In April 2024, the Alabama Supreme Court issued an opinion in Alavest, LLC v. Harris that significantly expands the application of Rule 19 of the Alabama Rules of Civil Procedure to post-foreclosure proceedings when it held...more
Everybody is familiar with the part of a wedding where the audience is given an opportunity by the person officiating to express why the couple about to be married should not proceed with the ceremony, telling all present to...more
In In Re: Bay Circle Properties, LLC., No. 1812536, 2020 WL 1696303 (Ala. April 8, 2020), the Eleventh Circuit dismissed an appeal by a guarantor alleging a wrongful foreclosure, because the guarantor did not own the...more
A trustee in charge of administering a trust has many duties. A trustee appointed pursuant to a deed of trust, however, is different. The duties of a deed of trust trustee are exceptionally narrow. A recent opinion...more
Under California’s “tender rule,” a borrower suing to halt or unwind a wrongful foreclosure sale generally must allege that it tendered the amounts due on the loan before the sale. The rationale underlying the tender rule is...more
For nearly three years, one of the rapidly developing areas of California foreclosure law has focused on whether a borrower has “standing” to challenge a wrongful foreclosure based on defective assignments of the note or deed...more
On February 18, 2016, the California Supreme Court issued its eagerly anticipated decision inYvanova v. New Century Mortgage Corporation, et al., Case No. S218973, finding that a borrower has standing to state a claim for...more
A recent decision by the California Court of Appeal held that the practice called “dual tracking” – when a lender forecloses on a property while the borrower’s application for a loan modification is under review – violates...more
In Haynes v. McCalla Raymer, LLC, No. 14–14036, __ F. 3d __, 2015 WL 4188459 (11th Cir. July 13, 2015), the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the Northern District of Georgia’s grant of summary judgment in favor of...more
In a wrongful foreclosure lawsuit, the plaintiff may recover tort damages – i.e., any damages proximately caused by the foreclosing defendant, the Fourth District Court of Appeal held last week. Miles v. Deutsche Bank...more
“There are no free houses,” began the decision issued by the Court of Appeal on March 23, 2015 in Boyce v. T.D. Service Company (B255958). Examining three years of litigation in bankruptcy court, unlawful detainer court, and...more
In recent years, lenders have been forced to defend a record number of so-called “wrongful foreclosure” lawsuits. However, several Tennessee court rulings issued this year indicate that if lenders act quickly and offensively,...more
In the wake of the California foreclosure crisis, one of several arguments relied on by borrowers facing foreclosure (and their attorneys) in “wrongful foreclosure” suits has been that some aspect of the statutory foreclosure...more
Last summer, the Georgia Court of Appeals ruled that a foreclosure advertisement must identify the secured creditor on whose behalf a foreclosure sale is being performed. See Reese v. Provident Funding Assocs., LLP, 317 Ga....more
California's Legislature responded to the residential foreclosure crisis by, among other things, enacting new statutes aimed at clarifying the rights of borrowers facing foreclosure and imposing new restrictions on...more
Any follower of this blog or the mortgage crisis at large will — sadly — not be surprised by the seemingly never-ending news of foreclosure misdeeds by the nation’s biggest banks. Recent news reveals a particularly...more
We have long been skeptical of most loan “repurchase” or “indemnification” demands made by big banks against the third-party originators (i.e., correspondent lenders) who sold those loans to the big banks many years ago....more
In Campbell v. Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems, Inc., the Campbells borrowed money from a lender to purchase a residence. No. 03-11-00428-CV, 2012 Tex. App. LEXIS 4030 (Tex. App.—Austin May 18, 2012, no pet....more