Bradford Botes

Did you know that the average student loan debt amount is over $37,000? To cover this increasingly expensive amount, you’ll will likely need some sort of financial aid. Each year, many new graduates leave college excited to begin their journey in the workforce or to continue their education at the Master’s level. Too often, though, these young people begin their working lives saddled with suffocating amounts of education debt. Some graduates even leave college with more debt than the national average. The attorneys at Bond & Botes, PC — lawyers who provide financial solutions to clients in Alabama, Mississippi, and…Read   More

If you have followed the news at all during the last week, you know that the stock market has seen significant turmoil. Cryptocurrency and Commodity markets have seen the same ups and downs. Both social and the traditional media have been abuzz with stories of great financial losses and gains. With all of this going on, I was invited to appear on the Matt & Aunie show Tuesday morning to share my perspective on what the turmoil on Wall Street means to the average consumer on main street. You can listen to a podcast of my appearance here. The Matt & Aunie show is hosted by Matt Murphy and Andrea…Read   More

Today marks the 12th anniversary of the implementation of the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005 (BAPCPA). The BAPCPA, bought and paid for by the banks and credit card companies, represented the biggest overhaul of the bankruptcy system in our country in almost 30 years. At the time the legislation was passed, I served on the board of directors of the National Association of Consumer Bankruptcy Attorneys (NACBA).  NACBA opposed the legislation fiercely but after seven failed attempts, and immense lobbying expenditures by the credit card industry, congress finally succumbed. The legislation was passed by the Senate…Read   More

Bond & Botes, P.C. is proud to announce the winner of our 2017 Financial Hardship Scholarship: Telvin J. Miller. Mr. Miller graduated from Wenonah High School  earlier this year and is currently attending the University of South Alabama. The $2,000 Bond & Botes scholarship will help covers some of Telvin’s college tuition costs. About Telvin J. Miller Telvin’s High School experience was no easy feat. He sacrificed a “normal” high school life of spending time with friends for balancing school work, football, a part time job, and helping raise his younger siblings. With these challenges came many achievements. He excelled…Read   More

At Bond & Botes, P.C., we work with a variety of people who have fallen on financial hard times and, in some cases, need to file for bankruptcy. Of all the financial problems we encounter, few compare to being caught in the trap of payday lending. We believe that the state of Alabama is not doing enough to protect our citizens from the predatory payday loan industry, and we are working to make our voices heard. We’ve created a petition to demand that our state legislators take concrete action to reform payday loans in our state. What Is a Payday…Read   More

Something special happened twenty-five years ago, today.  On January 2, 1992, Suzanne Shinn (at that time, she was Suzanne Carlson – more on this later) began work as an attorney with Bond & Botes, P.C. In the quarter century since, she has become a dear friend, confidant, respected advocate, and mentor to many.  Suzanne and I have worked together, commiserated together, prayed together, celebrated together, mourned together, and cried together – but more often we have laughed together, and, well, experienced life together.  Suzanne was the very first attorney that Mark Bond and I invited to join our firm. Bond…Read   More

We get calls from people almost every day asking how much we charge to file bankruptcy. They have apparently already decided, perhaps upon the advice of a friend or family member, that they need to file bankruptcy and are making their way through a list of law firms asking this question alone to determine who they can pay the least to be the caretaker of their financial future. Now think about this for a moment. The person’s finances are at a point where they feel that they have no option but to file bankruptcy and they are making a decision…Read   More

On September 1, 2016; Chapter 13 Standing Chapter Trustee D. Sims Crawford became United States Bankruptcy Judge D. Sims Crawford. Having earned his undergraduate degree at the University of Alabama and his law degree at Cumberland School of Law, Judge Crawford has been a member of the Alabama Bar since 1995 and brings a wealth of experience to the bench. Prior to taking the bench, Judge Crawford served for twelve (12) years as the Standing Chapter 13 Trustee for the Northern District of Alabama, Southern Division and for seven (7) years prior to that as the former trustee’s staff attorney….Read   More

As corny as it may sound, I like to think of the folks I work with as family. Many of the attorneys and staff members at Bond & Botes have been with us for a long time. We have shared good times and bad. There have been weddings, children born, graduations, birthdays and so much more. Not everybody can say that they enjoy what they do for a living and the people that they do it with. I know that I am fortunate to be able to say both and thank God daily for his blessings. My partner Gail Donaldson…Read   More

For many of our clients, the automatic stay is the best thing that has happened to them in a long, long time. In fact, in my opinion, there is no other provision of the law that can do more good for an individual more quickly than the automatic stay. The Automatic Stay So what is the automatic stay? It is really central to everything we do in bankruptcy. My partners and I have blogged on the topic several times. In a previous post, I noted “On the day a bankruptcy petition is filed, in fact at the very moment the…Read   More