By Michael J. McCormick, Esq., McCalla Raymer Leibert Pierce, LLC (Roswell, GA) The Escrow Analysis For purposes of Regulation X, an escrow analysis is the accounting that a servicer conducts in the form of a trial running balance for an escrow account to: Determine the appropriate target balances; Compute the borrower's monthly payments for the next escrow account computation year...

Jack N. Zaharopoulos was appointed as the Chapter 13 Standing Trustee for the Middle District of Pennsylvania on May 1, 2021. He succeeded Charles DeHart after his retirement. After graduating from Marquette Law School in Milwaukee in 2002, Zaharopoulos worked at a general practice firm, doing debtor and creditor bankruptcy work, family law, and even some criminal cases. After gaining...

Even though the Model Plan in the district provides that the applicable commitment period starts from confirmation, the debtor may not apply pre-confirmation payments toward payments made during the applicable commitment period but must apply those payments in addition to the applicable commitment period payments. (Applebaum) In re Batoha, 2022 WL 1310943 (Bankr. E.D. Mich. May 2, 2022) Case Summary...

By Craig Shopneck, Chapter 13 Standing Trustee for the Northern District of Ohio Retired It was many months ago when Mike Joseph asked, if, as a retired trustee, would I be interested in writing an article for the NACTT Academy. This may seem like a rather straightforward task but before putting pen to paper I needed time to reflect not...

By Lawrence R. Ahern, III, Brown & Ahern (Nashville, TN) Part IV Two More Things Trustees Should Know About the Small Business Reorganization Act of 2019 Introduction Four bankruptcy-related bills were enacted during the 116th Congress and signed into law on August 23, 2019.1 The legislation affected both business and consumer cases. One bill, the Small Business Reorganization Act of...

By The Honorable William Houston Brown (Retired) Legal rate of interest applies after foreclosure judgment. Applying New Jersey common law on merger, the mortgage was merged into a final order of judgment of foreclosure; therefore, the mortgage was no longer the basis for determining post- judgment interest. The debtor obtained a sale from which the mortgage creditor would be paid,...

By William H. Brown, Academy Editor & Advisor The First Circuit held that under § 362(c)(3)(A), upon the repeat filing by Chapter 7, 11 or 13 debtors within one year of dismissal of a prior pending case, the automatic stay terminates entirely on the 30th day after filing of the subsequent case as to the debtor, property of the debtor...

By Angela M. Scolforo, Staff Attorney to Herbert L. Beskin, Chapter 13 Trustee for the Western District of Virginia “How long?” is a common plea. When my children were young and we travelled they would ask, “how long before we get there?” In scripture we find David, Habakkuk and Zechariah (none of whom were Debtors’ attorneys) all crying out, “how...

On June 26, 2017, Bradford W. Caraway was appointed as the Chapter 13 Standing Trustee for the Northern District of Alabama, Southern Division. He replaced D. Sims Crawford who had been appointed as a United States Bankruptcy Judge for the Northern District of Alabama. Trustee Caraway maintains his office in Birmingham. At the time of his appointment as Standing Trustee,...

By Wm. Houston Brown, United States Bankruptcy Judge (Retired) Discharge - Section 523(a)(8)(A)(ii) does not include “loan.” Denying Navient’s motion to dismiss debtors’ complaint, reviewing the split of authority on whether § 523(a)(8)(A)(ii)’s “educational benefit” included loans, and finding no controlling authority in the Tenth Circuit, the Court concluded that Congress made a distinction between “loan” in § 523(a)(8)(A)(i) and...