My, oh my, how things can change. Monday, May 18, 2020 — a point in time when COVID-19 forced the legal profession to truly cross over to the unknown.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit recently held that a mortgagee’s office that was located within 200 miles of the mortgaged property, but did not conduct any mortgage-related business, was not a “branch office” of a “mortgagee” under the HUD rule requiring a face-to-face meeting with mortgage borrowers before filing a mortgage foreclosure action unless the mortgagee does not have a branch office within 200 miles of the borrower's home.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit recently reversed a trial court’s order remanding a plaintiff’s claims under the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act (BIPA) back to state court for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction because she lacked standing under Article III.
The Supreme Court of the United States recently held that to prevail in a claim for racial discrimination under 42 U.S.C. § 1981, “a plaintiff must plead and ultimately prove that, but for race, it would not have suffered the loss of a legally protected right.”
The U.S. Bankruptcy Appellate Panel for the Eighth Circuit recently reversed a bankruptcy court’s disallowance of postpetition interest at the default contract rate, holding that “the bankruptcy court erred in applying a liquidated damages analysis and ruling the default interest rate was an unenforceable penalty,” and also erred in weighing “equitable considerations” to avoid enforcing the contractual default interest rate.
The federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has extended the deadline for public comments on its Supplemental Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on time-barred debt disclosures to Aug. 4. The Bureau stated its reason for the extension as “the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.”
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit recently ruled in favor of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), Fannie Mae, and the mortgage loan servicer in a title dispute arising from a homeowners' association (HOA) lien foreclosure.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit recently held that California law does not permit preemptive actions to challenge a party's authority to pursue foreclosure before a foreclosure has taken place.
The Appellate Court of Illinois, First District, recently affirmed a trial court order dismissing a foreclosure counterclaim by two borrowers seeking rescission under the federal Truth in Lending Act (TILA), 15 U.S.C. § 1601 et seq., holding that section 1640(e)’s one-year statute of limitation for legal damages applied to bar the borrower’s section 1635 equitable claim, when the borrowers demanded rescission within three years of closing but did not file suit within one year after the lender failed to respond.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit recently reversed entry of summary judgment in favor of a satellite television provider against a consumer on claims that it violated the Florida Consumer Collection Practices Act by attempting to collect a debt it knew had been discharged in bankruptcy and directly contacting the plaintiff consumer knowing she was represented by counsel.
The Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act prohibits merchants from including, among other information, credit- and debit-card expiration dates on printed receipts. After this provision originally became effective in 2004, plaintiff class-action firms flooded courts with expiration date lawsuits, which courts and others “met with varying degrees of contempt.”
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit recently reversed the dismissal of a trustee borrower’s claims under the federal Truth-In-Lending Act, Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act, and California’s Rosenthal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act seeking rescission of a loan obtained to effectuate repairs upon a property inhabited by the trust’s beneficiary.