Un-frozen!
OK, big news today.
9am, I called the Trustee's office and of course was put on hold for 15 minutes and then told he'd "stepped out of the office." I asked for his voice mail and left a short, polite but direct message about our situation (which has been explained in this thread a few times) and to please call us back within the hour. After no return call, I called again and talked with the Trustee's temporary secretary who I think accidently put me through to the Trustee.
After a few minutes describing our situation, he pulled our paperwork, put me on hold for about 10 minutes and came back on saying after reviewing our paperwork, he'd unfreeze our bank accounts for about $10,500. When I asked why it wouldn't be the full amount of over 12k, he said that the amended paperwork faxed to his office by our BK attorney last week only showed the 10k+ as being in our accounts per the CA wild card exemption and that's what he *had* to go by. Within half an hour, Wells Fargo had received the Trustee's fax and unfrozen our accounts. Needless to say, less than an hour later, we went in to a local branch and pulled all but $50 to keep the accounts open in the hope we'll get the rest after our BK hearing next month. We basically dealt with this no money situation for almost 10 days when the Trustee only needed about 10 minutes to do his thing.
Now here's the kicker. Our imbecile attorney said he wasn't sure if the Trustee would unfreeze all our funds in our account so he *changed* the amount to a lower amount guessing it would up the odds that the Trustee would be more inclined to release a lesser amount. Nevermind how absurd it sounds giving back 10k versus 12k in such a situation, nevermind the 12k amount falls far below the 21k+ wild card exemption amount allowed here in California and thus in theory should be covered as exempt and not subject to any sort of lien, *especially before* a 351 hearing, our dope attorney just "thought" it was a smart move to cut down the amount by 2k!
At this point, we'll argue for the rest of the money during our hearing. Our attorney has indicated he may not be able to attend and may have to send his assistant. Wotta shock. I'm actually kind of glad at this point as I fear the guy will just be in the way. I will say when this is done, I will be looking at whatever avenues are available to get our attorney reprimanded or whatever for his clear incompetence handling our case.
Although my BK story isn't done yet, clearly there's lessons already to be learned from my experience.
- Screen your potential BK attorney as best as you can. Interview several before settling on one.
- Do as much research as you can on the subject before you file. Don't be lazy and think an attorney will be your safety blanket when things go off script. Never take for granted that your attorney has all angles covered or in my case, even knows what the hell he's doing beyond filing the basic paperwork.
- Don't keep any more money in your bank accounts in the weeks and even months before and through filing than you can afford to lose in a lien. It doesn't matter if you don't list your bank as a creditor, it's clear a growing number of banks and not just Wells Fargo are pro-actively freezing accounts on behalf of Trustees.
These are all things we didn't fully do or understand beforehand. This thread is an example of a near worse case scenario.
OK, big news today.
9am, I called the Trustee's office and of course was put on hold for 15 minutes and then told he'd "stepped out of the office." I asked for his voice mail and left a short, polite but direct message about our situation (which has been explained in this thread a few times) and to please call us back within the hour. After no return call, I called again and talked with the Trustee's temporary secretary who I think accidently put me through to the Trustee.
After a few minutes describing our situation, he pulled our paperwork, put me on hold for about 10 minutes and came back on saying after reviewing our paperwork, he'd unfreeze our bank accounts for about $10,500. When I asked why it wouldn't be the full amount of over 12k, he said that the amended paperwork faxed to his office by our BK attorney last week only showed the 10k+ as being in our accounts per the CA wild card exemption and that's what he *had* to go by. Within half an hour, Wells Fargo had received the Trustee's fax and unfrozen our accounts. Needless to say, less than an hour later, we went in to a local branch and pulled all but $50 to keep the accounts open in the hope we'll get the rest after our BK hearing next month. We basically dealt with this no money situation for almost 10 days when the Trustee only needed about 10 minutes to do his thing.
Now here's the kicker. Our imbecile attorney said he wasn't sure if the Trustee would unfreeze all our funds in our account so he *changed* the amount to a lower amount guessing it would up the odds that the Trustee would be more inclined to release a lesser amount. Nevermind how absurd it sounds giving back 10k versus 12k in such a situation, nevermind the 12k amount falls far below the 21k+ wild card exemption amount allowed here in California and thus in theory should be covered as exempt and not subject to any sort of lien, *especially before* a 351 hearing, our dope attorney just "thought" it was a smart move to cut down the amount by 2k!
At this point, we'll argue for the rest of the money during our hearing. Our attorney has indicated he may not be able to attend and may have to send his assistant. Wotta shock. I'm actually kind of glad at this point as I fear the guy will just be in the way. I will say when this is done, I will be looking at whatever avenues are available to get our attorney reprimanded or whatever for his clear incompetence handling our case.
Although my BK story isn't done yet, clearly there's lessons already to be learned from my experience.
- Screen your potential BK attorney as best as you can. Interview several before settling on one.
- Do as much research as you can on the subject before you file. Don't be lazy and think an attorney will be your safety blanket when things go off script. Never take for granted that your attorney has all angles covered or in my case, even knows what the hell he's doing beyond filing the basic paperwork.
- Don't keep any more money in your bank accounts in the weeks and even months before and through filing than you can afford to lose in a lien. It doesn't matter if you don't list your bank as a creditor, it's clear a growing number of banks and not just Wells Fargo are pro-actively freezing accounts on behalf of Trustees.
These are all things we didn't fully do or understand beforehand. This thread is an example of a near worse case scenario.
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