The federal government offers Parent PLUS loans to parents of college students to help pay for the students’ educations, but they are notoriously difficult for struggling parent-debtors to deal with because they have high interest rates and aren’t protected by as many of the student-loan innovations that keep regular direct-loan borrowers afloat, e.g. Income-Based Repayment …
“Loss Mitigation” sounds like an intimidating term, but it’s really just a mechanism within New York bankruptcy to help parties resolve foreclosure issues to debtors’ and creditors’ benefits. That is, its objective is to keep debtors’ principal residences out of foreclosure or reduce needless costs to creditors. It involves negotiations between the parties, possibly including …
In addition to mortgage modifications, deed-in-lieu of foreclosure offers, New York bankruptcy, and other options, the federal government has finally created the effective solution that until now has been off the table for underwater homeowners: mortgage principal reductions. On April 14, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) announced the Principal Reduction Modification program, which would …
At Last, a Principal Reduction Opportunity for Underwater Homeowners Read More »
It’s understandable that young Americans would not want to take out even more debt to purchase a home after the housing bust led to a wave of New York bankruptcy filings and foreclosures. Indeed, according to a 2014 Federal Reserve Bank of New York study, the number one reason a group of renters gave for …
Is Debt or Income Preventing Young Americans From Buying Homes? Read More »
After considering how the means test affected New York bankruptcy for the worse, my mind wanders to other aspects of the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act (BAPCPA), which was passed in 2005. Specifically, the addition of a credit-counseling requirement for debtors to complete before filing bankruptcy and a financial-management course to be completed …
More on Bankruptcy Reform’s Legacy: Debtor Education a Waste of Time? Read More »
It’s unusual for august publications like Scientific American to discuss why people might not manage debts as well as they should, particularly those who are otherwise good with numbers. Nevertheless, that’s exactly the question a guest blog post tackled recently: Debtors with multiple debts tend to focus on paying down the ones with the smallest …
Researchers Disagree Over Debt-Management Strategies Read More »
Each month the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) publishes a monthly report that explores consumers’ financial complaints, and it usually focuses on one region in the country. For January 2016, the agency chose New York State and the New York metro area, which the CFPB defines as the city along with several zip codes in …
CFPB Showcases New York Consumers’ Financial Complaints Read More »
The bad news for student-loan debtors is that the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case filed by a debtor to clarify the “undue hardship” standard for discharging student loans. For now, the disparate rules laid down by the federal circuit courts of appeal will remain in effect, meaning debtors’ cases depend in part …
Surge in Student Debt ‘Borrower Defense’ Discharge Claims Read More »
It’s not unheard of for debtors filing New York bankruptcy to own property that can’t be fully protected by an exemption. Although the state’s homestead exemption is quite generous compared to the federal exemptions, it might not cover all equity in a property. Alternatively, debtors might be concerned with equity in non-real estate property, or …
Three Ways of Dealing With Excess Equity in Bankruptcy Read More »
When it comes to student-loan debt, state governments don’t usually help a lot. That’s not surprising because most of the loans come from the federal government, which offers a variety of repayment options. However, New York State’s Higher Education Services Corporation (HECS) initiated a new program at the beginning of the year to help out. …
New York State to Offer Aid to Student Loan Debtors Read More »
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