New Hampshire bankruptcies remain at low levels

New Hampshire bankruptcy filings in February continued at their record-low pace.

Some 59 individuals and businesses filed for bankruptcy protection in February – just three more than the modern record set in January, though still the lowest number recorded in any February since 1987.

Indeed, the low number of bankruptcies has persisted despite the resurgence of the pandemic during December and January, with some restaurants and hotels going into hibernation following a muted Christmas.

The filings have sunk been in the double digits for 11 straight months, dropping in April 2020, just after the pandemic first struck the state’s economy.

The February total is almost 90% lower than the 506 bankruptcies filed in January 2010, in the midst of the last recession. And it’s a little more than half the 115 filings of February 2020, the month before the pandemic hit.

There have been only a few business filings. In December two individual filings involved business-related debt and two businesses filed directly. In January, there were three business-related filings but only one was directly filed by a business, and in February there were four. One was filed by the owner of a dentist office, and the other – the only direct business filing – was the dentist office itself. It was: Merrimack Valley Dental Care PLLC of Nashua, which filed on Feb. 11 for Chapter 7 protection. Assets were $50,001 to $100,000. Liabilities were $500,001 to $1 million.