By Jeff Curl, San Mateo Bankruptcy Attorney
Waiting too long.
This is close to, if not my number one enemy in bankruptcy practice. If you have a toothache you may take Aspirin to make it go away. If it still hurts the next day, it’s a probably a good idea to make an appointment with the dentist. If you wait and start getting the throbbing pain and headaches, you’re in trouble. If you wait until there is a nice abscess, you can actually die from that initial toothache. Was it better to get the cavity examined and filled at the outset, or better to wait until the end when you needed full surgery? Which cost more, and which one was more traumatic?
You’re smart, and you can see where I am going with this. People in financial distress don’t typically visit a bankruptcy attorney the first time they miss a payment or realize something is wrong with the money situation. But as things get progressively worse, they often still won’t reach out for help because of a feeling of paralysis, fear or good old fashioned denial. You’re not alone in just hoping that things will get better. But if you are unemployed or chronically underemployed - or your wages are being garnished or some other invasive action has been taken against you, stop the suffering.
I don’t have a way to accurately reconstruct the exact amount of assets my clients unnecessarily lost by waiting too long to decide to file. But I am confident that it is in the millions, if not tens of millions. Between losing homes to foreclosure and draining retirement accounts they could have kept, the amount of lost assets that could have been preserved is staggering. To be frank, it’s a little sad as well. And the suffering that people endure in the form of lost sleep, health and well being, family stress and other indicators is quite alarming.
This is not to say that you should call the doctor, dentist or, in my case, the bankruptcy lawyer every time you feel a scratch in your throat, a sensation in your tooth, or you lost your job. Maybe an Aspirin is the right response, and maybe you will find a job soon and scrape by just fine. But you should have some awareness of your situation and get the courage to respond accordingly. If you do find yourself fearing the phone because of creditor calls, or there is an unspoken but understood anger between you and your significant other over the money situation, things like this need to be addressed.
It may not even be that bankruptcy is the correct route at the end of the day. We’ll help you find a resource if we’re not the right solution. But I cannot emphasize enough how many times our clients have said after our first meeting, and at the end of the bankruptcy process, that they wished they had done it sooner, and that they now feel better.
Image Credit: chrisinplymouth
