Expert: Mark J. Markus- California Bankruptcy Attorney - 3/18/2009

Question
QUESTION: When I filed for Bankruptcy my lawyer asked me if we had any IRA's, 401k's,
etc... At the time when he asked we did not have any so I told him no.   
However, earlier in the year we had cashed out one of our IRA's because we
had moved and were paying rent, utilities, etc for two houses so we needed
the money to live on to make ends meet until one of our houses sold.  That
was at the beginning of 2008.  I ended up loosing my job so then we started
using the money to live off of.  Also our house did not sale.  Our bills got to
be too much with all our debt so that is when we filed Chapter 7.  Now that
I'm doing my taxes for 2008 I'm wondering if that was something my Lawyer
needed to know.  We spent the money early on in 2008 and when he asked
we really didn't have it because it was closed.  He never said anything about
having any accounts like that before we filed.  He asked us if we had any "at
the time of filing".  What should I do?  Thanks in advance for any help.

ANSWER: What is the status of your bankruptcy case, and on what date was it filed?

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: I got my discharge of debtors letter December 16th of last year.  It was filed Aug
26th of 08.  Thanks

Answer
If your case is over, then I don't think there's anything to worry about.  If you cashed out the IRA within 6 months prior to filing your bankruptcy case, it should have been included in your means test income, but otherwise I don't see what impact it could have had anyway.