Our client, K.R. took out a Note in 2016. Later in 2016, due to a change in financial circumstances, K.R. defaulted on the loan by failing to make an installment payment and in early 2017, the Plaintiff filed a foreclosure action claiming to be the holder of the Note. Attached to their Complaint was a copy of the Note and Mortgage. The copy of the Note attached to the Complaint was made payable to the original lender/Plaintiff.
The litigation was fairly standard. K.R. filed Affirmative Defenses to which the Plaintiff did not reply, however the Plaintiff did move to strike some of the Affirmative Defenses, which was granted in part. In late 2017, the Plaintiff filed a Motion for Summary Judgment and the accompanying affidavits. The Motion for Summary Judgment was set for hearing in early 2018.
Prior to the Summary Judgment hearing, K.R. filed their opposition and accompanying affidavits. In general, standing, conditions precedent and damages were challenged. In particularly, K.R. questioned whether the Plaintiff’s own affidavit qualifies as an exception to hearsay, whether proof of conditions precedent was present, perhaps most importantly, whether the Plaintiff could prove the amount of damages they sought.
Inexplicably, the Plaintiff failed to include a copy of the ledgers/payment history with their own affidavit supporting summary judgment. This issue was directly challenged in K.R.’s opposition and argued at the Summary Judgment Hearing. Unfortunately, and for unknown reasons, the trial Judge decided to grant Summary Judgment for the Plaintiff anyways. K.R. immediately filed an appeal.
Upon filing the appeal, Plaintiff hired additional counsel to look over the merits of the appeal. Thankfully, their new counsel recognized that notwithstanding K.R.’s additional reasons to oppose summary judgment, without at least a payment history provided to support the damages Plaintiff sought, the summary judgment would be overturned on appeal. Instead of going through the lengthy process of appealing the summary judgment, Plaintiff’s new counsel proposed the idea of vacating the summary judgment and dismissing the appeal. This serves everyone best as it cuts back on unnecessary litigation over a pretty clear-cut error and gives K.R. the opportunity to continue defending his home. Moreover, with the new Plaintiff’s counsel, K.R. has been invited to try again for a modification or to explore other options available to help them keep their home.
Loan Lawyers has helped over 5,000 South Florida homeowners and consumers with their debt problems, we have saved over 1,800 homes from foreclosure, eliminated $100,000,000 in mortgage principal and consumer debt, and have collected millions of dollars on behalf of our clients due to bank, loan servicer, and debt collector violations, negligence and fraud. Contact us for a free consultation to see how we may be able to help you.
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