N.H. bankruptcy filings fall in Oct.

The number of New Hampshire bankruptcies dipped a bit in October, another indication that the economy has been treading water over the past few months, but it’s not sinking. Some 439 bankruptcies were filed last month, down from 466 in October 2009 the 481 filings in September 2010. But at this point, its unclear whether this is the start of a decline or the continuation of the up-and-down pattern over the last few months. Filings went down in June, up in July, down in August, up in September and now down in October. With two months of filings left in the year, the state is running about 400 filings more than last year, when a total of 5,122 were filed annually — the most ever except for in 2005, when there was a mad rush before federal bankruptcy law changed to make filing more difficult. But the rate of increase has slowed, hovering about 10 percent rather than at the more than 30 percent growth of two years ago. Almost all of the filings were personal bankruptcies except for seven, an increase of three business bankruptcies since September: • Cutting Edge Sheetmetal LLC, Weare. Filed Oct. 1, Chapter 7. Assets: $27,847.81. Liabilities $393,503.39. • Regency Homes Inc., Nashua. Filed Oct. 5, Chapter 7. Assets: $0. Liabilities: $281,034.51 • Stray Communications Inc., Auburn. Filed, Oct. 7, Chapter 7. Assets: 33,985.05. Liabilities: 101,906.88 • Southfield Village Development LLC, Peterborough, filed Oct. 14, Chapter 11. Assets: Less than $5,000. Liabilities: from $1 million to $10 million • SSN Painting Company LLC, Weare. Filed Oct. 20, Chapter 7. Assets: $950. Liabilities $99,044.04. • WWW Holdings Inc. (dba The Way We Were Outlet), Nashua, filed Oct. 22, Chapter 11. Assets and liabilities: $500,000 to $1 million. • Momenta Inc., Northwood. Filed Oct. 23, Chapter 11. Assets and liabilities: $1 million to $10 million. — BOB SANDERS/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW