Just my 2 cents here...

[nazstar]

I've been lurking on this board for a while and starting posting recently. After reading many, many posts, it occurs to me that people frequently seem to get snagged on things one just wouldn't think of. Unless you were advised by a lawyer over a year prior to filing, you wouldn't know that payment to grandma is considered "preferential". Unless I didn't call a laywer, I wouldn't have known that carrying a car loan for $19,000 was preferable to going to an auction and buying the same car in cash for $1000. It really seems like we try to do things to improve the situation and we shoot ourselves in the foot. No wonder you really need a lawyer to file!

[chpxiii]

Yep. Totally agree. And I'm really glad.

Interestingly enough ... speaking of preferential payments: I had just paid off a coworker who lent me $500. My paperwork shows that I gave her that money.

I have no clue if they went after her or not. I suspect not. I would hate that an individual person, who was being kind in lending you money - with no interest! Would be treated the same as the legalized loan sharks of bankers and lenders.

[BKcrazy]

Well, that's why there are lawyers, to deal with this stuff for us.

There were tons of things I worried about , still worry about some, that I never would have even thought twice about before.

[HHM]

That is true, but at the same time, you really shouldn't live your life as if you are going to be filing BK in the next 12 months

[nazstar]

That is true, but at the same time, you really shouldn't live your life as if you are going to be filing BK in the next 12 months

I agree. But if I knew preferential payments would have been a problem, I probably would not have leaned on friends and family as much. I would have caved much sooner and declared bankruptcy. Instead, I dug myself deeper in a hole with the promise of paying them back with a lump sum amount I'm getting in February. But I couldn't get all the creditors to move in the same direction and it fell through AFTER I used the money to make good faith payments. So, here I am with promises to family and friends, the cash in the bank, and I can't write the check. If I had known then what I know now....