There are three main costs in filing bankruptcy:
1. The attorney fees;
2. The court costs; and
3. The credit counseling classes.
If you handle the whole case yourself, you can save the attorney fees. The bankruptcy court calls this a "pro se" filing. In the Dallas area, bankruptcy attorney fees range from around $1700 on the low end to around $3,200 on the high end with lots of bankruptcy lawyers falling somewhere in between. You will need a copy of the forms and stuff but the bankruptcy court website has a place where you can find those.
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Once you get them all figured out and filled in, the bankruptcy court charges a filing fee ($299 for a Chapter 7 and $274 for a Chapter 13). Even if you save the attorney fee by doing everything yourself, the court still is going to charge you the filing fee.
You also have to obtain the credit counseling (typical cost $50) and the financial management course (usually another $50). The United States Trustee's office maintains a list of places that can guide you through the class and provide you with one of the required certificates.
Now, I'll let you in on a little secret...
There's a way to get the court to waive the filing fee. If you qualify for that waiver, then you'll also qualify for a waiver of the credit counseling fee. In order to qualify for these waivers, the court needs a lot of financial information from you and they compare the information you compile to the written guidelines for granting waivers (which can be obtained from the court's website). There will be a hearing in front of the bankruptcy judge and that's where the decision whether to give you a waiver will be made.
There are several criteria, but the main one is just how broke you are. What I mean is this-- everyone who files bankruptcy is broke. Only about 2% of bankruptcy cases will qualify for the waivers. They have to save the fee waivers for "the brokest of the broke." (I just made that phrase up, the court doesn't actually call it that.)
So technically, it's possible to file bankruptcy for free. It's hard, but it can be done if you have the stomach for it.
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