On 8 September 2022, sitting en banc, the Eleventh Circuit held that a debt collector’s communication of a customer’s information to the debt collector’s private, third-party commercial mail vendor was not actionable under...more
On defendant’s petition for rehearing in Hunstein v. Preferred Collection and Management Services, Inc., a panel of the 11th Circuit recently issued a new, but not improved, decision involving the Fair Debt Collection...more
On 29 June 2021, the Court by a 5-4 vote, denied an emergency request by a group of rental property managers and trade associations to lift the stay imposed by the D.C. Circuit regarding the constitutionality of the Centers...more
As detailed in a recent alert, U.S. District Judge Dabney L. Friedrich, in Alabama Association of Realtors v. U.S. Department Of Health And Human Services, found that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) did...more
A federal judge in Washington, D.C. has ruled that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) exceeded its authority in issuing a nationwide eviction moratorium aimed at protecting renters facing hardship in the...more
Under the Massachusetts Motor Vehicle Retail Installment Sales Act (RISA), creditors repossessing automobiles are entitled to recover a deficiency from debtors, so long as the creditors deduct the “fair market value” of the...more
Federal Judge Enjoins Enforcement of Massachusetts Attorney General’s Debt Collection Ban Under First Amendment - In response to the COVID-19 emergency, the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office (“AGO”) issued a set of...more
On Monday April 20, 2020, Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker signed into law an emergency act that will temporarily ban almost all eviction and foreclosure proceedings statewide during the COVID-19 pandemic. That law, H4647...more
The rapid spread of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (“COVID-19”) has caused unprecedented disruptions to the U.S. economy, both at the state and national levels. On March 10, 2020, the Governor of Massachusetts declared a State...more
The 1st Circuit Court of Appeals recently affirmed a district court’s ruling to allow in evidence a mortgage loan account history printout that included entries from two prior loan servicers as a business record exception to...more
In Obduskey v. McCarthy & Holthus LLP, the U.S. Supreme Court held unanimously that entities engaged in no more than security-interest enforcement (here, nonjudicial foreclosure) are not debt collectors under the Fair Debt...more
Should a Massachusetts homeowner be allowed to claim a homestead exemption in a principal residence that is also used for business or other commercial purposes? ...more
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court recently held in Dorrian v. LVNV Funding, LLC, that “passive debt buyers” are not “debt collectors” required to be licensed under the Massachusetts Fair Debt Collection Practices Act...more
The U.S. Supreme Court has held that the filing of a proof of claim in bankruptcy proceedings with respect to time-barred debt is not a “false, deceptive, misleading, unfair, or unconscionable” act within the meaning of the...more
In a decision that should be read as a warning to mortgage industry participants doing business in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the state’s high court has validated a condominium associations’ so-called “rolling”...more
On March 31, 2015, West Virginia Governor Earl Ray Tomblin signed SB 542 into law. This new law amends frequently litigated sections of the West Virginia Consumer Credit Protection Act (“WVCCPA”), W. Va. Code section 46A, in...more