Mailbag with Julia - How Does the Abstract of Judgment Work?

S. Family writes:

 

"Do you know how we can get a judgment lien against a property when our judgment is in the name of the individual but the property is in the name of the individual's revocable trust?"

Dear S. Family -

 

If you already have a judgment, you should absolutely record an abstract of that judgment against the debtor (individuals) in the county where they own property.  This form is freely available from the Judicial Council Forms website.

 

There is caselaw that there isn't much difference between an individual and their trust.  The issue is, will your abstract attach to the debtor's property if the name on the abstract and the name on the title are not identical.  The answer is--it depends. 

 

Counties are set up on a Grantor/Grantee index.  If you spell the individual's name wrong on the abstract - you have a problem.  If you spell it correctly, but it does not match the Grantee index exactly, you will not know if a title company will pick up until you try it yourself.

 

The normal scenario on a payoff is that if the debtor tried to sell the house, your abstract would show up on the preliminary title report.  So, the practical response is for a judgment creditor to record the abstract in the county (for example if the debtor owns real estate in San Jose, that would be Santa Clara county), and then a few weeks later, contact the customer service department of a title company to see if they can pull it up in their search.