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When you are living in challenging circumstances, every small victory counts. The fact that most people who buy lottery tickets have less employment income than they need to make ends meet surprises no one who has ever lived paycheck to paycheck. Winning a free lottery ticket is worth the price of the original ticket, if…

In the corners of the Internet dedicated to the debt-free lifestyle, people will tell you that you should never borrow money under any circumstances. People who manage to do this are relying in part on good luck. Who can own a house without taking out a mortgage loan?  Only people who inherited houses from relatives…

Reading the news can fill you with dread, and most Internet content is designed to play on your insecurities, even if they are of a personal nature, but you can also count on the Internet to find evidence that there are other people out there who are even more hopeless than you are. According to…

It is infuriating when old people give you outdated financial advice that makes it sound like your financial problems are all your fault. They tell you that you are wasting money by paying rent instead of a mortgage, but they do not have a plan for how you can qualify for a mortgage and get…

If you have accessed the Internet at any time in the past decade, you have probably found content about how people your age do not understand the financial struggles that young people are facing, and that you and your peers are unfairly blaming the young generation for their dismal financial situation. Now think about the…

As the spring weather starts to feel like summer, you often see advertisements encouraging people to spend their tax refunds on new furniture, a vacation, or a down payment on a new car to add to the trade-in value of their old car. Your frenemies on social media, or the lifestyle influencers whose content you hate-watch,…

In an era characterized by the Great Resignation and where journalists have started to call young adults who have never had a paid job “the new unemployables,” people like you are an increasingly rare breed.  You have a salaried job and a retirement account, and you own your house.  You are in your 60s and…

You have been considering filing for bankruptcy for years, but things are starting to feel different now that you have set a date in your mind to file your petition for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection. Like an unhappily married spouse counting down the days to Divorce Monday, or for that matter, like a fiancé who has…

It is easy enough to get in over your head with debt even when all parties involved are being honest and abiding by the law. When you look at the cost of rent, utilities, and healthcare, it is understandable to feel like big companies get away with fraud and extortion on a regular basis. For most Americans,…

The law recognizes several situations in which a person has control of the assets that belong to a person or legal entity but does not personally own those assets. For example, the personal representative of a deceased person’s estate must authorize or initiate all transactions by the estate, but the estate, not the personal representative, owns…

All this aspirational claptrap about how much money you need to be middle class is downright depressing when, with every passing pay period, you fall farther and farther behind on your debts. Even if you discharge your debts in bankruptcy, you will probably never be middle class, but gratitude doesn’t cost a penny, so take comfort…

Broken promises are a theme that runs through the lives of many borrowers of federal student loan borrowers. Their college advisers told them that it would only take eight semesters to graduate, so that, between federal grants and part-time employment, they would only need to borrow a small amount, which they would be able to repay…

The best thing about filing for bankruptcy protection is that it discharges your eligible debts, but the worst thing about it is that you have to start rebuilding your creditworthiness from zero. Secured credit cards are a good place to start, but they have such low credit limits that, if you are living paycheck to…

Young people are understandably in a panic about the economy. No matter how hard they work, they cannot afford anything. A good month is when you can keep up with payments on your buy now pay later (BNPL) installments on last month’s groceries. Your friends would let you stay with them, but your friends’ landlord is strict about…

When you were younger and less wise, you started a business, but within five years, it went the way of most new businesses. Creditors came after you, but you could not keep up with the payments after your business venture folded, and you eventually filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy. That was more than eight years ago, and…