Your Path to Financial Freedom
So what is a seven? Probably the easiest thing I can say is it’s a deal. It’s a deal between you, the client, and the government, through the trustee of the Bankruptcy Court of the United States. So what are you giving your debts? That’s your part of the deal. And what is the trustee getting, if anything? Your property is unprotected, a lot of your property is protected. So that’s the basic, it’s a deal.
So how do you know if it’s a good deal for you? And it usually is if you qualify, which we’ll get into in the next Three Minutes To Financial Freedom. But how does the deal work? So the debt that qualifies for discharge is given up in exchange for any property that is not exempt. So the big words, are discharged and exempt. Discharge means the debt’s gone. It actually doesn’t disappear. Technically, it just means it can never be collected, but it’s what you’re going for. That’s what you want, those debts to go from being valid debts that can be collected against you to entirely discharged. And most of the debts that come through my door are completely dischargeable. Any unsecured payday loans, signature loans, medical bills, old utilities, phone bills, basically anything without collateral tied to it and that is not criminal fines or costs or student loans backed by the government, which they don’t let you discharge, go figure or child support. Those are things you can’t discharge. Most of your other unsecured will be in there.
So that’s what you want. Dischargeable is good. What do you give up? You’re non-exempt property. Your unprotected property. So what is protected? Let’s start there. Your home. In Oklahoma, we’ve got a great homestead exemption. Basically anything up to an acre in city limits and 60 acres and beyond the outside of city limits. Exempt, you can think of exemption as what the government thinks you need to get by. Most of your personal stuff, your furniture, your dining room table, your bedroom stuff, your TVs, all that, exempt, protected. They can’t touch it. What’s not exempt? Well, pretty common sense. You’ve got a lake cabin on Tenkiller. They’re going to be able to take that. You’ve got a second vehicle. They’re going to be able to take that.
So how do you figure out this deal? Do I want to do a seven? Well, do you have a lot of debt you can get rid of, and hopefully, you don’t have much property that you have to give up. So that’s a seven. That’s Three Minutes to Financial Freedom. For more information, you can reach me, a chapter 7 lawyer in Oklahoma, at oklahomacityattorney.pro.