Today is Monday September 26, 2011 and there's a reason I'm starting this article with today's date. I had no plans of writing anything today. My week is segmented into research days, planning days, and writing days. Today was supposed to be research day, and it is for that reason that I decided to share these thoughts with anyone that may be looking into bankruptcy. I had been doing some initial research on the bankruptcy exemptions in New York State, and what I found during that research turned out to be the motivation for this article.
I have spent considerable time researching, learning, and interacting with bankruptcy attorneys in an effort to clearly understand the many aspects of bankruptcy. However, I still find it necessary to research specific aspects of the Bankruptcy Protection Codes. With any type of law, there is always the possibility of changes and new interpretations and bankruptcy is no exception.
In my work I have found that many people spend countless hours researching bankruptcy before they finally contact an attorney. I have always been an advocate of consumers learning as much as possible about bankruptcy in order that they can properly assess the choice for or against filing. I've also been quite insistent that part of that research include a meeting with an experienced bankruptcy attorney. I have never been more certain of that last fact then I have become today.
During my research today, I came upon a well respected and heavily trafficked site whose sole purpose is to provide bankruptcy information to consumers and have those same consumers fill out information so that their information can in turn be given to an attorney in their area. Many of you will be familiar with these types of "lead pages", which are in great abundance in just about every imaginable category.
This information I found on this particular site was surprising to me in that it contained facts about the New York State Bankruptcy Exemption Rules that were no longer accurate. In January of 2011, the governor of New York signed into law new rules concerning the state bankruptcy exemptions.
The administrators of the site in question, have had nearly 10 months, at the time of this writing, to have updated the information on their web pages to reflect the correct data. I did not look deeper into this site to see what other information might be incorrect, but it would be safe to assume that there must be other outdated information as well.
So the question of how can this hurt you can be answered in this way: Had you been researching bankruptcy and a major concern of your was the ability to keep your family vehicle, the exemption rules are the aspects of bankruptcy that come in to play. The information you find may or may not be accurate, and the resulting decision would have be based on false information.
Obviously, had you decided to contact an attorney to get more information, you would receive correct and accurate facts relating directly to your circumstance. Regardless of the accuracy of the information on the website, there is no doubt that your attorney will be able to provide you with all the correct data. However, the part of this equation that could prove dangerous to your financial health would be if the incorrect information on any website, led you to believe that bankruptcy was not a viable answer to your financial hardship.
Clearly it is important to learn and understand everything you can about something as important as your financial life. Bankruptcy is a major step and should never be undertaken without the advice and representation of a qualified and experienced bankruptcy attorney. There is nothing more critical to your success then being armed with true and accurate information. When it comes to bankruptcy or any aspect of law, only an attorney can provide you with what your really need to know to come to an intelligent decision.
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