Money Judgement

greenspun.com : LUSENET : Repossession : One Thread

I understand that by law the lender must go to court within one year of repossession in order to obtain a Money Judgement Order giving them the right to pursue for shortfall.

Okay - so if they don't do it within the year - what gives them the right to go to court many years after the event to claim a MJO?

Personally I don't have a bean to my name and nothing to loose even if it does go to court - but just wondered about the legal wranglings here.

-- (_Believer14@excite.co.uk), February 17, 2001

Answers

As part & parcel of the introduction of the Civil Procedure Rules in April 1999, I understand that any existing case not brought before the Courts by April 2000, was automatically stayed.

As I suspect that the Money Judgement Order would be considered, to all intents and purposes, to be Stage 2 of the Possession Order/Proceedings, then it may well be that lenders are now effectively 'stayed' from seeking a delayed MJO ?

This may go some way towards explaining the well documented harrassment of borrowers on this website, via solicitors, rather than through the courts, in the hope that people will cave in under the sustained pressure.

-- Vic Harper (victorcharper@aol.com), February 18, 2001.


Thanks Vic. This is very enlightening. I must research this more. Many thanks indeed.

-- (_Believer14@excite.co.uk), February 19, 2001.

What an interesting insight, Vic. That would explain why the only case I know of where a Money Judgement was successfully obtained after a gap of some years occurred in September 1999, and *not* after April 2000.

-- Eleanor Scott (eleanor.scott@btinternet.com), February 19, 2001.

Is there anyone using this board who has had a money judgement obtained against them after April 2000? Do we know of any cases where this has happened?

Halifax have told me that they can and will go to court and get a money judgement order against me if I don't fill in their I & E forms. Hmmmmmm.

-- (_Believer14@excite.co.uk), February 19, 2001.


This is a standatrd response by Halifax. They make it sound easy, but in *my opinion* this is not necessarily the case. The first arguement that they have to overcome is undue delay which is definately covered by the CPR. And if they use the sort of response that they were allowing you time to get back on your feet, then that does not constitute a level playing field. ie they deliberately waited until a) you were worth sueing or b) you had more to lose by not settling. Hmmm do we see a pattern emerging here. Then we start talking about the negligent valuations, negligent marketing etc etc. It is not as eay as they make it appear.....

-- Tim Heath (tim_n_heath@hotmail.com), February 19, 2001.


Exactly. Even if the lenders do have 12 years (which is in doubt in many very cases) the Limitation Act does not necessarily take precedence over all other considerations, and undue delay is a big factor with the courts now.

Ask three different people who work for the lender to account for the undue delay, and you'll probably get three different excuses.

-- Eleanor Scott (eleanor.scott@btinternet.com), February 25, 2001.


Further to Vic's earlier posting I have done some digging into his comments that lenders actions to obtain a Money Order my be stayed. I have recieved this response from the Lord Chancellors Department : "Any existing proceedings not brought before a judge at a hearing on paper between 26 April 1999 - 25 April 2000 shall be stayed. Further detail is set out in the Part 51 Practice Direction."

Part 51 of the Practice Direction can be found at:

http://www.open.gov.uk/lcd/civil/procrules_fin/pdp-51.htm

Any comments or further insight would be welcomed.

Regards Tim

-- Tim Heath (tim_n_heath@hotmail.com), February 27, 2001.


Interesting, this:

"Existing proceedings after one year:

19 1.If any existing proceedings have not come before a judge, at a hearing or on paper, between 26 April 1999 and 25 April 2000, those proceedings shall be stayed.

2.Any party to those proceedings may apply for the stay to be lifted.

3.Proceedings of the following types will not be stayed as a result of this provision:

a.where the case has been given a fixed trial date which is after 25 April 2000,

b.personal injury cases where there is no issue on liability but the proceedings have been adjourned by court order to determine the prognosis,

c.where the court is dealing with the continuing administration of an estate or a trust or a receivership,

d.applications relating to funds in court.

4.For the purposes of this paragraph proceedings will not be "existing proceedings" once final judgment has been given. "

Do shortfall cases, where people are 'only' being threatened with action, count as 'existing proceedings'? Even if not, the lenders nevertheless have to justify the undue and inordinate delay in contacting ex borrowers and then implying/threatening legal action. They can't have it both ways.

-- Eleanor Scott (eleanor.scott@btinternet.com), March 03, 2001.


I think, from reading the whole of this thread, the question of a proceeding being stayed is refering to the obtaining of the MJO. The MJO is part and parcel of the repossession proceedure and therefore, if one has not been got by the dates mentioned above then it could be that that is it as far as the lenders etc are concerned. For voluntary repos where no court case was needed things may be different - there has been no action to be stayed so it may be possible to go around this legal problem and continue to chase those who went voluntarily.

-- Matt (mattyc@ntlworld.com), March 04, 2001.

Does this mean that if it's too late for them to get a MJO then they can't take us to court even if they want to? Am I right in thinking that without a MJO there can be no court case?

-- (_Believer14@excite.co.uk), March 04, 2001.


Voluntary repos might not involve a court case but surely they do involve a legal process? (A legal process which can be 'stayed'?)

-- Eleanor Scott (eleanor.scott@btinternet.com), March 07, 2001.

My advice was that there is no legal "proceeding" if you hand over the keys, as I did. It's actually the worst thing I could have done, but my Lender was so unco-operative and I had nowhere else to turn at the time. The upshot of this is that they have 12 years to chase you from the date they sell the property - but I hope someone will correct me because this specific point matters a lot to me!

-- Too scared to say (iwasduped@yahoo.com), March 07, 2001.

In view of the recent postings my situation begs one further question. I have managed to piece this together as my ex wife had the property and I knew nothing of what happened around the repo, sale and shortfall until I got my first letter. It appears that a date was set for court and the day before the hearing my ex handed the keys in (circumstances around which I am unsure ie was she advised to or not?). It's my belief that because they had a court date and summons had to have been serverd etc, that this matter would have been on paper and therefore meet the guidelines for being stayed. What other views on this situation are there?

-- Tim Heath (tim_n_heath@hotmail.com), March 07, 2001.

Sorry, I missed a bit of my response (over zealous mouse clicking!) In response to the upshot being that teh lender has 12 years from the date of sale I would say that this is what the lenders claim. In reality the date of sale has no practically no bearing on the starting point as there are a lot of other factors involved. ie Mortgage terms, Date of last payment etc etc. In theory it is possible to argue that the start point is date of "sustained default". I saw this in my Mortgage T&Cs and got a copy of the "Indemnity Claim Form" (quite by accident) that lists the date of sustained default as over 12 years ago in my case. May just well be one more document you want to ask for if you had an MIG.

-- Tim Heath (ti,_n_heath@hotmail.com), March 07, 2001.

I wonder what rule states the time span please advise

-- Steph (samace@btinternet.com), March 11, 2001.


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