Loan Modification

Missing Name in Notary Acknowledgment Really Means Bad Mortgage in Massachusetts

By L. Jed Berliner, Marlborough & Springfield, MA For

“Money moves electronically, but paper moves at human speed.”  I wrote that back in August to introduce a new decision that allowed a bankruptcy trustee to set aside a mortgage under Massachusetts law, where the name was missing from the notary’s acknowledgment.

The borrower had signed the mortgage, but the notary public was hurried and didn’t write in the name where it belonged a second time.

That case has been affirmed on appeal, and the lender paid $120,000 to the trustee to keep the mortgage.  Wow !!  Good news for the trustee.  Neutral for the borrower, as nothing in the decision voided the enforcement of the mortgage against the borrower.

Creative, crafty attorneys can work up an advantage from this.  I won’t say any more in public . . .

Related posts:

1. Name Missing in Notary Acknowledgment Means Bad Mortgage In Massachusetts
2. Let’s Treat Massachusetts As A Judicial Foreclosure State
3. Massachusetts Foreclosures In Jeopardy

Full post as published by Mortgage Law Network on March 19, 2010 (boomark / email).