FL foreclosure laws, answering a summons about foreclosure

How you answer a summons and complaint will depend on the facts of your case, beginning with the origination of the loan, all the way to the allegations in the complaint.

This is assuming that service was properly done and does not need to be challenged, which it may. None the less, it is important to choose how you answer very carefully. The rules of civil procedure require you to assert any "affirmative defense" or related claim against the plaintiff or other party with the filing of your answer otherwise such defenses and claims could potentially be waived.

The best advice I can give you is that if you think you have bonafied defenses or claims that need to be asserted, contact our firm or another firm that is experienced in counter-suing lenders and properly asserting defenses in foreclosure actions.

If you have further questions ask away or contact our office for an appointment.
However, if you do not feel that you have any real defenses, and just are concerned about not having to move right away, be sure to file a response that includes an answer to each enumerated answer to the complaint. You should admit, deny or if you are without knowledge to admit of deny a paragraph, then say that. If you need to have a differnent answer to one part of the paragraph, than another part of the paragraph, that is allowed too.

Then after you do so, you can state any reasons that you feel the forelcosure is improper. There are books at the Law Libraries that can help you if you want to do-it-yourself. However, they are very general and probably will only help you stop a default, but not summary judgment.

Summary Judgment in this case means that the court will order your house to be sold without a trial because no valid defenses were raised to necessitate a trial. Summary Judgment can't be scheduled until twenty days after the filing of the lawsuit, and most often will not occur until two months or later after the filing of the suit.

From the day that the summary judmgent is entered, the sale date will occur in about 30 days, unless the judge is convinced that there is good cause to not follow the statutory guidelines for sales.

As far as representing that you "represent" that you would like to pay the holder of the original promissory note, it will not work if they successfuly re-establish the "lost" note. In Florida, equity allows enforecment of documents without being in possession of the original. There is a lot more to waging an counter attack based on possession of the note. There is a good seminar out in California every three months or so on this approach, it is $600, and very useful. Challenging standing usually works best on debt to securitized trusts, but only if you scour the pooling agreement and find non-compliance. This is because the lender is not required to produce a valid assignment until summary judgment if there is not one recorded in the public records or attached to the complaint.

Hello.

Responding properly to a foreclosure summons and complaint is very tricky. There are not many people who know how to do this. If you do it incorrectly, it can make matters worse instead of better.

Many foreclosure complaints claim that the note is lost. That is often not really the case - they say that to get the action started before they find the note, and then remove that claim later, after they find it. Not honest, but that is what is often done.

If the mortgage was sold by the loriginal holder, it no longer has any right to receive payment. Many originators in Florida are not in business anymore either. The only party who has a right to receive payment is the current holder, whoever that is.

PLEASE BE VERY CAREFUL ! You only have twenty days from when you are served to respond, after that, the lender can obtain default, which will bar you from raising any defenses to the foreclosure.

If you want me to review your summons and complaint and to discuss it with you, I will be happy to do that at no charge. This first twenty days is your only real opportunity to decide what your strategy is from here forward, and so it is critical that you make the right decisions.

If you want me to look at what you have, please call me at my office, 954-943-8444.

Margery Golant
Golant & Golant, P.A.

I've gone through this twice. Missing or Lost Promissory Notes.
#1 Certify the Judge and the parties involved.

Request that the "true" plaintiff provide the original note. Don't fall for a new court date to re-establish the note. Judges are not stupid. They are aware that a foreclosure is not permissable unless the authentic note is provided. It's called "No Standing".

What is happening is that, behind your back, mortgage companies have sold and/or transferred these notes in some type of means. Should this be overlooked, another party may come after you for their payments ( after you've been foreclosed on. Challenge it, wisely.

I've done this with two properties, since 2006. It's still going on. Judges are starting to penalize attorneys individually and firms with sanctions . The last I read was 25K each attorney and 100K for the whole firm. I'm on my third, my own home. I'm really a no one. I don't have a business and I'm not trying to sell anything.

Goodluck ! truly and just do your research Theresa

search : Flipping Frenzy Mortgage Fraud "the #1 fastest growing white collar crime" per the F.B.I.

Further to the above advise I would add that we are successfully stopping foreclosures at the summary judgment stage especially if the lender has lost the original note. You have the right to be sued only by the right person, the owner and holder of the note and thus not subjected to double jeopardy for this debt.

There is a very specific rule of proceedure that requires the lender to attach all documents to the complaint that serves as the basis of their action or upon which you may base a defense.

Lastly, don't make it easy for the lender to re-establish the note by accepting their self serving affidavits. This is a material issue of fact which you should dispute by counter affidavit and saved for trial on the merits.

gclark560@aol.com
www.gregorydclarklaw.com

If you want help answering a foreclosure summons go to www.summonsreply.com. It gives a template for you to write your answer and also advice about how to use the 'produce the note defense'. SummonsReply will provide an example of an answer to a summons written by a certified lawyer too, so that you can make sure you've done it right.

I used it myself and I highly recommend it to anyone who doesn't want to spend thousands of dollars on a lawyer or who doesn't have the money to do so. I still recommend getting the advice from a lawyer as to what defenses you should use, but that you can get for free and the website will explain that too. Once you get the tips from the site, you'll find that answering your summons is rather easy, and it's pretty ridiculous that lawyers charge so much to do it.

Answering my summons myself gave me enough time to get a loan modification from my lender, without spending the $2,000 or $3,500 that most lawyers charged.