Gideon Gratsiani Speaks on the Florida Foreclosure Act Getting a Potential Update

Florida foreclosure law could undergo an important update after a Miami Circuit Court Judge ruled that a part of the Florida Fair Foreclosure Act is unconstitutional. The Florida Fair Foreclosure Act was passed in 2013 after years of exploding foreclosure actions in Florida and elsewhere around the country. Judge David Miller, in an Order issued on March 30, 2019, ruled that the portion of the Act that allowed mortgage lenders who had initiated foreclosure action to seek payment on the mortgage while the foreclosure case was ongoing. The part of the Act that allowed lenders ask for payments, and much of the Act in general, were included in order to speed up foreclosure actions that could languish in court for years for any number of reasons. Judge Miller stated in his ruling that the part of the Act that allowed mortgage lenders to ask for payments violated the Florida Constitution by imposing a new lien on private contracts and because it would apply retroactively to contracts signed before the Act passed. Judge Miller also stated that the Act impaired property owners the right to use their property as they say fit, including using it for commercial activities. Foreclosure expert Gideon Gratsiani, explains that while this would seem to be good news for borrowers and homeowners in general, the case before Judge Miller is only in circuit court, a lower court, and this issue will most likely be considered by the Court of Appeals and even the Supreme Court of Florida as big banks seeking to collect on their loans fight for a source of income now denied to them by the ruling.