This week I hosted a woman’s club at my home. The club raises money to be used at the grade school for fine art extras. The women meet once a month, and donate their time and energy fundraising to give their children the best possible educational opportunities. When we were sitting around the dining room table, introducing ourselves and our occupations, I mentioned that I am an attorney and that I prepare estate plans. When I asked who had estate plans in place, none of t

Recently, Julia spoke to high school students at Ridgewood High School as part of C.A.R.E.Chicago. CARE stands for Credit Abuse Resistance Education and it aims to teach high school students about the many consequences of consumer credit abuse. It is a group of Chicago area lawyers and judges whose goal is to educate students about the pitfalls of easy credit and students loans, before they get into trouble. “High School students will become college students who will be inu

As part of my work here at DiMonte and Lizak, I file bankruptcy petitions for individuals and businesses. When I tell people what I do, they usually recite a television ad which states that you can file a bankruptcy while keeping your house, car and possessions. They then ask whether its true. The answer is yes. Sometimes. It depends on the value of your assets and the exemptions given to you by the state in which you reside. A Chapter 7 bankruptcy is the typical bankruptcy f

When you cannot pay your bills, eventually you may be sued. Once you are sued, and a judgment is entered against you, a creditor can use the court system to seize your property and collect on the judgment. The creditor and creditor’s attorney have many legal tools in his or her arsenal to collect money to satisfy the judgment. In this newsletter, we have written about them before - wage garnishments, citations to discover assets and real estate levies to name a few. It is usu

When you enter into a contract with another party, you expect the other party to do what they say they will - to repaint your house, to pay you for the product you send them or to repay the money you lend them. But sometimes they do not. You hire DiMonte & Lizak, LLC, we file suit, and the court enters a judgment in your favor. A judgment is known to the collection bar as a "Hunting License." With it, we can initiate post judgment collection proceedings. Some post judgment co