“All Property Must Be Listed” States Monee Bankruptcy Lawyer

Let’s dive into the bankruptcy petition.  Now for any of our bankruptcy cases Chapter 7’s or Chapter 13’s, the staff works on the data entry for the petition.  This petition is based on the intake that we had our client come in and fill out originally.  Some aspects that are mentioned in the petition is listing properties which would include time shares, mobile homes, townhouses, as well as other property such as vehicles, trucks and motorcycles.  One thing that’s very important to stress is that the client has to list all of the property items that they have title to or any item that they are listed on the lien.
Sometimes clients might think that “I want to keep my Chevy, so I don’t want to have it listed.”  They can still keep their vehicle, but we need to have all of their personal property items listed on the bankruptcy petition.  That’s very important to stress.  So have the clients list all of their items whether or not they plan on keeping the items or not.  We also have them list personal property items, which would include furniture, jewelry, things of that nature.  One thing to stress is that we have our clients guesstimate on the fair market value of these items.  And again, that’s the key word here: fair market value.  For example, if in 2007 a client bought a $1,000.00 television from Best Buy, chances are in 2011 that same TV is not worth $1,000.00.  So they just want to list approximately what could you get at a garage sale.  The garage sale value is what a trustee would likely get if the items were auctioned off and sold.  We also ask about 401(k) loans, pets, anything that could be listed as a potential asset of one of our clients.