Bankruptcy Law Discussion Forum

[Anonymous User]

What is it? What does a bankruptcy lawyer typically do?

How competitive is it to become one? How should I make moves as a law student to get involved?

Is bankruptcy law biglaw or bust?

[Anonymous User]

"Bankruptcy law" comes in many different shades. If you're talking about consumer bankruptcy (Chs. 7/13), it's not competitive at all to become a practitioner in that area. Lots of solos do it, but it's not exactly illustrious work, nor overly profitable, though you can do well. I've never done this kind of work, but, you can imagine, it's a lot of no asset resolutions, very few adversary proceedings, etc. Pretty run of the mill.

If you're talking about big, sexy Ch. 11 cases, then yeah, you're looking at biglaw, and all the competitiveness that comes with getting into a biglaw firm. If you're interested in this, take Bankruptcy and related coursework, but getting good grades is more important, and express an interest when interviewing/working at your firm of choice.

ETA: Remember too, bankruptcy is counter-cyclical. Right now, for example, bankruptcy practices around the country are (to my understanding) running pretty slow. At the best(/worst) of times, bankruptcy can be feast or famine, and that is doubly true when the economy is strong.

[Anonymous User]

Right now, for example, bankruptcy practices around the country are (to my understanding) running pretty slow.

ITT: Someone who doesn't know what they're talking about makes a fool of themselves.

[Anonymous User]

I was a paralegal doing BK work from 2011-2013. It was consumer BK, but I was in the unique position of working on Ch 11 for most of my time. Consumer Chapter 11 work is marginally better than 7/13.

However, this was creditor-side. I'll tell you hwat, it sucked. My supervising attorney used to joke that we were the HMO of law firms. The clients (banks) suck, are disorganized, have crazy high turnover, and are often unreasonable. Oh, and they're incredibly cheap. We had to get authorization in increments of single digit hours for any sort of motion practice. They paid a flat rate for standard work (Proof of Claim/Motion for Relief).

As for the lawerly work, it was very low-level. Most of it was reviewing the POCs and MFRs prepared by barely trained paralegals/legal assistants. Basically making sure the lien position is correct, loan amount is right, etc. They would have to go to hearings and basically do nothing. File objections to plans. It was all very tedious and frankly boring.

Oh, and the pay sucked. I think regular associates started out at $49-55k in Southern California. My boss was Counsel and made $144k.

However, I think there could be a decently profitable niche in doing consumer Ch 11 BK on the debtor side. With property prices in Southern California, it's incredibly easy to be over the Ch 7/13 limits just by owning a home. These BKs are easy, and the attorneys get paid well. But still, I'd rather get out of law than do BK work again.

[midwestrocks]

I work in Houston and bankruptcy is red hot here right now. I assume that's spilling over to Kirkland/Weil and other firms that specialize in restructuring.

[Anonymous User]

Right now, for example, bankruptcy practices around the country are (to my understanding) running pretty slow.

ITT: Someone who doesn't know what they're talking about makes a fool of themselves.

This is an unnecessarily douchey comment, but I'm passing on what I've heard/read/experienced. A quick Google search turns up several articles to this effect, but, y'know, YMMV

[Anonymous User]

I can only speak for my district (Colorado), but filings have been down for a few years now. We have processed 2008 related BKs, lots of people have enough equity in their houses to make chapter 7 undesirable and chapter 13 unaffordable, and a lot of the debt is student loan debt. We are starting to see an uptick due to falling oil prices, but it hasn’t yet been the flood we were expecting.

A few perspectives on the OP. In this district, much of the chapter 11 debtor side work is handled by a few boutiques. Big firms mostly represent corporate clients on the creditor side. Again, it depends district to district, I’m sure.

I work for a boutique that does a little on all sides, everything but commercial debtor work.

Consumer debtor work is tough because there are a lot of crappy attorneys (and unlicensed petition preparers) who are constantly undercutting your fees, so it becomes a question of how many cases you need to process per month at the flat rate to pay the bills. If you like helping people out, though, nothing in my day beats telling someone who is buried in debt that they can get out of it and we can help.

If you can get secured creditor clients, they pay a monthly bill, which is nice. The way to do that is to let everyone you know in law school know that you want to do BK, and keep reminding them that you do BK when you get out, so hopefully they refer their client to you when they get the bankruptcy notice. BK is like tax- if you don’t practice it, you generally want to run away quickly when you encounter it.

We represent a lot of chapter 7 trustees, which can be entertaining. A lot of suing secured creditors on little secured transactions screw ups. Again, that is about who you know, and usually involves a willingness to take crappy cases for a while before they hand you one that might pay (we get paid at the end of the case, based on our hourly bills adjusted to the benefit provided to the estate).

[Anonymous User]

Right now, for example, bankruptcy practices around the country are (to my understanding) running pretty slow.

ITT: Someone who doesn't know what they're talking about makes a fool of themselves.

This is an unnecessarily douchey comment, but I'm passing on what I've heard/read/experienced. A quick Google search turns up several articles to this effect, but, y'know, YMMV

Biglaw bankruptcy practices are very busy right now as the oil and gas industry is basically collapsing. They'll remain busy for the foreseeable future as the ripple effects from these bankruptcies work their way through the system + the cheap debt from recent years comes due.