R
Rosie65
Guest
I apologize for this being so long, but it's a complicated situation. In 1997 my husband was sued in Texas small claims and got a judgement against him. We live in Oklahoma. My husband made payment arrangements but unbeknownst to us the plaintiff had his lawyer do an abstract of judgement in our home county in Oklahoma. We paid off the money and as far as we knew everything was taken care of long ago. The judgement never appeared on his credit report. We paid off our land last year and went to the court house and received what we were told was a clear deed. There is nothing on the deed to indicate any liens.
So we go to build a house, but when our builder/lender does a title search they discover the judgement and supposedly a lien on our land. This was the first we had heard of any such thing. And although I now have a copy of the abstract of judgment, I don't see anything that ties it specifically to our land. Does it just automatically attach to any property we own?
But now the plaintiff has died. And we are getting the run around about what we can do. The court clerks (TX) say that only the plaintiff can release it, even though he is dead. The legal department of our builder/lender say the widow can release it. But she won't because she says we never paid it. Which we did but she is in Arkansas (which was also the plaintiff's home, but he used his daughter's address in Texas to file the lawsuit). The daughter admits that her father received partial payment (as her address was the one I sent money orders to) but that it wasn't paid in full but she doesn't know how much is still owed.
And 2 Oklahoma lawyers we've consulted say that the judgement is only good for five years unless renewed, and we should sit tight until next summer and let it drop off. The plaintiff is dead so he can't renew it. But can his widow? BTW, to avoid inheritance taxes he transferred everything to her and died without a will so there is no estate and no executor with the power to act in this matter.
(But the manager at our builder's says the lawyers are wrong and that the judgement and lien on our propery will stay on there forever.)
What can we do?
So we go to build a house, but when our builder/lender does a title search they discover the judgement and supposedly a lien on our land. This was the first we had heard of any such thing. And although I now have a copy of the abstract of judgment, I don't see anything that ties it specifically to our land. Does it just automatically attach to any property we own?
But now the plaintiff has died. And we are getting the run around about what we can do. The court clerks (TX) say that only the plaintiff can release it, even though he is dead. The legal department of our builder/lender say the widow can release it. But she won't because she says we never paid it. Which we did but she is in Arkansas (which was also the plaintiff's home, but he used his daughter's address in Texas to file the lawsuit). The daughter admits that her father received partial payment (as her address was the one I sent money orders to) but that it wasn't paid in full but she doesn't know how much is still owed.
And 2 Oklahoma lawyers we've consulted say that the judgement is only good for five years unless renewed, and we should sit tight until next summer and let it drop off. The plaintiff is dead so he can't renew it. But can his widow? BTW, to avoid inheritance taxes he transferred everything to her and died without a will so there is no estate and no executor with the power to act in this matter.
(But the manager at our builder's says the lawyers are wrong and that the judgement and lien on our propery will stay on there forever.)
What can we do?