I filed pro se on Nov 24th, I filed a fee waiver and all of the standard Chap 7 documents. Our fee waiver was declined (no indication why) and we recieved notice of our filing fee due one day before our first installment was due. No biggie, got it to the clerks office on time. Our 341 was set for today, Tuesday we recieved a letter saying the trustee needed additional info PRIOR to 341, please fill out enclosed forms and return via enclosed self addressed envelope ... there was only one form, and no self addressed envelope. I filled out the form that was enclosed and drove it to the trustee s office because I knew there was no time prior to our 341 being that we had just received it. Trustee in her office said "Oh you could ve just brought it to the 341 sorry I got it out so late" I asked if she needed me to bring anything else to 341 (at that time she didn't have anything other than what was filed, no tax returns, no bank statements etc.)" Yeah go ahead and bring 08 tax returns"
We get to the 341 ... ALOT of people there, we sit and wait. We are the only ones in the room without an attorney. All of those ahead of us were basically asked the same questions. Every single one of the attorneys had to search for bank statement and tax returns, most would say I don't have that and then their clients would say, I gave it to you...they would search a little and find it.One lady had claimed some cosmetic inventory from her mary kay business as exempt(she had it valued at 2700$), and its not... attorney didn't advise her it wasn't exempt prior to 341. Trustee said you can give me an offer or I ll take it...you have 10 days. I couldn't help but think shouldn't her attorney have avoided that scenario. Also schedules had to be ammended because it wasn't exempt. Finally we were the last ones to be called, looking at her docket she had hand written "take last" by our names....I m wondering if it is because we are pro se?(any ideas)She asked typical questions, all that I expected a few about my business...and told us like everyone else not to spend the 09 return, to get her those tax returns as soon as possible so she could figure what she would take and what we would get back(we expected this).
So my final take .... I m glad I filed pro se. Had I of paid an attorney to sit there and hold my paperwork I would feel very dumb, because I would ve done my research whether I would ve hired an attorney or not. One of the attorneys was so busy talking with another attorney he didnt notice his clients had been called and had to be called up by the trustee!
So I guess we are in the 60 day club!
We get to the 341 ... ALOT of people there, we sit and wait. We are the only ones in the room without an attorney. All of those ahead of us were basically asked the same questions. Every single one of the attorneys had to search for bank statement and tax returns, most would say I don't have that and then their clients would say, I gave it to you...they would search a little and find it.One lady had claimed some cosmetic inventory from her mary kay business as exempt(she had it valued at 2700$), and its not... attorney didn't advise her it wasn't exempt prior to 341. Trustee said you can give me an offer or I ll take it...you have 10 days. I couldn't help but think shouldn't her attorney have avoided that scenario. Also schedules had to be ammended because it wasn't exempt. Finally we were the last ones to be called, looking at her docket she had hand written "take last" by our names....I m wondering if it is because we are pro se?(any ideas)She asked typical questions, all that I expected a few about my business...and told us like everyone else not to spend the 09 return, to get her those tax returns as soon as possible so she could figure what she would take and what we would get back(we expected this).
So my final take .... I m glad I filed pro se. Had I of paid an attorney to sit there and hold my paperwork I would feel very dumb, because I would ve done my research whether I would ve hired an attorney or not. One of the attorneys was so busy talking with another attorney he didnt notice his clients had been called and had to be called up by the trustee!
So I guess we are in the 60 day club!
Bankruptcy Wizard
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