Bankruptcy in New York, specifically
What bankruptcy looks like when you file from anywhere in New York
Where a New York bankruptcy case is filed and heard
Which federal court hears your case depends on where you live. If your address is in Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island, Nassau or Suffolk, you file in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of New York (EDNY), which sits at the Conrad B. Duberstein U.S. Courthouse at 271-C Cadman Plaza East in Brooklyn and at the Alfonse M. D’Amato U.S. Courthouse in Central Islip. If your address is in Manhattan, the Bronx or Westchester, you file in the Southern District of New York (SDNY), which sits in lower Manhattan and in White Plains. Cases are assigned to a judge by the clerk, not chosen.
Wherever you file, the mechanics are the same federal process. As of the court’s current fee schedule, the filing fee is $338 for Chapter 7 and $313 for Chapter 13; fees can be paid in installments, and in some Chapter 7 cases waived entirely. Because we keep offices on Long Island, in Queens and in Brooklyn, we handle cases in both the Eastern and Southern Districts.
Your meeting of creditors will be on Zoom
Everyone who files bankruptcy has to attend one meeting, the “341 meeting,” named for the section of the Bankruptcy Code that requires it. It is not a hearing, no judge attends, and in most consumer cases it lasts under fifteen minutes. Across both the Eastern and Southern Districts of New York, the U.S. Trustee now holds these meetings by video on Zoom rather than in the courthouse. Each trustee has a standing meeting ID and passcode that appears in the notice the court mails after you file, and if a video appearance is genuinely impossible, the U.S. Trustee can approve another arrangement.
Your trustee is assigned, not selected. In consumer cases, a Chapter 7 panel trustee or a standing Chapter 13 trustee runs the meeting and reviews your paperwork under oath. Wherever your case is filed in New York, our clients come to the office nearest them, where our attorneys prepare them beforehand and appear on the Zoom with them.
The homestead exemption, and what downstate equity actually looks like
New York protects a set amount of equity in a home you own and live in, and the amount depends on the county. The five boroughs, Nassau, Suffolk, Rockland, Westchester and Putnam sit in the highest tier. As of April 1, 2024 that figure is $204,825 per owner, published by the New York Department of Financial Services under CPLR 5253, with the next scheduled adjustment on April 1, 2027. Counties further from New York City fall into lower tiers. The exemption applies to a house, a condominium unit, a mobile home, and shares in a cooperative apartment corporation (CPLR 5206(a)(2)).
Downstate, this matters because of arithmetic. A long-held home anywhere in New York City, on Long Island or in Westchester, carrying a small remaining mortgage, can hold equity several times the exemption. That does not make bankruptcy impossible, but it changes the analysis from “which chapter is cheaper” to “how do we protect the house,” and it often points toward Chapter 13 rather than Chapter 7.
Two-family houses, three-family houses, and co-ops
Two- and three-family houses are common across downstate New York, and owner-occupied multi-family homes raise specific issues in bankruptcy. If you own one and live in part of it, three things follow: your rental income counts as income for the means test and your budget schedules, the local rules require you to give the Chapter 13 trustee copies of the leases for any property you rent out, and the trustee will look closely at the value of the building, because equity above your mortgage and your homestead exemption belongs to your creditors.
New York treats co-op shares as personal property, but the homestead exemption covers them by name. The bankruptcy court’s local rules also treat co-ops specifically: relief-from-stay motions involving a security interest in a co-op use a dedicated court form, and Chapter 13 debtors must document that maintenance and management fees coming due after filing have actually been paid.
When high New York property values push a case out of Chapter 13
Chapter 13 has a debt ceiling. As of April 1, 2025, you qualify only if your unsecured debts are under $526,700 and your secured debts are under $1,580,125 (11 U.S.C. § 109(e)); a temporary combined limit of $2.75 million expired on June 21, 2024 and has not been restored. In high-value New York markets, the secured-debt figure is the one people trip over: a first mortgage, a home equity line, and an unpaid second on a downstate building can add up past $1,580,125 without the owner ever feeling wealthy.
When that happens, Chapter 13 is simply unavailable, and the realistic options become Chapter 11, often subchapter V, for which the debt limit is $3,424,000 as of April 1, 2025, or a Chapter 7 with a plan for the house. This is not a rare problem in New York, where home values in the boroughs, on Long Island and in Westchester routinely exceed these thresholds once a second mortgage or line of credit is added in.
What New York filings actually look like
The right chapter tends to track how you live. Renters, who make up a large share of households in the boroughs and in New York’s cities, usually have no house to save and most often file Chapter 7 to discharge unsecured debt. Homeowners behind on a mortgage more often turn to Chapter 13, which lets them cure the arrears over the life of the plan and keep the home. Suburban Long Island and Westchester filings skew more toward homeowners than dense urban filings do.
Self-employment is common across New York, from freelancers and contractors in the city to small-business owners on Long Island. It is the single most frequent reason a bankruptcy takes longer to prepare: there are no pay stubs to hand the trustee, so income has to be documented a different way. Wherever you file in the state, we build that documentation before your case goes in, so the trustee has what they need at the 341 meeting.
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We help clients engage in crucial compliance with Disclosure, the open and honest conveying of financial information required in the bankruptcy petition, schedules, statement of financial affairs, and other documents filed in the case. Disclosure also includes information requested at the creditor’s meeting, where a bankruptcy trustee (and possibly creditors) can ask the debtor far-reaching financial questions and request backup documentation about the debtor’s economic circumstances.
We strategize with clients, especially debtors in emergency situations, to expedite filing the bankruptcy petition so that the Automatic Bankruptcy Stay provides immediate protection from creditors the minute the case is filed. The automatic stay quickly and broadly protects the debtor and their assets from any manner of debt collection: foreclosure sales, vehicle repossessions, bank restraints, wage garnishment, collection lawsuits, and eviction actions. However, the automatic stay is not unconditional, impervious, or permanent: secured creditors, landlords, and other creditors can move to lift the stay if they show their rights may be impaired. We oppose those motions and strategize to protect the stay by ensuring the debtor timely meets requirements and submits a fair plan.
The goal in most bankruptcy cases is a Bankruptcy Discharge, a Court Order issued at the end of a case granting the debtor permanent legal forgiveness of pre-petition debt. In Chapter 7 (the most-used chapter), if there are no serious issues, the case can be administered and a Discharge Order issued approximately four months after the petition is filed. Some cases have issues involving inadequate disclosure, unnecessary spending, excess income, potential equity in assets, and/or potential avoidable transfers. Most debts are dischargeable; however, government fines, student loans, and taxes need to be reviewed by our office for whether and how they can be discharged. After obtaining a Discharge, we help the debtor pursue a financial Fresh Start, rebuilding finances and credit. Creditors or the Trustee can, in extreme situations, object to discharge based on misrepresentation, lack of cooperation, unexplained loss of assets, abusive spending, avoidable transfers, or excessive income; we represent and defend our clients in all such situations.
In Chapter 13, Chapter 11, and Subchapter V cases (all of which reorganize, extend, and potentially reduce debt) we focus on achieving Confirmation of a Plan. A Confirmation Order is a Court Order making a proposed reorganization plan binding on all parties. In Chapter 13 and Subchapter V, confirmation of a plan (maximum five-year term) is decided primarily by the Court based on the Bankruptcy Trustee’s recommendation. In Chapter 11 there is more variation in plan duration (which can exceed five years), and the amounts/methods of distribution and method of confirmation are voted on primarily by impaired creditors. Once a plan is confirmed, the debtor must fulfill its terms in order to obtain debt forgiveness at the end of the plan; if a debtor with a confirmed plan defaults, creditors and/or the trustee can seek relief from the automatic stay or have the case dismissed.
