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Arizona

In October 2005 the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention & Consumer Protection Act officially went into effect. Since then, the number of bankruptcy filings in Arizona has dropped dramatically (scroll down to see the numbers). The biggest reason for these changes lies in the fact that not only are consumers less willing to suffer the same long-term credit effect, but fewer are able to qualify in light of the new bankruptcy laws. Due to the changes, a person whose income exceeds the median in their state must first pass the means test in order to qualify. Listed below are the median income figures for Arizona:

2-person families: 51,681
3-person families: 58,127
4-person families: 65,050
5-person families: 56,336
6-person families: 53,513
7-or-more-person families: 53,887

The means test is basically an examination of your income and expenses to determine whether you can reasonably afford to pay back at least part of the debt. More importantly, your expenses are not your actual expenses. Instead they are based on state, county, and federal averages, so if you are overspending on anything, you can’t expect too much mercy from the courts.

For this reason and many others, many people in the state have begun turning to debt management firms to lower their debt payments and help them become debt free much faster.

Recent Arizona Bankruptcy Figures

2004: 30,907
2005: 39,689
2006: 7,532

Arizona felt the effects of the bankruptcy law changes as validated by the considerable drop offs in filings from 2005 to 2006. The number of personal bankruptcy filings declined by more than 80 percent between these two years in Arizona, which is far above the national average. There is a wide array of reasons for this. The primary cause of the reduction in the number of people filing bankruptcy has to do with the fact that more consumers are being forced into Chapter 13 “payment plan” or reorganization bankruptcies, instead of the preferred Chapter 7.

To learn more about Arizona credit & debt topics, visit these pages:

Arizona Consumer Credit Counseling Services
Arizona Debt Collection
Arizona Bankruptcy Laws