NH Bankruptcies Up By 30%

More and more people in the state are finding it hard to pay their bills, from mortgages to credit card balances.

Concord Attorney Mary Stewart says she’s been handling bankruptcies for more than a decade.

But she says she’s seeing more potential clients than she’s seen in a long time.

I think I used to talk to maybe two or three clients a week. And so that number has increased. So not all those result in bankruptcy cases but the more people you’re talking to, the more people that are looking for help, so I’m definitely setting more initial appointments….

Stewart says many of the people who come to her are having problems paying their mortgages.

But others are struggling, because their debt has gotten out of hand.

They may just have unsecured credit card debt or medical bills that they can’t pay and they had gone to credit counseling and credit counseling suggests that they talk to a bankruptcy attorney.

According to The U.S. Bankruptcy Court for New Hampshire, more than 2500 people have filed for bankruptcy through August.

Less than 1900 had filed in the same period last year.

A large portion of those bankruptcies were filed after a homeowner got behind on his or her mortgage.

Attorney Walter Maroney specializes in helping people who find themselves in this predicament.

An awful lot of people planned on refinancing mortgages. They got into mortgages two to three years ago, planned on refinancing before the step up period hit, and have found because of the spiraling effect of the mortgage crisis and its effect on home values here in the state that they now owe more than their house is worth or owe more than anyone is willing to lend on it right now.

Bankruptcy attorneys in other states say what’s happening in New Hampshire is happening across the country.

And they say most of these homeowners end up losing their houses through foreclosure.

Every house that goes into foreclosure likely means yet another mortgage that doesn’t get paid.

It’s these non paying mortgages that plunged Wall Street into the crisis it is mired in now.

Officials at the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys or NACBA say many foreclosures could be averted.

They say that could happen if Bankruptcy judges were given the authority to change mortgage terms for debtors, which current law doesn’t allow.

Maureen Thompson of NACBA says they’re asking lawmakers to make that change in the 700 billion dollar bailout bill now being considered in Congress.

you know people who were sold these abusive subprime loans with abusive fees and penalties and interest rates could go into bankruptcy courts and under a court supervised process work out with their creditors some new terms. The one thing we like about that is that comes at no cost to the U.S. taxpayer.

While mortgage debt relief would certainly help many New Hampshire debtors get back in the black, many homeowners still struggle.

High energy prices are also causing problems.

Credit Counselors in New Hampshire and Vermont say high food, fuel, and mortgage prices caused twice as many people to seek their services in 2006 than in 2007.

Bill Brooks of Consumer Credit Credit Counseling Service says he’s worried about heating fuel for this coming winter.

We do see a lot of people still paying off last season’s heating bills and that’s scary. That’s very scary because come October, its going to start happening, cold mornings you’re going to have to turn the furnaces on and heat the place. So then come January and February, that’s when the money really starts to pour out.

Federal and state officials have announced plans to help families and senior citizens cope with high heating costs.