It rarely is just one thing. Sure, sometimes a bankruptcy can be greatly helped along by a significant change or problem in your life. Losing a job or suffering a loss of hours, a divorce or a major health condition, like a stroke or heart attack can all contribute to your needing to consider filing for bankruptcy protection.
But it can also be incremental, with seemingly limited and mild setbacks that shouldn’t send you spiraling down into financial distress. However, when those setbacks pile up on one another, they can come together to leave you with few options outside of bankruptcy.
For young adults, who have recently graduated from college, are full of optimism and often school debt, may believe that taking on additional debt with credit cards is a good tactic. They can use a credit card to cover an unexpected car repair or the need to fly to their parent’s home.
But when a few of those “unexpected” expenses combine with your needing to change jobs or the loss of a job, the student loans, credit card debt, food, phone, rent and additional car repair bills can suddenly leave you feeling overwhelmed.
While bankruptcy typically cannot be used to discharge student loans, except in cases of extreme hardship, it can help alleviate many if not all of your other debt. Moreover, with all of the credit card debt removed, you can often regain your financial ability to repay your student loans and begin reducing that often-substantial amount.
With the debt gone after a Chapter 7, you are able to move forward and will better understand the warning signs of financial trouble, and be better able to make strategic decisions to protect your future financial health.
Dailyfinance.com, “Bankruptcy Can Happen, Even With a 700 Credit Score,” Adam Ward, November 24, 2014