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Posted on Thursday, 23rd December 2010 by Eden Fryett

The board of directors at the Honolulu Symphony, which has brought music to the Hawaiian island of Oahu for over a century, has voted to file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy and dissolve the organization.

The decision marks the end of efforts to save all or part of the symphony organization, after having filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection a year ago. The attempt, according to the Honolulu Star Advertiser, was a failure, and the bankruptcy court case was converted to a Chapter 7 bankruptcy liquidation case.

A quickly convened meeting led to the board’s decision just before a scheduled appearance in bankruptcy court concerning a request for a deadline extension for a reorganization plan. The reorganization wasn’t meant to be, however, as the board decided to disband the symphony and liquidate its remaining assets.

Bankruptcy lawyers for the symphony will soon request the conversion to a Chapter 7 bankruptcy.

Among symphony assets is a large music library. The symphony’s endowment would not be a part of the bankruptcy liquidation, according to the Star Advertiser. The e

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Tags: Bankruptcy, Honolulu Symphony
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Posted on Wednesday, 22nd December 2010 by Toby Duncan

Bankruptcy trustees will target debtor’s income tax refunds. Tax refunds provide immediate cash available for distribution to creditors as opposed to other assets, such as cars, which have to be stored, noticed for sale, and liquidated at auction with commissions due.

One of my bankruptcy clients is expecting a significant tax refund. He stated that all his income in the past year was in the form of distributions from a qualified pension plan and social security. Proceed from pensions and social security distributions are exempt under Florida law after they money has been distributed to the recipient debtor. My client wants to know if his tax refund representing taxes withheld from pension and social security distributions is exempt in Chapter 7 bankruptcy.

I have never seen a case on this issue, and the issue has not come up before in any of my previous bankruptcy cases. In my opinion, the tax refund would not be exempt. Money from pensions and social security in a debtor’s financial account is exempt only if the debtor can trace the funds in his financial account to pension or social security distributions. It

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Tags: Income, Tax Refund
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Posted on Thursday, 16th December 2010 by Toby Duncan

Q: I’ve had my hours reduced at work and no longer working overtime. To make ends meet, I’ve been using my credit cards. I have about $30,000 in credit card debt, paying very high interest rate (hovering around 30%). I have five cards. My parents offered to loan me $15,000 from their savings. Can you help me settle my debt? I don’t want to file for bankruptcy.

I get questions like this all the time. Clients wanting to borrow money from family and friends to pay off or settle credit card debts. Usually, the question is prefaced by “I read on Google…” or “My friend told me…” I cringe every time someone says this because I’ve met too many clients who has tried this strategy, failed and comes in to file for bankruptcy anyway. Now, in addition to listing Chase, Discover, American Express, etc. on his or her bankr Read more…

Tags: Card, Credit Card
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Posted on Thursday, 16th December 2010 by Lucy Hales

Does closing a credit card negatively affect credit score? Not really or rather the fact that you close credit card does not affect your FICO scores on itself, but here are two important points to know,

1. Closing a credit card will only lower FICO credit score if the debt utilization ratio will go up because of that. If you have three credit cards, carry significant balances on the two and want to close the third one, it will raise the utilization ratio. So if you want to cancel a credit card, see how it will affect this ratio. Once it jumps over 35%, you may see lower credit score.

2. Long-term and this is very long term, when you cancel a credit card in good standing with a $0 balance, it will generally fall of your credit reports after 10 to12 years. At that point, you lose the account credit history and average age of your credit report decreases which may lower your FICO scores. So if you have only a few credit records including a long time ago opened credit card, think hard before closing such. I know a few people in their mid 30s now, who still keep the very first student credit card obtained in college.

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Tags: Credit Card, Credit Score, Score
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Posted on Wednesday, 15th December 2010 by Toby Duncan

If a Chapter 7 debtor has a significant amount of non-exempt personal property over the exemption limits the debtor has to buy back from the Chapter 7 trustee the non-exempt property. Non-exempt property subject to buy back includes automobiles and other types of personal property such as cash, stocks and furniture. Most trustees give clients up to 12 months to purchase the non-exempt property in monthly installments without interest. Most Chapter 7 debtors do not have enough non-exempt cash to make a lump sum repurchase.

A few debtor’s have the ability to pay cash immediately to buy back non-exempt assets because they have money in exempt retirement funds or can get a loan from other family members. Cash purchasers deserve a discount, and most trustee will discount the purchase price for debtors able to pay all cash in 20 to 30 days. Trustees provide discounts up to 25 percent off the full value of non-exempt cars or other property. The discount is warranted because a quick sale results in less work for the trustee and a quicker return to the creditors.  In other words, an immediate cash repurchase earns an 25% profit in one year. At

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Tags: Chapter Trustee, Trustee
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