Maryland

Having 51% consumer debt doesn’t necessarily mean that the debtor has ‘primarily’ consumer debt.

Bankruptcy Judge Michelle Harner decided that a mortgage servicer must allow a chapter 13 debtor’s continued use of an online payment platform.

Bankruptcy courts are divided on whether the calculation of a trustee’s commissions includes distributions made to co-owners of property that the trustee has sold.

Bankruptcy Judge Michelle Harner held that a wholly unsecured, subordinate lien may be stripped off in chapter 13 even if the lien arose before the debtor owned the property.

Judge Harner does the best she can to ease the burden imposed on a debtor by student loans.

Decision by Bankruptcy Judge Michelle Harner demonstrates the flaw in the Fourth Circuit’s rule requiring parallel proceedings in bankruptcy court and in arbitration when disputes are both core and non-core.

A creditor without knowledge of bankruptcy isn’t always entitled to file a late claim in chapters 7, 12, and 13, Judge Harner says.

The addition of Section 362(b)(3) is held not to affect the ‘freeze rule’ with regard to lapsing security interests.

Midland Funding expanded to allow unlicensed debt collectors to file claims.

Even if an exemption is lost after filing, a Code provision must bring property into the estate, Fourth Circuit holds.