Judgments Explained

By: Mark D. Shapiro | Posted: 17th August 2015

Most folks that win a judgment don't completely understand what they are. A judgment is an order coming from a court which says one party owes money to some other party. Judgments begin as claims, which some court or judge, makes their ruling, to make a judgment. Usually, the court cannot help folks collect judgments; and there is never any court-ordered mandatory due dates that cause debtors to satisfy judgments.

This article is my opinion and is not, legal advice. I'm a judgment expert, and not an attorney. If you need a strategy to use or legal advice, you should retain a lawyer.

The person or entity who starts the lawsuit is the plaintiff, and at a hearing at the court; they usually become judgment creditors. The person or entity who gets sued is the defendant, and most often gets turned into a debtor. Post-judgment, occasionally court judges gloss over the fact that the debtor wronged the plaintiff, and some attempt to give debtors breaks whenever they can.

Judgments are created because of many causes, a typical start is one party owed money to another party. A judgment can also begin from loans not being paid back, damages done to people or property, taxes not being paid for, services and goods not paid for, theft, fraud, etc.

All judgments depend upon first serving notice of the court original lawsuit upon the defendant. Certain defendants do not show up at the court after being served, and that creates a default judgment. Default judgments occasionally cause a type of legal loophole, that some judgment debtors might take advantage of.

Occasionally, a judgment debtor actually was not served legal notice for their court lawsuit. More than once, some "bad apple" process server person has done a "sewer service" and has tossed court lawsuit papers in the trash. For each debtor this has actually happened to; probably over one hundred additional debtors, try to claim they were not served properly, however the debtor really was served.

There's several types of court judgments, including judgments from criminal courts and civil judgments specifying a defendant not do certain things. Some judgments can be strange, as an example people being ordered not to place evil curses on the plaintiffs. Only a judgment which list some amount owed, have any opportunity for potential recovery; and they're most often named civil money judgments. Judgments are not cash, judgments are just a chance for being paid some cash in the future.

Unlike claims, a judgment is backed by a court, that allow Sheriffs to try to garnish the debtor's assets. A typical claim, such as a UCC lien, does not have the "power" of court a judgment. A judgment's power is only a potential, as there are no guarantees.

A judgment almost always earn some some interest, although any interest earned is always hypothetical unless it's recovered. The majority of judgments are not recovered. One reason is because you cannot just turn the debtor upside down, to see what kind of things drops out of their pockets.

The only method to actually recover the majority of judgments is to pay the court and the Sheriff so they will attempt to go after the available assets belonging to the debtor, such as the debtor's wages or bank accounts. If your debtor becomes poor, sick, dead, old, currently in jail, is bankrupt, professionally hiding their available assets, or can't currently be located, your judgment is most likely worthless.

The majority of people get very surprised to learn their judgment is worth very much cash up-front. Many people spend far too many hours attempting to find somebody to purchase a judgment (at their predefined terms), and don't ever receive a penny; or get anything more than their debtor's situation supports. Usually, the more assets and income the debtor has, the more your judgment might be worth.

It all depends only on the debtor, not on who you talk with or email your judgments to. Perhaps the most common reason a judgment does not sell for very much money upfront is, if your debtor files for bankruptcy protection, most judgments become worthless.

Most people with judgments don't believe judgments can't actually be sold for money, until a really thorough due diligence is first performed on their judgment debtor. Judgment owners that insist on a certain amount of money upfront price for their judgments is wasting their time; as judgment buyers do not care what judgment owners ask for. A contingency future-payment judgment enforcement may end up being the best option for certain creditors, especially if you do not have to assign the judgment.


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Judgment recovery, is a collections attempt, which means to recover or collect your judgment. Buyers are available and can help you with your judgment collection efforts. Mark Shapiro of http://www.JudgmentBuy.com - Your fastest and easiest free method of finding the best expert to buy or recover your judgment.
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