Hi all: In Sept 1998, I was one of the two parties named on a lawsuit which resulted in a judgement of $9220 total. My questions: 1) Am I liable for the entire amount or only half?? 2) I am refinancing my house and this judgement needs to be paid off in escrow BUT WE CANNOT FIND THE PLAINTIFF on the lawsuit to pay this off!!! The person may have left the country. What are my options now in order to close on this refinancing?? Is there some law that says if you geniuinely cannot find the plaintiff from the last contact info that plaintiff left with you that judgement can be say left alone/set aside etc??? Please help!!!
All. More than likely they don't care if they get 50% from you, 50 from the other defendant, or 1% from you, 99 from the other defendant, just whoever they can get to pay first. Is the lender aware that you cannot find the plaintiff? If such a law exists, its a state law.
Hi : Thanks for answering. The broker for the lender is heping me search for the Plaintiff in the judgement. In 1998, plaintiff only eft me a phone number to contact her when I have the money to pay. Now when we call that number, the perosn answering says " NO such person". We drove by a house that Plaintiff used to own--its been knocked down and rebuilt. So both the broker and I don't know what to do.
I am in Californai. I think all SOL on judgements are 10 years but it gets dropped off the credit report in 7 years. Judgement is dated Sept 1998
I was hoping that the lender gets this waived cos its realy not my fault that plaintiff cannot be found to collect the money. But was looking for some laws to support my case.
This is the queue for the LEGAL EAGLES and REAL ESTATE EAGLES of the board to chime in: Marie, Whyspers, to name a few. Hopefully they will have information that can help you.
See if escrow will do a withhold for you. This is where they hold the money in an escrow account for the plaintiff so that you can go ahead and close. I don't know what happenes if you can never find the plaintiff. Maybe you can go to court and get the judgement vacated or something.
If I can get ESCROW to withhold, how much would they withhold?? The entire amount of the judgement for $9220 or half or only a portion of it?? There were two parties named on the suit. Am I liable for half or whole amount??
I bet you can. If you file a motion to vacate and the Plantiff fails to respond I think you win by default. In order to properly notify/serve the plantiff I believe you can make arrangements to do so via newspaper classified ad. This would be excellent as the possibilty of the plantiff seeing the ad and showing up to answer would be remote, even when they are findable (new word). I have no idea what I'm talking about here either, when it comes to Judgements. LOL
I'm gonna doubt vacating the judgment will be that easy. When you file a petition to vacate, they ask for a reason. I don't think you want to say the judgment should be vacated because I can't find the plantiff to pay. The judge will just say pay the court clerk and we'll hold it until they surface. You need someting valid like improper service, etc. If time is of the essence, you can pay the court clerk.
I'm with butch on this one. It's my understanding that most judgments contain errors. Whether or not those errors are grounds for voiding or vacating the judgment, I don't know. Might be worth getting a copy of the judgment and having an attorney look it over. If he finds something and the plaintiff is out of the country, you may get lucky.
