Judgment Question

[kal9988]

I have a judgment on my credit report, for an amount less than $2,000. Does the impact of a judgment on your credit score depend on the dollar amount? Also, if I pay the judgment and the status changes to paid, will my score go up at all? Thanks!

[BrandonSS]

From my understanding, (I have one) it doesnt matter the $ but the fact that a PR is on your CR.  And NO, updating it to paid will have no effect.  I paid mine in 2006 and just this year noticed it still showed as unpaid.  I had it updated to paid and score didnt budge.  But I have since sent a motion to vacate in hopes of getting it removed from my report.  I'm told the judgment is having a huge negative effect on my score.

[RobertEG]

+1

[kal9988]

I paid it last week, they said that in 45 days they will sent out a letter that it was paid. My only way to get the judgment vacated would be that I was never served (not sure if that's a requirement in california), plus I moved so I never received the letters from the creditor that they were filing for a judgment. They addressed the letters to me as J Doe instead of John Doe, and the post office only forwards mail that has you full name. Think I have a shot?

[BrandonSS]

Yes!  Here is some great advice i got from O6 here on the board:

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To have a judgment vacated you'll need to go back to court on a Motion to Vacate.  Keep in mind that in the vast majority of the cases simply satisfying a judgment does not create an obligation for the court to vacate the judgment, though some jurisdictions are different.  That said, many courts will vacate a satisfied judgment understanding the current financial crisis and the effect a judgment on one's credit report may have.  First thing you'd have to do is find out from the court clerk (it pays to be really, really nice to court clerks!) what she has seen the court do regarding judgments and having them vacated.  You can even ask -- since they are public records -- to look at other cases where judgments have been vacated to see how they worded their Motion, copy it and tailor it to your needs.

In the very likely event that they will not accept being satisfied as a reason to vacate your judgment, you'll have to file a Motion to vacate that alleges the court's lack of jurisdiction to eneter the judgment against you in the first place.  Generally this is accomplished by claiming lack of proper service.  The court will send a notice to the judgment creditor and they will be notified of a hearing date.  If they fail to show or show and do not object, the judgment will probably be vacated.  If they object, you really need to show that service was defective.  Where you served when they sued you?  How were you served? 

The best thing is to ask the judgment creditor not to object to having the judgment vacated.

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[RobertEG]

Brandon hit all the nails on the head!

Just one suggestion.  Rather than only asking the paid creditor to not oppose a motion to vacate, you might want to ask the creditor to either send you a letter stating such, or to, better yet, ask their atty to file a motion to vacate.

[MattH]

Other posters have stated the matter correctly.  It might be helpful to think of the difference between annulment of a marriage versus divorce: divorce means there was once a legally valid marriage, just as satisfied judgment remains a valid judgment, paying satisfies the judgement but does not make it go away.  If you want the legal situation to be as though the judgment had never happened then you need the equivalent of annulment.