Spring cleaning typically signifies dreaded house cleaning.  However, at this same time of the year when you mopping, sweeping and washing, its not a bad time to do some legal spring cleaning. 

 

Take this time to review all your legal documents, wills, trusts, health care documents and the like.  Determine if you have your current insurance policies.  Make sure you have photos and/or a written inventory of the contents of  your house.  Hurricane season is right around the corner.  In the event of a claim, you must prove to your insurance carrier the contents of your dwelling.  Do you have a valid Power of Attorney?  What about an Living Will or Designation of Health Care Surrogate? 

 

If you have any questions regarding the status of your current documents of your future needs, please feel free to contact us for a free consultation.

As you have likely seen profiled in the local news media, mortgage foreclosures have hit record levels.  In 2007, more than 1% of all homes were in some stage of foreclosure. In 2006, only 0.58% faced foreclosure. Here in Florida 2% of all households are entering some stage of the foreclosure process, with 165,291 total properties entering foreclosure.  These alarming statistics are a result of the subprime lending practices of many defunct lenders. 

 

In December of 2007, foreclosure filings had jumped 97% from one year ago, indicating that the troubles for many lenders may be just beginning.  Who is at fault for the foreclosure crisis? Recent trends in mortgage underwriting have changed lending as we know it.  Lenders took unreasonable risks on what had been non-performing borrowers.  Lenders offered borrowers more money that they actually should have qualified for.  "As stated" income applications were approved and borrowers could not make hefty payments that resulted from this over lending.  Finally, mortgage fraud resulted in a segment of non-performing loans.  The FBI recently indicated that Florida was a hotbed of mortgage fraud. 

As a result of this crisis, lenders have become very conservative as they try to mitigate their global losses. 

*Chris Heise recently joined the firm as a legal assistant.  Chris previously worked for another area law firm and will provide litigation support.  We are very excited to have Chris as a member of our team.

*Rachel B. Goodman and Jessica L. Wright have recently joined the firm as law clerks.  Rachel is a graduate of the Transylvania University and a second year law student at Stetson College of Law.  Jessica is a graduate of the University of Florida and third year law student at Stetson. 

*Charles Gallagher & Bobby Reynolds recently served as Judges for both the Phi Alpha Delta Closing Argument Competition and the AAJ Mock Trial Competition at Stetson College of Law.