North Carolina Bankruptcy Lawyers
As a bankruptcy lawyer, we have worked with a lot of people who feel like they can no longer control their debt; rather, they feel like their debt controls them. We always try to find a resolution that works best for our clients. Many times, the best solution isn’t bankruptcy, but another form of debt relief. As we often tell our clients, one of the simplest ways to start eliminating your debt is by creating a budget.
As an example, we recently had a client who came to our firm for a consultation on debt relief. After careful review of his situation, we soon realized that filing bankruptcy was probably not his best option. He had some pretty big debts, but I knew that with some careful budgeting he would probably be able to overcome his debts.
This client had credit card debt and medical bills. Each month he would borrow from one credit card to pay the balance on another one. He is married and also has two children, and they were concerned about their children’s future. His wife wasn’t employed but does receive $1,050 per month from SSDI.
Our bankruptcy team advised him that the first step to ridding himself of debt was to establish a budget. Like many of the clients we meet, He already knew that he should have a budget, but for other reasons. As a consequence, he had no idea how much his family was spending every month.
We began by examining the family’s income. We reviewed his paychecks and other sources of income, such as his wife’s SSDI payment. All together his income was around $5,000 per month.
We reviewed the family’s monthly expenses. This, however, was a little more difficult because he did not keep track of his expenses. However, they did use a debit card to pay many of their monthly household expenses. We were able to visit their banking website, which provided us with an itemized list of everything he purchases with his debit card.
We were then able to use this information to figure out how much they were spending each month. It turns out that they were spending a lot more money than was necessary for entertainment and eating out. As a result, they only had $400 leftover each month to pay off their personal loans and debts.
We then helped create a budget that would increase the amount of money they had leftover to pay their monthly debts. Being able to track how they spent their money enabled them to change some of their bad spending habits. Having this new budget and a commitment to place limits on their spending, they were able to avoid bankruptcy and begin to make some headway on their debts.
If you are having financial issues and find yourself not knowing what to do, contact the experienced bankruptcy lawyers at King Law Firm. We’ve been helping North Carolinians for over 30 years and we can help you too.