Personal bankruptcies up 45% in 2023 in Eastern, Southern districts of NY

In the first four months of 2023, individuals in the Eastern and Southern districts of New York filed 45 percent more personal bankruptcies than in the same period a year before. Filers made 3,887 petitions in the first four months of this year, compared with 2,680 in the same period of 2022. PincusCo included chapters 7, 11 and 13 in the analysis if the filer was an individual.

The filings are not directly related to real estate but indicate a general trend of more distress in the market. In addition, this data is not exclusive to New York City, as the Eastern district includes Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island and Long Island, while the Southern district includes Manhattan, Bronx, Westchester, Rockland, Putnam, Orange, Dutchess, and Sullivan.

The Eastern district is more active in filings, averaging about 75 percent more filings each month over the period starting January 2021. In eight of those months it had more than double the number of filings than the Southern district had.