Finally going to file, Bankruptcy filing services

[anewday]

I have thrown in the towel as my business has buried me in debt (personally guaranteed). I am going to file pro se as I am not a homeowner and I am well under the $20K wildcard exemption in California. Here is my question, has anyone had experience with the online Bankruptcy filing software or services which fill out all the paperwork for you? Any feedback would be appreciated.

[dingdong]

I did it all myself and used a software program called PDFill to fill in the PDF forms and save them.


There is a free trial BK software out there, where it is fully functional in trial, but if you print, it says "Trial" or something in big letters on it, but you can use it to do the figuring and kind of take notes and apply the figures to your own documents.


Basically you print all the forms from your district site, use the software to do the math, etc, and insert appropriate part of code for exemptions , and then transfer the info to your real docs.

Kind of a PITA, but it works. And it is free that way, except for the PDF software which was around 19.00.

[anewday]

Thanks the wildcard in CA is $20k right?

[JoeBankrupt33]

If you are not exempting home equity, the CA wildcard is $18,350.

[justbroke]

The exemption is based on what System you choose. System 2 provides the largest wildcard, and is used (generally) when you don't have any homestead to exempt.

Also, to answer your original post, I have used an online service. I used one which specifically has an "interview" based web interface. The web interface prompted for all sorts of questions. You are then able to click a link and instruct it to generate your documents. It generates a PDF document with all the appropriate paperwork. They guaranteed that it will be accepted by the Court.

I found several errors in the filing, and it did the math wrong (based on old IRS allowances and/or mismatched ones). I ended up re-doing form B22C (Means Test) by using a fillable PDF.

The PDFfill option is nice, as dingdong points out. I don't think I'd recommend using the "fillable" PDFs that come from teh U.S. Bankruptcy Court's website. Those forms are fillable, but you can't save what you typed in! What a waste of time.

You definitely need some way to easily fill, save and later modify those schedules and forms.

[GWBcasualty]

If you are not exempting home equity, the CA wildcard is $18,350.

No. It's $20,750 + $1,100 which is the actual WC.

Total of $21,850 that you can use to exempt anything not covered by other exemptions, including cash, bonds and stocks.

http://legalconsumer.com/bankruptcy/exemptions/

[JoeBankrupt33]

Oops... my source was outdated - the bain of the internet.

[Seeker40]

I used Blumbergs software and downloaded the Nolo ebook. Between the two it wasnt difficult at all.

[MrSmithster]

I used a local Law firm that offers to do all the paperwork only or full service. I choose the cheap route. I filled out a long question form. They called to ask a few more questions. Emailed me the forms, which i took to the Bankruptcy Court and filed. Cost me $499 plus the $299 filing fee. I just had my 341 meeting, and the people with Lawyers where getting a harder time from the Trustee than us that file Pro Se

[vegasbaby]

Hi im in nevada what is the wildcard exemption,how can it help me?im just over the income level for means test by $1500.00