Virginia Bankruptcy Consultation

When should we meet for a bankruptcy consultation?

If your finances are interfering with your work, your family, your health, your life– we need to talk about what bankruptcy can do to help you.

Bankruptcy is a last resort.  But not a last minute, last resort.  Filing bankruptcy requires paperwork and advance planning.  And more and more, it requires a strategy.

That’s why we need a lot of information about you and your situation.  So we we get together, we can really answer your questions and really solve your problems.

We need a lot of information to give you the right answers

Before you see me,  we’ll want to have have all the information we need to help you.

Based on our experience with ten thousand people under the old law and two thousand under the new, I designed forms to organize the information we need to get you your new start.

Filling in the forms may take an hour or two.  (If you have trouble with some parts, you can skip over those and keep moving; just be as complete as you can.)

Then, you have an hour long (free) paralegal-consultation with one of my experienced bankruptcy paralegals.  She can give you general information–the kind of thing you’ll find here on my website–and explain how the process works.  (Paralegals are not allowed give you “legal advice.”)

At that paralegal-consultation, your paralegal will also go over your forms with you.  To make sure we’re not making any mistakes.  And to help you with any parts of the forms that are confusing or give you trouble.  So by the end of the paralegal-consultation, we want to to have all the information we need to help you.

(It’s a little easier to ask questions and avoid mistakes when people can look each other in the eye.  But if you can’t get off  work and come in, we can do the paralegal-consultation over the phone.  We’ll especially need you to take your best shot at the forms and email them to us.  So you and your paralegal both have them to work with during the call. )

Your paralegal also needs six months worth of pay stubs.  Getting eligibility to file bankruptcy is can be very tricky in a high cost of living area like Northern Virginia.  We need your pay stubs so we can plan how we are going to get eligibility for you.

After your meeting with your paralegal, we put at lot of that information into our computer, so you and I can see it together when we talk in person.

Now we’ll set up our hour-long free lawyer consultation.   I’ll take the time to understand what’s going on in your life, and the best way to use bankruptcy to help you.

When we meet, we don’t talk about how bankruptcy “usually” works for “most people.”  We talk about how bankruptcy can work for you.

If you bring everything I need, then at our lawyer consultation, I will:

Answer all your questions
Help you decide if  bankruptcy is right for you
Determine your eligibility
Work out a strategy to prove your eligibility
Plan your bankruptcy in a way that best fits your situation and goals
Work out a fee and payment schedule
Agree to take your case.

At the end of our intensive consultation, most people leave with a plan to get a “new start in life and a clear field for the future.”

Ready to Get Started?

Here’s a short slide show that explains the bankruptcy process.  I call it my Bankruptcy Guide Book.   If you don’t Microsoft Powerpoint, you can download the Guide Book here.

Guide Book:  A  PowerPoint Tour of the Bankruptcy Process

If you don’t have PowerPoint, you can download a FREE viewer from Microsoft.  Or, you can view the Guide Book in PDF by clicking on the link below   (When you click, give it a few seconds; it takes a while to load or right-click and save it to your computer.)  Sorry, the pdf version doesn’t have the animated robots that the PowerPoint has.

The Guide Book – PDF Version

Next, please download our forms (right click this link and choose “save” or “save as”)  This is a PDF document and you can fill it in on your computer or print it out and fill it in by hand. You will need a PDF reader, which is free if you don’t have one. If you have trouble opening the files get a free reader either from Nitro Reader or Adobe PDF Reader. Keep in mind, we’re here to help, you so please feel free to call our office if you have any trouble.

Filling in these forms will take a couple hours.  But when you’ve done it, the hardest part of your bankruptcy process will already be done!   After that, the hard work is mostly on me.  (Please do not get hung up if you have trouble with parts of the forms.  Do your best with them, and bring your questions with you to the paralegal-consultation.)

You also need to get your credit report. Try to get one for free at: experian.com/reportaccess

There are lots of credit reports out there on the internet.  This one, experian.com/reportaccess is by far the best for what we want.  It’s easier to read than most, it has bigger print, and it has more information.  (I’m over 60 years old–I need a credit report with a little bigger print.)

Other credit reports that say Experian are not nearly as good.

(It’s free if you have been turned down for credit in the last 60 days.  Most people have been, whether you know it or not.)

The credit bureaus don’t like giving you something for free (even when they are required to), if they can sell it instead.  So they make it tough.  If you do a search for experian.com/reportaccess, they will route you to a pay site.  You need to copy those words straight into your browser.

How to Get Your Free Credit Report at experian.com/reportaccess

This video takes you there, step by step.

Do you live in one of these counties?

One more thing: I can only serve the counties under the US Bankruptcy court in Alexandria, VA. Those are:

Alexandria
Arlington
Fairfax and Falls Church City
Fauquier
Loudoun
Prince William, Manassas and Manassas Park
Stafford

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