Daniel Gershburg

by: Daniel Gershburg, Esq.  

I recently had a Landlord Tenant case in Brooklyn New York where the Landlord threw out the Tenants belongings the day after the tenants were evicted.  Lets just say thats bad.  Instead, as required by law, put the property of the tenant into storage for 30 days and inform the tenant that the property is in storage, that they should come pick it up, and that if they do not, it will be sold.

Trust me, it will save you a ton of time and money in the end.  

Daniel Gershburg Esq., is a Bankruptcy & Real Estate attorney serving  clients in Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan, Staten Island, Long Island and Westchester.  Mr. Gershburg has given lectures and presentations to both attorneys and the community at large surrounding Bankruptcy and financial advocacy in the New York City area.  Currently he is working on his first book giving practical advice about repairing troubled credit and how to improve credit post Bankruptcy

By: Daniel Gershburg, Esq.

I have said for some time that credit cards and New York City Bankruptcy trustees are not involved in a vast conspiracy to preclude you from filing for Bankruptcy in New York.  So long as your credit card debts are legitimate, and you have no way out, credit card companies will not, despite incessant phone calls, stand in your path to obtaining Bankruptcy relief.

A fellow attorney’s horror story over the weekend buttressed my above point.  This fellow attorney had a client who, approximately one week before coming into his office, charged approximately $15,000.00 on three separate credit cards in two days.  The attorney was not aware of this when he filed the bankruptcy.  He made reasonable inquires of his client who told him that he stopped using credit cards months ago.  All seemed to be well during and after the meeting of the creditors.  However, approximately 2 weeks later the attorney began receiving letters from American Express, Visa, etc. listing the enormous charges the client ran up immediately prior to retaining his attorney.  They did not stop going after him and even filed what is known as an adversary proceeding against him alleging fraud to receive monies back.

The point of this story is not to scare you.  Because chances are the above problem client shares no similarities with you.  As opposed to really being down on his luck this client had one goal in mind-to take advantage of the system.  He was likely employed, likely not downsized, likely did not have health concerns or a huge mortgage to pay.  Likely did not have kids schooling and clothing to worry about.  If you legitimately cannot pay your bills each month, the creditors, no matter what their nasty collection agents say, will not stop you from filing for Bankruptcy.  There is a huge difference between the above problem client and you.  Which is why you should not be fearful of the Bankruptcy process.  It can and will provide more relief than you think.

Daniel Gershburg Esq., is a Bankruptcy & Real Estate attorney serving a diverse clients in Brooklyn, Queens, Manhattan, Staten Island, Long Island and Westchester.  Mr. Gershburg has given lectures and presentations to both attorneys and the community at large surrounding Bankruptcy and financial advocacy in the New York City area.  Currently he is working on his first book giving practical advice about repairing troubled credit and how to improve credit post Bankruptcy

By: Daniel Gershburg, Esq.

So you live in New York and you’ve got a creditor…and they are after you.  Let’s say you don’t believe the charge is accurate.   You legitimately think that the charge is either not yours or that you have paid it off in full.  If you listen to what the nasty credit collectors tell you, you’ll likely believe you are still liable and that there is nothing you can do.  FALSE.  There are a myriad of things you can do if you believe you are not responsible for the charge.  The first thing you should do is to write a letter to all three credit reporting bureaus (Experian, Transunion, Equifax) and ask them to investigate the charge.  If they find the charge is still valid, then you use another weapon…validation.  You, or your friendly attorney, write a letter to the actual collection agency who continues to haggle you at work/home, etc. asking them to “validate” the charge.  Validation doesn’t mean the collection agency can simply look at the charge and say “Yes this is valid.”  Instead, the collection agency must make reasonable efforts to determine the paper trail of the charge and how it leads to you.  However, collection agencies aren’t so great at paperwork, and they may very well drop the charge entirely if they cannot validate it.   Just a small tip to help consumers in the fight against collection agencies.