Our South Florida Foreclosure Lawyers Beat BSI Financial Services At Trial — Again. This is My Favorite Win of the Year.
What a great way to end the year for our South Florida foreclosure attorneys. We had our last foreclosure trial of the year. It was against BSI Financial Services in Broward County. This is the second time we beat this bank at trial in the last couple of months. They have not beaten us at trial yet. The bank’s law firm was Greenspoon Marder. They have a reputation as a quality law firm in the community. I won’t name the attorney who tried the case because I actually feel for her, although after she called me “slimy” before trial, I should name her.
Prior to the foreclosure trial, the bank offered to allow our client to stay in the house for 120 days, waive the right to collect the deficiency from the client, and would give her $8,000 to move. My suspicion is that almost all foreclosure defense attorneys would jump at that deal. That because many foreclosure lawyers do not go to trial for their clients. I don’t think many foreclosure defense attorneys would have the guts to turn that down. When I first arrived in court, the bank lawyer told me that now they are offering my client nothing because we did not jump at her offer sooner. I told her we are not interested in anything other than having our day in court.
The bank initially filed its foreclosure lawsuit swearing under oath that they lost the note. Forty-eight hours before the trial, the bank drops its lost note count. I asked for a 60 day continuance of the trial to ask for additional time to conduct discovery about the circumstances of this mysteriously found note. The court agreed and gave the continuance. As I was writing up the order, the bank’s lawyer came over to me in a packed courtroom and called me slimy loud enough for many people to hear. She was ranting and raving about me asking for a continuance. She wanted to go back up to the judge and re-address it. When we got up there, I was getting so annoyed by this bank lawyer, I told the judge that I no longer wanted a continuance and I wanted to be the first case to go to trial. This may be one of the first times a foreclosure defense attorney went back on his request for a continuance after it had been granted. So, we got sent upstairs for trial to a different judge.
Then, the fun started. I do not think that the bank could have done a worse job putting on their case. For starters, they did not bring the original mortgage. While the law does not require an original mortgage to be introduced into evidence at trial, the bank must be able to authenticate a copy of the mortgage before it can come into evidence. Authentication means that the witness must be able to testify that the mortgage is a true and correct copy of the original or they must have a certified copy. Well, the copy of the mortgage was not certified so that option was out the window. The comical part of this was that the copy of the mortgage they brought was missing pages 5 through 15! I can honestly say that I say that I have never seen that before. The bank lawyer and the bank representative were stunned by this. Obviously, the judge did not allow this mortgage into evidence. If the bank lawyer was smart, she would have dismissed this foreclosure case right there because she can’t win without a mortgage. Stubbornly, she pressed on and it never got any better for them.
The bank lawyer tried to introduce the default letter and the payment history from the prior loan servicer into evidence. She fell woefully short of getting past my hearsay objection. The judge kept these records out of evidence pursuant to the Fourth District Court of Appeals cases on Yang and Glarum. This argument is a post unto itself, so I’ll give the gist of the argument. Basically, a current loan servicer can not normally lay the foundation for the the introduction of the prior loan servicer’s records. Thus, these records were not allowed into evidence. The show was over at that point, but the bank kept pressing on and actually allowed the court to issue a final judgment in my client’s favor. That was a huge rookie mistake. Now, my client has a final judgment in her favor. She should have dismissed and re-filed the lawsuit. The bank lawyer was actually surprised that she did not win after all that.
Now, I wanted to go up to her after the trial and say something like “That continuance looks pretty good about now, huh” or maybe “Not too shabby for a slimy lawyer”, but I tried not to allow my ego get in the way. She was licking her wounds enough and she learned a valuable lesson.
Moral of the story??? If you are facing a foreclosure trial anywhere in Florida, you need an attorney with the guts, the knowledge, and the experience to go to trial for you. It is highly unlikely to get this type of result if you don’t have a lawyer who knows their way around a courtroom. Now, the facts of every case are different and no specific outcome is guaranteed.
If you are facing a foreclosure, don’t face it alone. Put the Loan Lawyers team behind you. We offer free consultations with our foreclosure lawyers in Broward, Miami-Dade, and Palm Beach counties. Call us now, don’t delay. (844) 344-4813