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Attorneys At Law

Attorneys practicing in and around the Chicagoland area. Experienced in the practice areas of Real Estate Law, Mortgage Foreclosure Defense Litigation, Business Law, & Estate Law.

Attorneys At Law - Attorneys practicing in and around the Chicagoland area. Experienced in the practice areas of Real Estate Law, Mortgage Foreclosure Defense Litigation, Business Law, & Estate Law.

Understanding Today’s Real Estate: Short Sales, Foreclosures and More 4/26

The ubiquitous “short sale” has changed the working environment for both the real estate attorney and the title insurance company. However, the short sale has affected the attorney and the title company in very different ways. What should the attorney do when the clients comes in and state that they want to sell (or buy) at a short sale? How does the title company view the short sale transaction?

This month’s presentation will offer both perspectives. Lora Fausett will present the short sale as viewed by the attorney. Dick Bales will examine the short sale through the lens of the title company.

April 12, 2012
Noon – 1:15 pm
Naperville Country Club

NATIONAL MORTGAGE SETTLEMENT

The Federal Government & Attorneys General have reached a landmark settlement with major banks. The agreement covers roughly $25 billion in relief for distressed borrowers, states and federal government. After many months of negotiation, 49 state attorneys general and the federal government have reached agreement on a historic joint state-federal settlement with the country’s five largest loan servicers:

Ally/GMAC
Bank of America
Citi
JPMorgan Chase
Wells Fargo Who May be Eligible for Assistance

Because of the complexity of the mortgage market and this agreement, which will be performed over a three-year period, borrowers will not immediately know if they are eligible for relief. Borrowers from states who did not sign the settlement will not be eligible for any of the relief directly to homeowners. Borrowers from Oklahoma will not be eligible for any of the relief directly to homeowners because Oklahoma elected not to join the settlement.

The settlement provides assistance for:

Homeowners needing loan modifications now, including first and second lien principal reduction. The servicers are required to work off up to $17 billion in principal reduction and other forms of loan modification relief nationwide.

State attorneys general anticipate the settlement’s requirement for principal reduction will show other lenders that principal reduction is one effective tool in combating foreclosure and that it will not lead to widespread defaults by borrowers who really can afford to pay.

Borrowers who are current, but underwater. Borrowers will be able to refinance at today’s historically low interest rates. Servicers will have to provide up to $3 billion in refinancing relief nationwide.

Borrowers who lost their homes to foreclosure with no requirement to prove financial harm and without having to release private claims against the servicers or the right to participate in the OCC review process. $1.5 billion will be distributed nationwide to some 750,000 borrowers. Additional information is available at: http://www.nationalmortgagesettlement.com/help.

DuPage County Bar Association’s Judiciary Committee Issues Recommendations for Applicants for Associate Judge

Wheaton, Illinois — Colleen McLaughlin, President of the DuPage County Bar Association has released the recommendations just made by its Judiciary Committee which is responsible for reviewing the qualifications of those applicants seeking to fill the current DuPage County Associate Judge vacancy.

The recommendations are the result of an investigation and screening process conducted by the DuPage County Bar Association’s Judiciary Committee.
The Committee consists of a cross-section of 16 attorneys who are appointed for a three year term by the DCBA President and approved by the DCBA’s Board of Directors and three of the DCBA Past-Presidents. Several new Committee members are appointed each year based on expiration of terms. To ensure representation from a broad spectrum of its membership,DCBA’s bylaws require that the Judiciary Committee be comprised of a set number of members having practice experience in each of three categories (5-10 years, 10+, 15+).

Candidates are evaluated upon the following criteria: 1) legal knowledge and ability which includes professional experience; 2) integrity; 3) judicial temperament; 4) diligence and punctuality; and 5) health.

Following investigation and candidate interviews, the committee rates each candidate by one of the following categories: Highly Recommended, Recommended, or Not Presently Recommended.

The names of those candidates rated Highly Recommended are as follows:
• William Belmonte of Bloomingdale
• Alan J. Brinkmeier of Elmhurst
• Kimberly A. Davis of Winfield
• Robert E. Douglas of Carol Stream
• Nicholas J. Galasso of Wheaton
• Scott M. Hardek of Elmhurst
• John P. Kelly of Wheaton
• John J. Kohnke of Glen Ellyn
• Jeffrey S. MacKay of Wheaton
• Brian N. Nigohosian of Wheaton
• John J. Pcolinski, Jr. of Naperville
About the DCBA

The DuPage County Bar Association whose members makes it Illinois’ largest County Bar Association, was founded in 1879 and represents 2,500 member attorneys dedicated to advancing the practice of law and promoting the legal profession through community service and education.

Courtesy of www.dcba.org

New bill requires landlords to report contractor information

Janet Portman – Rent It Right

According to Section 2101, all landlords will have to file “information returns” (in most cases, the IRS Form 1099-MISC) when they pay a service provider (such as a plumber, accountant or landscaper) $600 or more during the tax year. The 1099 filing requirement applies only to payments to service providers who are not incorporated, (with the exception of lawyers). In other words, payments to corporations (other than legal corporations) are exempt, as are payments for goods (such as appliances or furnishings). Landlords must also send these 1099s to the provider.

Article

Q. I’ve heard that the new tax bill signed by President Obama in late September 2010 affects landlords — that we will have to file 1099s when we pay contractors over a certain amount. Is this so? What a pain!

A. You heard right. On Sept. 27, Obama signed the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010, a hefty bill that aims to spur small-business hiring through measures designed to make credit more available and to give small businesses many tax breaks. But deep within the bill there’s a section titled “Reducing the Tax Gap” (Subtitle B, Part I), and you can imagine what that means — bringing back into the IRS tax coffers some of the money that the rest of the bill leaves in the pockets of those small businesses. The landlord provision is one of them.

According to Section 2101, all landlords will have to file “information returns” (in most cases, the IRS Form 1099-MISC) when they pay a service provider (such as a plumber, accountant or landscaper) $600 or more during the tax year. The 1099 filing requirement applies only to payments to service providers who are not incorporated, (with the exception of lawyers). In other words, payments to corporations (other than legal corporations) are exempt, as are payments for goods (such as appliances or furnishings). Landlords must also send these 1099s to the provider.

Until now, only landlords who were actively engaged in running their business (by managing day-to-day activities, for example) were required to file 1099s. “Investors” (owners who turned over all or most management duties to someone else) didn’t have to file them. The new law declares that even investor landlords must send 1099s, and it applies to payments made after Dec. 31, 2010.

And how, you may wonder, will filing 1099s result in more money to the tax man? Once the IRS receives the landlord’s 1099 showing that it paid a contractor a specified amount, the IRS will expect that contractor to pay taxes on that income. Contractors know this, and feel pressured to report — and pay — accurately, or face fines. According to the Senate Finance Committee, the number of increased tax filings will result in additional revenue of $2.5 billion over a period of 10 years.

The reporting requirements apply only to landlords whose rental income is over a threshold amount, which is yet to be determined, in regulations that will be issued by the secretary of the Treasury. And the law includes some exceptions.

People who are renting their principal place of residence on a temporary basis — such as renting your home while you spend three months away on vacation — are exempted, as are active members of the military and members of the “intelligence community.” Anyone for whom the requirements would pose a “hardship” may also be exempted; the definition of a hardship will also be contained in regulations that are yet to come.

So the message for most landlords who report income from their rentals is this: Get ready to prepare and send 1099s to every covered service provider who maintains your property or helps you run your business, if you pay that provider $600 or more per tax year.

And incidentally, there’s a twist: To complete a 1099, you’ll need an individual’s Social Security number (or the business’s Employer Identification Number). Undocumented workers — those who are not authorized to work in the United States — won’t have SSNs, and some will supply phony numbers. Landlords who submit 1099s with fake SSNs may get caught by the IRS, which checks the numbers against their records.

While the IRS has historically not turned this mismatch over to immigration authorities, they have gone back to the hiring firm (the landlord) and demanded that the landlord begin backup withholding for that worker (such withholding must begin within 30 days of being notified by the IRS of the mismatch). The IRS has a very detailed publication on this topic, called Publication 1281, Backup Withholding for Missing and Incorrect Name/TIN(s).

The penalties for failure to file informational returns have been increased. These penalties alone will narrow the “tax gap” to the tune of $421 million over 10 years, according to the Senate Finance Committee.

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