foreclosure on a US condo

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guypea

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I am a UK resident who bought a condo in florida in 2006 as an 'investment' (haha, good move huh)
iits now worth just $33,000 (i have a mortgage outstanding of $160,000)
its taken ALL my savings to keep it going, but i now have nothing left.
I have applied to my US mortgage company for ashort sale, but it looks as though they will turn it down.
I need to know what the implications are if i foreclose on my us mortgage to my home and finances in the UK.
my uk home is mortgaged and i have no savings.
 
I am the General Trustee for a company that sues lenders in foreclosure situations. There are a number of tactics including making the lender produce the original note, which they normally can not do in 40% of the cases. There is a little cost to it (about half the payment) but it will prevent the property from going into foreclosure, cut the principle owed on the property, and possibly allow you to keep the property long enough to have it recoup some of it's losses. We also try to rent it out to people if you are not living there.

If that would help you email me gahousetrust@gmail.com
 
guypea said:
I am a UK resident who bought a condo in florida in 2006 as an 'investment' (haha, good move huh)
iits now worth just $33,000 (i have a mortgage outstanding of $160,000)
its taken ALL my savings to keep it going, but i now have nothing left.
I have applied to my US mortgage company for ashort sale, but it looks as though they will turn it down.
I need to know what the implications are if i foreclose on my us mortgage to my home and finances in the UK.
my uk home is mortgaged and i have no savings.
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Relax in the knowledge that no plaintiff in a US state court can obtain jurisdiction over your assets in the UK easily and cheaply.

I could bore you to death explaining "long arm statutes" and such, but in your case; even if you were served, a US state court's judgment would have little effect in the UK.

The article below explains it somewhat.

Briefly, to effect service of you and enforcement of any judgment in the UK would be very expensive.

In your case, $150,000 isn't worth the effort, unless you are a multi-millionaire.
Bottom line, it can be done, but not cost effectively.

You would be wise to speak with a Florida attorney about this, or investigate jharris' proposition.
You should also speak with a UK barrister about enforcing US judgments in the UK.

If I were in your position I would have walked away months ago.

Good luck.


There is no bilateral treaty or multilateral international convention in force between the United States and any other country on reciprocal recognition and enforcement of judgments. Although there are many reasons for the absence of such agreements, a principal stumbling block appears to be the perception of many foreign states that U.S. money judgments are excessive according to their notions of liability. Moreover, foreign countries have objected to the extraterritorial jurisdiction asserted by courts in the United States. In consequence, absent a treaty, whether the courts of a foreign country would enforce a judgment issued by a court in the United States depends upon the internal laws of the foreign country and international comity. In many foreign countries, as in most jurisdictions in the United States, the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments is governed by local domestic law and the principles of comity, reciprocity and res judicata (that is, that the issues in question have been decided already.) i

The general principle of international law applicable in such cases is that a foreign state claims and exercises the right to examine judgments for four causes: (1) to determine if the court had jurisdiction; (2) to determine whether the defendant was properly served; (3) to determine if the proceedings were vitiated by fraud; and (4) to establish that the judgment is not contrary to the public policy of the foreign country. While procedures and documentary requirements vary widely from country to country, judgments which do not involve multiple damages or punitive damages generally may be enforced, in whole or in part, upon recognition as authoritative and final, subject to the particulars cited above, unless internal law mandates a treaty obligation.
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http://travel.state.gov/law/info/judicial/judicial_691.html
 
thanks a lot for that army judge.
i have wanted to walk away for years, not months!!!
but it is only recently that my latest tenant defaulted, so now I have NO money coming in, not just 'not enough' as before.
i'll talk to a florida attorney first off, assuming they formally reject my short sale offer.
thanks again.
 
guypea said:
not really. i wanted advice, not a salesman. thanks anyway
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If you check the boards I give more advice that practically anyone here except maybe Army. But if you want to be a jerk then good luck. I just happen to have had a solution for your problem. But you just carry on without me and you will get exactly what you pay for.
 
sorry if i came over sounding like a jerk, and yeh i do appreciate the help jharris. why wouldnt they have the original document tho?
 
Search the internet for "Produce the Note." Real estate foreclosure defense. Because they have sold and sold and sold these notes they have lost about 40% of them and many of the others have been seriously compromised. I didn't mean to come across as a salesman either I suppose, I was just telling you what I do. In any case, after the lender has been tied up in a lawsuit for a while they get very pliable about wanting to recast the note, interest rates, and payments. Where is your condo?
 
park central, orlando. yeh but the thing is about the note... i have had my loan modified within the last year. so they will be bound to have that, surely
 
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