Michigan Bankruptcy Blog
On March 1, 2023, the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a decision with important implications for parties involved in debt collections regulated under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA)[1]. The decision, in Bouye v. Bruce[2], examined the FDCPA’s one-year statute of limitations for claims of improper debt collection practices, finding that the one-year period of limitations applied to each discrete violation of the FDCPA claimed by the plaintiff.
Taking effect on September 22, 2022, the Michigan Uniform Assignment of Rents Act (MUARA) will impact tenants’ rights in situations where landlords default on their loans. This Act also strengthens lenders’ rights, under certain circumstances, to appoint receivers to collect rent payments if one of their borrowers defaults on a loan secured by an income-producing property.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit recently ruled in a case involving a Chapter 13 debtors’ attempt to shield contributions to a 401(k) retirement account from “projected disposable income,” therefore making such amounts inaccessible to the debtors’ creditors.[1] For the reasons explained below, the Sixth Circuit rejected the debtors’ arguments.
A statute must be interpreted and enforced as written, regardless, according to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, “of whether a court likes the results of that application in a particular case.” That legal maxim guided the Sixth Circuit’s reasoning in a recent decision[1] in a case involving a Chapter 13 debtor’s repeated filings and requests for dismissal of his bankruptcy cases in order to avoid foreclosure of his home.
On January 14, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court decided City of Chicago, Illinois v. Fulton (Case No. 19-357, Jan. 14, 2021), a case which examined whether merely retaining estate property after a bankruptcy filing violates the automatic stay provided for by §362(a) of the Bankruptcy Code. The Court overruled the bankruptcy court and U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in deciding that mere retention of property does not violate the automatic stay.
Case Background
The City of Chicago (the “City”) impounded respondents’ vehicles for failure to pay fines for motor vehicle infractions. Thereafter, each respondent filed a Chapter 13 bankruptcy petition and requested the return of their vehicle. The City refused to return the vehicles, and the bankruptcy court in each case found the City’s refusal to be a violation of automatic stay. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, concluding that by retaining possession of the debtors’ vehicles after they declared bankruptcy, the City had acted “to exercise control over” the debtors’ property in violation of the automatic stay.
When an individual files a Chapter 7 bankruptcy case, the debtor’s non-exempt assets become property of the estate that is used to pay creditors. “Property of the estate” is a defined term under the Bankruptcy Code, so a disputed question in many cases is: What assets are, in fact, available to creditors?
A new amendment was recently enacted in Michigan which expands the scope of receivership proceedings, which are a liquidation alternative to bankruptcy. Previously, the receivership statute in Michigan applied only to receiverships over commercial real estate. Now it is applicable to all operating businesses in Michigan, and commercial and industrial loans irrespective of whether real estate collateral is involved.
Once a Chapter 7 debtor receives a discharge of personal debts, creditors are enjoined from taking action to collect, recover, or offset such debts. However, unlike personal debts, liens held by secured creditors “ride through” bankruptcy. The underlying debt secured by the lien may be extinguished, but as long as the lien is valid it survives the bankruptcy.
A Chapter 13 bankruptcy plan requires a debtor to satisfy unsecured debts by paying all “projected disposable income” to unsecured creditors over a five-year period. In a recent case before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit (the “Sixth Circuit”), the court grappled with whether a Chapter 13 debtor’s wages that are contributed to an employer-sponsored retirement plan are considered disposable income under the Bankruptcy Code.[1]
One of the objectives of the Bankruptcy Code is to ensure that each class of creditors is treated equally. And one of the ways that is accomplished is to allow the debtor’s estate to claw back certain pre-petition payments made to creditors. Accordingly, creditors of a debtor who files for bankruptcy are often unpleasantly surprised to learn that they may be forced to relinquish “preferential” payments they received before the bankruptcy filing.
