Transfers after a judgment, and the window that remains

0:33First, whether the lien was already there

But first, one question before any of that matters. Was the lien already there.

Before any of the voidable transfer law comes into it, check the order of the two recordings.

A judgment docketed in the county where the property sits attaches to the debtor's interest from that moment. So a conveyance recorded afterwards takes the property subject to your lien, and whether the transfer was proper never has to be reached. The buyer owns a parcel with your judgment sitting on it.

The interesting case is the other one. The deed went in first, and the judgment came second. Then the lien never attached, and what you have left is a claim against the transfer itself.

1:19Two statutes, nearly the same words

Now, two statutes with nearly the same words.

New York and Florida both adopted the uniform act, so the tests read alike and the section numbers don't.

DCL 273, and Fla. Stat. 726.105, cover transfers voidable as to present or future creditors. That's the intent case, and the case where the debtor received less than a reasonably equivalent value while insolvent, or about to become so. DCL 274, and Fla. Stat. 726.106, cover present creditors only. And 274, subsection B, and 726.106, subsection 2, reach the insider preference. A transfer to an insider for an antecedent debt, where the debtor was insolvent and the insider had reason to know it.

Which section applies decides which clock runs. And the clocks are not the same length.

2:18The windows

So here are the windows.

DCL 278, and Fla. Stat. 726.110, extinguish the claim, and they do it in nearly identical language.

For the intent case, 4 years after the transfer, or 1 year after it was or could reasonably have been discovered. Whichever is later. For the constructive cases, under DCL 273, subsection A, paragraph 2, and 274, subsection A, and their Florida equivalents, 4 years flat, with no discovery extension. And for the insider preference, under DCL 274, subsection B, 1 year after the transfer.

1 year. That is not a long time to notice a deed.

And here's the part that hurts. The recording date of that deed is a public fact from the day it's stamped. Which is exactly the argument the transferee will make about when you could reasonably have discovered it.

3:16What the transferee gets to say

Then there's what the transferee gets to say.

DCL 277, and Fla. Stat. 726.109, give the defense, and it's the one that decides most of these.

A transfer isn't voidable under the intent provision against a person who took in good faith and for a reasonably equivalent value. Or against any subsequent good faith transferee.

So the question is rarely whether a transfer happened. It's what was paid for it, and whether the person who paid knew.

Which is why the consideration recited on a deed is worth reading, even though it proves nothing on its own. A deed reciting $10 between spouses, and a deed reciting 800,000 to a stranger, are the same instrument type in the same index. They are not the same fact.

4:05Reading it off the register

So how do you read it off the register.

Four things are visible without leaving the public record, and not one of them is a conclusion.

The recording date of the deed against the docketing date of the judgment, which settles whether your lien attached. The consideration recited. The relationship suggested by the names, where a transfer runs between people sharing a surname, or to an entity whose name echoes the debtor's. And whether a mortgage was recorded at the same time, because a purchase financed by an institution is a different picture from one that wasn't.

None of that establishes intent or insolvency, and no page could. What it establishes is which of the four dates you're working from, and how much of the window is left.

4:53What this does not cover

Here's what I can't give you.

Everything that makes one of these cases actually win. Which is most of it.

Insolvency at the time of the transfer is a financial question, and the register holds no financial statements. Reasonably equivalent value is an appraisal question. Intent is proved from badges that are mostly not in any recorded document. And Fla. Stat. 222.29 removes the homestead exemption where the exemption results from a fraudulent transfer, which matters enormously in Florida, and turns on the same facts nobody can read off a deed.

I'm not a lawyer and none of this is advice. Whether to bring an action to avoid a transfer is a decision for counsel, on facts that come from discovery rather than from a register.

What I can tell you is narrower. Which clock started on the day that deed was stamped. And how much of it has already run.

So go and find the recording date on that deed, and start counting. And if the consideration recited looks like nothing at all, the piece on doc stamps shows you how to find out what was really paid.