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Asset case closed as a no asset case
Assets which are abandoned by dismissal are considered administered and not subject to attack in a reopened case (if your client was honest about it and did not underreport its worth). The trustee has to list each asset on his reports to the UST and indicate in the report what the trustee will do to administer the asset. The report to the UST filed in your client's case must now say the assets listed in your case are abandoned.
Those reports to the UST are a real pain in the ***. The clerk for the trutee has to list each and every asset listed on the schedules and report what is being done in the case to administer the asset. We used to have to file these reports every six months, but I believe they are now only required once a year. A clerk at the UST's office reviews the report and requires amendements for each and every asset on the schedules and not on the report (multiply the reply to a UST inquiry on chapter 7 case by 100 or so and you get the idea of the complexity of getting the report of asset cases right. When I was on the panel five years, the report got to be about seven inches thick (multiple volumes).)
This is why trustees continue 341a hearings and avoid filing a notice of assets until they are sure there is an asset to administer. As soon as a notice of assets is filed the trustee has to add the case to the list of asset cases and start filing reports on the case.
So that was a long answer to a short question, but if you went to the US Trustee's office to read the trustee's report on the case, you would see the asset was intentionally abandoned by the trustee and that the UST essentially approved the abandonment by allowing the trustee to close the case as a no asset case.
For those of you out there telling trustee's about assets the debtors own at 341a meetings, and then not filing amendments to list the assets, you are leaving the assets on the table to a reopened case.
dennis
The post was migrated from Yahoo.