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Before Bankruptcy, There Are Two Ways Your Credit Score Tricks You Are you worried about what bankruptcy will do to your credit score? Your credit score is the tool the banks and credit card companies use to trick you into paying them, even when you can’t afford it. Think for a moment. Is your credit score more important than feeding your children?  Probably not. Back in 1934, the Supreme Court said that a fresh start in bankruptcy is “of public, as well as private, interest.” Here’s what they meant. The country is better off if you take care of your family; [...]

Chapter 7 income eligibility got slightly easier on April 1, 2025 If you are making less than the median income, you have income eligibility to file Chapter 7 bankruptcy. Those eligibility numbers adjusted up, April 1, 2025.  For Virginia, eligibility is automatic for singles under $77,420, and a family of 4 under $145,585. What if I’m over the median income? You can still pass the “means test.” You can still be eligible for Chapter 7 if you are over the median income cutoff.  But you have to pass the means test.  The means test is a way of looking at your [...]

Why is Bankruptcy Better for Your Credit Score than “Debt Consolidation” “Now I can’t even rent an apartment.” Sam, not his real name, talked to us last month about filing for bankruptcy. He’d been trying to “resolve” his debts through one of the newer debt settlement outfits. He had been paying the Debt Consolidation Company for eighteen months, and his credit score declined. Why was that? Why Debt Settlement/Debt Consolidation Wrecks Your Credit The big idea behind these companies is that you stop paying your debts:  Making your creditors wait for payment encourages them to give you a better deal, in [...]

Merry Christmas from our Family to Yours.

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Motivation Monday! Mo·ti·va·tion /ˌmōdəˈvāSH(ə)n/ noun 1. the reason or reasons one has for acting or behaving in a particular way: "Escape can be a strong motivation for travel" motivation, forces acting either on or within a person to initiate behavior. The word is derived from the Latin term motivus (“a moving cause”), which suggests the activating properties of the processes involved in psychological motivation. Psychologists study motivational forces to help explain observed changes in behavior that occur in an individual. Thus, for example, the observation that a person is increasingly likely to open the refrigerator door to look for food as [...]