Question about Judgements

[chelseagirl]

If a judgement is filed, how is it determined how it will be paid? Wage garnishment or is it a lein on your property? Is there actually a sheriff sale of personal property? I read that there are different ways the money is collected. Do the courts decide, or the creditor you owe the money to?

[cjtx]

The creditor needs to apply to the court for the specific remedy.

In some states personal property and homesteads are exempt from garnishment, but the sheriff may still execute a judgment on non-exempt property and auction it.

In those states where your homestead is protected, creditors may get a lien on the property so they will collect when you sell it.

If they have your banking info, they may try to garnish it if it's not exempt, and in some states they may garnish your wages, but this is only after the court approved their request to execute the judgment that particular way.

[flacorps]

If a judgement is filed, how is it determined how it will be paid? Wage garnishment or is it a lein on your property? Is there actually a sheriff sale of personal property? I read that there are different ways the money is collected. Do the courts decide, or the creditor you owe the money to?

Both. A judgment is just wallpaper until a judgmentholder either gets your voluntary cooperation or takes steps to compel some transfer of what is the debtor's property to the judgmentholder's pocket.

State law typically provides any number of remedies, and ways to make those remedies meaningful.

First, there is typically the ability to compel the judgment debtor to disclose under oath what he has and where he gets more of it ... assets and sources of income.

In an ideal world, there is a nice fat bank or brokerage account that is disclosed (or gets found rather quickly by a PI's asset search) and the court issues a turnover order ... which the debtor must obey or go to jail for contempt. But if those accounts ever existed, debtors have typically drained them or settled the case long before that could ever happen. So what's next?

After that, the creditor can often place liens on property, which cloud title to real property and can be foreclosed on if the debtor makes no move to sell.

The creditor can also often obtain a continuing wage garnishment. If the debtor doesn't make much money or changes jobs often, this can be pointless however. Garnishments can be adjusted by the court (often to near zero) when the debtor claims state and federal exemptions.

The creditor can obtain levies that would allow them to seize vehicles. Typically they would only want a newer valuable, paid off vehicle, since older vehicles and vehicles that are not paid off would not yield much money, and some of that might have to be returned to the debtor to take account of the state-law exemption.

The creditor could seize furniture and personal goods, but typically it's not valuable enough to bother with ... costs of seizure, storage and sale (you have to split it up into lots and sell it piecemeal, unlike a vehicle or boat or plane) mean that the creditor won't get much. Sometimes the government does this with the property of a high-profile tax cheat, but it's more to get publicity and make a point to the public than it is to make the government anything like whole again.

[chelseagirl]

THANKS.....That is very interesting. You answered my question. I surely DON'T want a judgement against me!!!

[SIXPAK GQ]

THANKS.....That is very interesting. You answered my question. I surely DON'T want a judgement against me!!!

sue them back! for not following the law