lot of people and if you are interested in talking about it, give me a call 7708818449, or check out my website, www. kellycanhelp.com. I’ve written a book on chapter 13 and chapter 7, and you can download it for free. Thank you so much for listening and have a great day.

Transcript:

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly. It is May the 10th 2019 and today I want to do a quick podcast here on “why am I getting so many advertisement letters from bankruptcy attorneys”. 

So, the number one reason that you’re getting so many letters from bankruptcy attorneys is because you’re being sued in your local court. My law firm, and most bankruptcy law firms, do a lot of direct mail marketing. If a creditor sues you in your local court, that’s public record, and we get access to that and we send out letters to let you know that we can help you. And my law firm, we offer a free consultation for anybody wants to come in and go over their income and their budget and see if we can come up with a plan to deal with whatever the situation is. I would encourage anyone who thinks they are about to be garnished to give us a call at 7708818449 to see put a stop to it because you don’t want to ignore the problem. Ignoring the problem is the absolute worst thing you can do. 

Here’s what’s going to happen. Usually after you start getting those advertisements pretty soon the sheriff is going to come out. And the sheriff is going to serve you with some papers. And on these court papers it’s going to have the name of the creditor that’s suing you, and maybe somebody that you don’t recognize. But if you if you read closely, you’ll see in there that the creditor that you don’t recognize probably bought the debt from somebody that you do recognize, and there will be a description in there. There’s the name of the attorney who filed the lawsuit, their phone number, and all this stuff is important information. 

Now, if you fail to take any action at all, what could happen is a garnishment could end up coming out of your paycheck. And Georgia is brutal when it comes to garnishments. In the state of Georgia, you can take 25% of a person’s paycheck. That’s a lot of money. So, for example, let’s say you make $2,000 a month, a creditor is going to be able to take 25% of that. That’s $500. That can be really tough paying rent and putting food on the table when somebody takes that big of a chunk out of your paycheck. So, don’t let that happen. But the other thing they can do, they can also garnish your checking account. And that’s even more brutal, because they’re not limited on how much they can take out of your checking account. They can take the full debt straight out of your account. We’ve seen people before where their entire checking account is just gone. Again, that’s a huge disaster. 

Now, a lot of people ask, “When is it too late to file?” The answer is it’s never too late. Give us a call as soon as you can. And let’s see if we can put a stop to it. Let’s see what we can do. Again, that phone number 7708818449. And it is Jeff Kelly. We’ve got offices located in Douglasville, Marietta, Kennesaw, Dalton, Rome, Cartersville, and in Dallas, Georgia. I’ve got a I’ve got a great staff. We’ve got good reviews online, check us out at www.kellycanhelp.com. Thank you.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly and today I would like to talk to you about stopping a car repossession in Georgia. Whenever you file a Chapter 13, your creditor is barred from repossessing your car. If you file a Chapter 13 bankruptcy, your your car is protected by what’s called the automatic state. Now, just last week, I was meeting with a client who said, Hey, I, you know, I can’t file on my car, because I signed a contract that said that I can’t file bankruptcy on it.

Well, here’s the truth about that situation. Number one, you cannot sign away your constitutional rights. So it really doesn’t matter what your contract says. If you file chapter 13, your car is protected. Secondly, whenever you file any type of bankruptcy case, you have to list all of your dads and all of your assets. So you cannot pick and choose which ones you’re going to listen Lift everything. And we again, we do not need the permission of the car company to protect your car. Now, it’s very important that you get a case number before that car is repossessed if you got a bankruptcy case number, and they come and repossess your car anyway, the car company is setting themselves up to get sued. Your bankruptcy attorney can file what’s called an adversary and car company can end up having to pay damages. Now, let’s say you’re in a situation where your car has already been repossessed.

Well, if you live in Georgia, you really need to go see a bankruptcy attorney as fast as you can. Because typically you’ve got about 10 days to get it back. Now in Georgia, for your car creditor to be able to sue you for any type of a deficiency. They’re going to have to send you what’s called the 10 day letter. And in this letter is going to Say, Hey, we’re going to auction this car off on this date. And after that, we’re going to sue you for the difference. So typically, when a car gets repossessed, the creditor is going to hang on to it for 10 days. So they will be able to set themselves up so they can come after you later. So if the car creditor is still in possession of the car, and you file and get a bankruptcy case number, then you’re going to be able to get the car back. Now, you know, sometimes we have issues with these little by here pay hears and they say no, no, you know, I read somewhere that I don’t have to get the car back because I got it before you filed well. That’s not true. They’re still gonna have to get the car back.

So we’ve had situations before where, you know, we’ve heard this from buy here, pay here, and then the car creditor says, I don’t have an attorney. I don’t want an attorney and I don’t care what you say I’m not going to do anything. You don’t get the car back. So we found the adversary, well, you know, then we call him up and say, Look, we’ve got a lawsuit now what are you going to do about it? You know, you need to get the car back and the guy says, Well,

I’m still not getting the car back. I don’t care what you say. Well, the next step after that is, we’re going to call the judge and see if we can get it set down for an emergency hearing. Because in that particular case, my client needed the car to get back and forth to work and she was going to lose her job and putting the car back. Well, guess what? judge sat down for an emergency hearing two days later. And, you know, judges get really upset having to do emergency hearings. And so, you know, this car creditor was really setting himself up to get severely penalised by the bankruptcy judge. Fortunately for him, he immediately gave the car back. So, again, if you’ve had a car repossessed Your case has been filed, you’ve got damages.

If a car has been repossessed, and you don’t have a bankruptcy case number, you need to get in there to see a bankruptcy attorney as soon as you can. Now, if the car creditor has repossess the vehicle and sold it before you filed, you’re not going to be it’s gone even if you fall maybe after that, but they would never the car company would never be able to sue you for any type of deficiency in the state of Georgia. Because they’re supposed to give you that 10 day letter. And that usually almost never happens. But you know, some of these crazy Buy Here Pay hers, they might repossess the car one day, sell it the next. And if there’s no bankruptcy case number, we got a problem if there was a bankruptcy case number, they’re in violation of the automatic state. All right, if you have any more questions, please check out my website, www.Kellycanhelp.com I’ve got over 200 articles about bankruptcy, and I am required to read this little disclaimer here.

Nothing on my podcast or my website constitutes legal advice. If you want legal advice you need to go see a bankruptcy attorney. No attorney client relationship exists until we have a written contract. We are a debt relief agency and we help people obtain relief from their creditors by filing for bankruptcy. wish the best of luck. Thank you.

Have a great day.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly and tonight I’m going to talk to you about chapter 7. What is it? And how in the world can it help you? Many people like to refer to chapter 7 as the Fresh Start provision of the bankruptcy code, because it basically allows you to wipe out all of your debt and get a fresh start. And a chapter 7, what we do is we want to show the court that you were unable, based on your budget to pay the debt that currently hangs over you.

Approximately 90 days after we file your chapter 7, you’re going to be granted a discharge, which means that you’re no longer liable for that debt. Usually, one of the first questions I get is how much is this going to cost and the total charge for filing a chapter 13 in my office right now is 1400 dollars. This cost includes your filing fee, the attorney’s fees, but in both your classes that are required by the bankruptcy code. Well, chapter 7 may be simple in theory, there’s a lot of different factors to consider.

For example, not every kind of debt can be discharged. And chapter 7 debts that arise from drunk driving, or you know, some type of intentional action, it’s not gonna get discharged student loans, child support, post petition homeowners associations, fees post petition timeshare fees and tax debts that are less than three year olds, three years old are not going to be discharged. Also, if you have a secured debt that you know, that’s tied to collateral, like a car note or you know, house and, you know, you’re going to have to reaffirm that debt if you want to keep that property, okay? Now, what is a reaffirmation agreement? That’s a contract when you when the creditor basically says this, hey, even though I’ve listed this car in here, I’m going to give up my rights. And we’re going to treat the debt for this car as if we’ve never filed So in other words, you keep making your car payments. You keep making your house payments.

Does a creditor have to let you reaffirm the debt? No, there’s nothing to back code that requires them to do so. But they’re crazy if they don’t. The reason they’re crazy is because when you reaffirm the debt, you are liable for the whole thing. And you can’t file bankruptcy again for eight years. So if something goes wrong with that car, for example, it turns out to be a lemon A few months later, you’re on the hook for the entire amount. Furthermore, if if they’re going to repossess your car, you know, shortly after you reaffirm it, you know, then they get to sue you for the difference. Whereas if they say no, all they get is the car. Okay. Will the chapter 7 trustee kind of my house, if I file bankruptcy? The answer that question is no. What about 99.99% of the cases? I’ve been doing this for 14 years. I’ve never seen a case where the trustee went to somebody’s house. Now I have heard of situations where somebody was a very you know somebody that made a lot of money a former doctor Maybe a former executive that had you know, hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of stuff in their house?

Well, yeah, the trustee is going to show up for that. But for the average person, no, it’s just not going to happen. Another common question we get is, when would it be better for us to file chapter 13? Well, if you’ve got a car that you’ve owned for more than two and a half years, and you have more than the cars worth, you need to take a look at chapter 13. Because in a chapter 13, you can cram down that car What that means is you would pay back not the total amount of debt of the car but instead you would pay back the value of the car. Furthermore, in a chapter 13, the interest rate right now in the Northern District of Georgia is typically around 5%. I’ve seen some clients come in and you know, they got these loans, car loans, these buy here, pay here, lots and the debt, the interest rate could be anywhere between 25 and 30%. Also, if you have two mortgages, you may want to consider looking at chapter 13, because in a chapter 13 you Some situations, you can eliminate the second mortgage in its entirety. I’ll try to do a blog post on that later. Another important thing to consider, you know, if you look at chapter 7 is a means test. If you make less than an average household, family of your size, we’re not gonna have a problem. If you make more, we’re going to need to look at your total income very closely. We’re going to need to look at you know, how much are your deductions for taxes?

How much are your deductions for health insurance? How much are you deducting for 401k? You know, do you pay in type of babysitting on a regular basis or daycare is another good one. Do you have a charitable donation like a tie or something like that all those things we can deduct? So if you have any questions, please give my office a call at 706-295-0030 and we can set up an appointment to sit down and discuss your situation.

Thank you very much.

Hello, my name is Jeff Kelly. I’m a bankruptcy attorney from Rome, Georgia. I’ve been practicing consumer bankruptcy for approximately 14 years. I’ve got office located. My main office is located in Rome, Georgia. I’ve got satellite offices located in Dalton, Cartersville in Dallas, Georgia as well.

What I’d like to do in this podcast is talk about chapter 13. What is it? And how could it possibly help you? Many people like to refer to chapter 13 bankruptcy as the catch your breath provision of the code is designed for people who have money to pay back their creditors but who just can’t do it all tomorrow, like the creditors are demanding when creditors are making those harassing phone calls, threatening letters, Chapter 13 stops all that 1013 gives you time to catch your breath while you while you pay your creditors. Chapter 13 can stop foreclosures, it can stop garnishments, lawsuits, and repossessions of your car. You do not need the permission of your creditors to obtain chapter 13 bankruptcy relief. Okay.

Now the first step

you need to do if you’re thinking about meeting with the bank attorneys make a list of all your debts. Every debt you have in the world, a lot of people ask, Well, can I pick this one? Can I leave this one out? Now list them all. You mean with your bank attorney? They’re on your side. Give them the full picture. Okay, the next thing you need to do is make a list of your assets. What do you own? How much is it worth? What do you owe on it? And then get as many paycheck stubs as you can because your bankruptcy attorney is going to want to go through your income and your budget and see you know what, what type of monthly payment could you afford what would work What wouldn’t work? Once they come up with the plan payment, this chapter 13 payment is going to cover all credit card debt, medical debt finance companies and car notes and IRS on your mortgage. If you have any Some cases people pay back IRS debt through chapter 13. Okay, in a chapter 13 bankruptcy plan, the credit card companies and all of the unsecured creditors are barred from collecting any interest. So this is a huge benefit of chapter 13. So, for example, let’s say you owe $10,000 in credit card debt and you’ve got an interest rate of 25%. So some are even higher. But let’s say it’s 25%. You’re going to be paying about $2,500 a year just in interest alone. But if you enter chapter 13, you’re not paying any more interest at all zero, zilch nothing on future credit card debt. A lot of people will ask, you know, am I going to end up with some type of payment plan that I just can’t afford? Well, that’s something you and your bankruptcy attorney need to determine what you can and can’t afford. That’s why it’s important to go through a budget, that you’re relying on real numbers. So that you know you don’t accidentally get put into a into a case that might be unrealistic that might not work for you.

A lot of people are hesitant to go meet with an attorney because they’re afraid it’s going to cost too much well the truth about chapter 13 and most divisions and the way it is and where I practice, the attorneys fees are included in with the chapter 13 payment so it’s very easy to do you just have to pay your filing fee and a fee for your classes you have to take beforehand and those attorneys fees are spread out over for four and a half years.

Also, most bankruptcy attorneys all over the nation will offer one free consultation. So why not take advantage of that go go meet if you know if you’re struggling with credit card debt, medical debt or being threatened with a car repossession. Don’t hesitate to meet with a bankruptcy attorney Time is of the essence. It can’t hurt for you to Explore all your options. Have a great day.

Hello, this is Jeff Kelly, and today I’d like to talk to you about stopping a garnishment in Georgia. When your employer is served with the garnishment, it is extremely important that you take action as soon as you can. If you don’t do anything, if you try to ignore it, here’s what’s going to happen, the creditor is going to take up to 25% of your net paycheck. In other words, if you take home $500 a week, they’re going to get $125 a week. Here’s how the garnishment process normally works in Georgia.

First, the creditor is going to file a lawsuit against you. In most cases, the local sheriff is going to drive up to your house and serve with court papers. You know if you dispute this claim, if you think somebody’s trying to pull a fast one on you and you don’t really owe this debt, you really need to hire an attorney and you need to respond to this lawsuit, you need to get an answer filed within 30 days of being served. Otherwise, a creditor is going to obtain a default judgment against you. Once they obtain the default judgment, the creditor is then going to apply for a garnishment and the court will then serve papers on your your employer.

Now, this is really important to note. If you’re the court papers are going to clearly state that your employer has 45 days to start taking money out of your paycheck, or explain to the court that you no longer work there. The employer will then send the money to the core that ordered the garnishment. Once the money is received by the court, the court will forward the funds to the creditor. Now, if your employer screws this up, they could be on the hook for a lot of money for the entire judgement.

In Georgia, if your employer messes up the garnishment they’re going to like I said they could be held liable for the entire amount of the debt. So how happy do you think your employer is going to be if they end up having to pay a large sum of large lump sum of money because you got garnished?

In contrast when you file a Chapter 13 It not only protects you from collection it also protects your employer from messing up a garnishment as long as the bankruptcy filing gets communicated to the creditor. Now when you file a Chapter 13 of my office, we’ll file a plaintiff’s day with court where your garnishment was filed. In addition, we will send a copy to your employer the employment deduction order, which has the bankruptcy judge’s signature on it.

So this current is going to be stopped. If you can bring us a fax number to your payroll department, this is going to speed things up a lot because we can get a copy of this order to your employer much faster. Now chapter 7 can also stop a creditor from garnishing your paycheck as well.

Don’t sit back and pretend like it’s not happening. Don’t Don’t try to hide this garnishment it’s not going to go away by itself. I’ve seen so many Georgia consumers who will just sit back and allow themselves to be garnished for months before coming to see me during this time they miss mortgage payments in this car payments, because so much money is being taken out of their paycheck every week. Some clients leaving let their car get repossessed or let their house get foreclosed. You don’t have to miss car payments, you don’t have to miss mortgage payments because of some creditor or trying to garnish your wages.

Let’s take a look at the entire picture and come up with a plan that is going to stop this action against you. Never, it never hurts to explore all your options. Call me today for your free consultation 7062950030 Thank you Have a great day.

Hello, this is Georgia bankruptcy attorney, Jeff Kelly and this evening I am going to talk about a motion for relief. Okay, if you are in an active chapter 13 case, and you receive a motion for relief, as a general rule, this is not a good thing.

Let me tell you why.

Let’s say you are in a chapter 13 and you are making payments on your house, but you know, hours get cut back at work, maybe some type of emergency pops up out of nowhere and you miss a few payments. Well, the creditor is going to respond by filing a motion for relief. Basically, a motion for relief from the automatic stay is a request from a creditor to the bankruptcy court for permission to take back collateral.

In other words, if the creditor has rights to your house, they want permission to get out of bankruptcy court and start foreclosure. proceedings. Oftentimes we’ll have a client, they’ll come in and they say, Well, you know, I’m not sure I buy all this stuff about how chapter 13 protects you because I had a friend who filed, but they still lost their house. How does that happen? Well, here’s how it happens. Somebody files chapter 13. They put the IRS in the plan, and all they have to do is make the future mortgage payments. But like I said earlier, sometimes things happen. And when you miss some payments, the mortgage company will respond by filing a motion for relief. Now, just because they file the motion, does that mean it’s it? Is it all over? Does that mean you’re definitely gonna lose your house? No. What happens is when it’s scheduled for a hearing, the person that’s filed the chapter 13 needs to come to court with their bankruptcy attorney and see if they can work out with some type of deal with the creditor attorney to get those payments caught up.

Now typically, in Georgia, a creditor is going to charge anywhere between $650 and $850 in attorneys fees just for filing one motion for relief. So those fees are going to have to get paid. As a general rule. Most credit, most mortgage companies in the Northern District of Georgia will spread out how many ever payments you missed, plus the attorneys fees out over six months. And they’re also going to want some type of explanation as to how are you going to be able to make this extra money? Whether it’s a relative help helping helping you out to be able to make these payments, or are you going to be able to get overtime at work?

Generally, most creditors want to know, Hey, is this really going to be feasible? Now, sometimes we have situations where a client’s in a chapter 13 they don’t Making they miss a few payments. And then they just kind of get used to not making their payments to the mortgage company. And the mortgage company sits back and waits a year before they finally get around to filing a motion with the court. Now, do you think there’s any way that if we have 12 months of arrears, we’re going to be able to pay it back over six months to a year? It’s, it’s not gonna happen, that person is probably gonna end up either losing that house.

Or there’s there’s another alternative just because a motion for relief is granted. And that’s, again, it’s not a guarantee they’re going to foreclose on you because you can still call the mortgage company and try to work out a loan modification plan. I’ve seen a lot of clients do it. I’ve seen a lot of clients where I thought there is absolutely no way a mortgage company is going to agree to this loan modification. motion for relief gets granted, the client gets their paperwork together. And next thing I know they’ve they’ve, they’ve managed to work it out. So just because the motion for relief is granted, that doesn’t mean you need to give up, you still need to keep calling the mortgage company.

Now in Georgia, if you know even if the mortgage even if there’s loan modifications denied motion for relief is granted, when do you need to move out of the house? And the answer is when they start advertising it in the newspaper. Under Georgia law, you’ve got to advertise a house for four consecutive weeks before the foreclosure date. As a general rule of foreclosures, non-judicial foreclosures in Georgia, are on the first Tuesday of every month.

There’s no need to move out immediately because some of these mortgage companies even when they refuse to deal with you, they just they wait a long time before they start foreclosure. So why not maximise the benefit of that situation and stay in the house rent free. In my personal opinion, you’re actually doing the mortgage company a favour by staying there, because while you’re living in the house, nobody’s going to be able to rob it or tear it apart. And also, as a general rule, houses stay in better shape when somebody’s actually living in them. Now, you know, motions for relief don’t apply just to houses, they also apply to any collateral. So let’s take cars for example. Let’s say you are in an active chapter 13. And for whatever reason, you let the car insurance lapse, Well, number one, you’re going to get in a lot of trouble in Georgia because if you’re driving around without car insurance, that’s not a good thing. You’re going to get a big expensive ticket.

A creditor, most creditors get notified when a car insurance lapses. Because most creditors that have financed your car will require that on your insurance, you list them as loss payee. And once you stop paying the mortgage company is going to tell the creditor, hey, he didn’t pay his insurance. And the car creditors going to respond by coming to get the car. So most of the time with a motion for relief a hearing is filed. And you’re going to have a hearing about 30 days later. Well, does this mean that if you drop insurance on the car that you’re going to get at least a 30 day window before you have to get it back? No. There’s a local rule in Georgia that says a creditor can basically go repossess the car they’ve got to give you notice. After they repossess it, but no, they don’t have to wait. 30 days to come and get it, they can hold on to the car, if there’s any issue, but they do have a right to protect their collateral, there is a local bankruptcy rule. So if you’re in an active chapter 13, you got to keep that insurance up to date or they’re coming to get the car. Let’s talk about chapter 7 for a minute. It’s very common in a chapter 7, where we’re going to give back a house or we’re going to give back a car. And we clearly state in the statement of tensions. We surrender the interest in the car, we surrender the interest in the house. And then the client gets served with a motion for relief. And even though I tell clients this ahead of time, some of them forget.

And they get really upset when they get this letter in the mail saying there’s going to be a hearing. So the conversation with the client usually goes like this. Hey, why do I have a hearing? I thought we made it pretty clear in the bankruptcy petition. What’s going on? Well, here’s what’s going on the creditor even though you say you’re going to surrender it in the chapter 7 petition, they are still going to file a motion for leave for the court to get permission to start foreclosure or to get permission to take the car, because it’s very rare but in some cases there is there’s equity in a car or equity in a house.

And a chapter 7 trustee is not going to be willing to let go of the collateral in those situations. In cases where there’s equity, a chapter 7 trustee is going to step up and try to sell the car or the house themselves, to see if they can recover some money on behalf of the estate.

So if you’re in chapter 7, and you’ve agreed to surrender house and you are car, whatever type of collateral, don’t be alarmed when you receive a motion for labour. That’s just the creditor covering their bases, getting permission from the court to Go get their collateral. give any questions regarding a motion for relief. Don’t make assumptions yourself.

You need to sit down with a rely bankruptcy attorney, someone who’s been doing it for years. And ask them your questions. It’s very easy to get confused on these bankruptcy topics. And there’s no need for you to get confused about a motion for relief. It’s you know, I’ll see other attorneys get yelled at by their clients in court, because chapter 7 client will just get the notice and immediately think, hey, I’ve got to go to court. So they take off work. And this work, they drive a long way to court, they show up for this hearing that there’s really no need for them to be at anyway because they were going to surrender the collateral.

So very important you communicate with your attorney. Don’t assume you have to be there. Maybe Maybe you don’t. Maybe you do. If it’s a house you want to keep you better be there, you better get something worked out with the court.

Otherwise that motion for relief will be granted.

Anyway, I hope you have a great day and I hope you will continue to tune in and hopefully we’ll have another podcast up here soon. Make it a great day. Thank you.