Dec 11
A provision in the Internal Revenue Code that allows owners of IRAs who are over 70 1/2 to make a direct contribution of up to $100,000 from the IRA to a charity will expire on December 31. The provision is found in section 408(d)(8) of the IRC. Last year Congress retroactively extended this provision to […]
Nov 27
A New York appeals court has ruled that a trial judge was correct when he instructed a jury in a wrongful death action that the fact that the deceased pulled the string on the driver’s bikini top and caused it to fall, which in turn distracted her and resulted in a crash that killed the […]
Nov 14
Residents of eleven rural counties in northern Colorado are seeking to secede from Colorado and form their own state, North Colorado, according to the Huffington Post. The reason given is that, due to the small population of these counties they have no say in the state legislature, which, under Democratic control, has passed a number […]
Oct 15
This is a question I often hear. The answer is no, you do not have to have a lawyer to file bankruptcy. But you might need one. There is no requirement that you have a lawyer, just as there is no requirement that you have a doctor to set your own broken leg or take […]
Oct 8
As of today, October 8, Christmas is only 80 days away. When Christmas is over and New Year’s Eve is a blur, will you be overwhelmed by bills and contemplating bankruptcy? You shouldn’t be, but thousands of people will be. Christmas seems to suck all rationality out of people. You could be the most rational […]
Sep 25
How Does Chapter 13 Work? The concept in Chapter 13 is that the debtor makes payments each month to the Chapter 13 trustee. The trustee then distributes these payments to creditors in accordance with a Plan that the debtor has proposed and that the court has approved. When all the payments under the plan have […]
Aug 29
As expected, in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision in Windsor on June 26, the IRS has now passed regulations that allow same-sex couples to file joint tax returns, regardless of where they live and whether or not the state in which they live recognizes their marriage. This will give same-sex couples the same tax […]
Jul 17
What, you say, I’ve never heard of U.S. v. Windsor. You have, unless you just came out of a hole in the ground. You just don’t know it. U.S. v. Windsor is the official name of the Supreme Court case striking down DOMA, the Defense of Marriage Act. It was an estate tax case. Three weeks after […]
May 14
In the last post we discussed that everything you own has to be listed. Just because it’s listed doesn’t mean you are going to lose it in the bankruptcy. Two things determine whether the trustee might sell your property. The first of these is whether the property is exempt. The second is whether the trustee […]
May 6
Just as with creditors, filing bankruptcy is an all or nothing proposition when it comes to listing what you own. Sure, you’d like to keep your boat or your mother’s china, but not listing it isn’t the way to try to save it. The basic premise of Chapter 7 is that you turn EVERYTHING over […]
