Judgment Enforcement

Clarkson and Hale, LLC is a law firm that understands receiving a judgment in your favor is just the first step. Seeing to it that the judgment is carried out and you actually receive the collection owed to you is a completely different ball game.

It won't be easy, but we can do this.

In South Carolina, there are several obstacles we have to face in order to collect on a judgment without compromising compliance rules and regulations. One of these obstacles is the fact that judgments expire based upon the court. Some judgments expire in just three years, but a time period of ten years to collect is allotted for other judgments. Furthermore, once these judgments expire, they can't be renewed. For those reasons, if you're in South Carolina, it's important to hire the right team of attorneys that can get to work on collecting for you sooner rather than later.

Another obstacle: It's not uncommon for debtors not to have any assets to collect from and South Carolina doesn't allow wages to be garnished. As an alternative route, judgment creditors have to look at the assets of the debtor as they come during execution of judgment. Some assets, however, are exempt from being imposed upon. For homes, there's approximately $50,000 exemption on equity. Yet and still, some debtors will hide - or attempt to hide - what they own.

As impossible as these challenges may seem, there are circumstances the debtor may face that play to the judgment creditor's favor.

One of these circumstances involves the debtor's credit. Typically, judgments will cause a negative impact on credit scores, which can significantly impact the debtor's livelihood and ability to do things like purchase a house or car. That said, a lot of times debtors will want to raise their credit score. At that point, they're more likely to be ready to work out an arrangement.

Usually, debtors don't realize that judgments act as a lien on any real property they own in the county where the judgment is recorded. As a result, the judgment becomes a barrier for the debtor as he or she won't be able to sell the property without taking care of the judgment.