On June 15 of last year the State of Minnesota changed the Minnesota foreclosures laws. These changes are meant to combat the snowball effect of lowered property values that occurs in a neighborhood when a home owner is forced to walk away from his or her home, leaving it in the hands of the mortgage holder. The new regulations affect homeowners, lenders and municipal governments.
The new regulations give homeowners facing a Minnesota foreclosure the chance to postpone a forced sale date by five months. Previously, the choice to postpone a sale was only available to the lender. The intention behind the change is to give laid-off workers who have fallen behind in their mortgage payments additional time to find new employment and, hopefully, get their mortgage up to date.
For homeowners who have no chance of bringing their mortgage up to date even with a 5 month grace period, the new solution is probably not the best choice as it only postpones the inevitable. For others, however, the changes in Minnesota foreclosure regulations can be the lifeline that saves the homeowner from personal bankruptcy. But homeowners who get the postponement and fail to make up the arrears may be in worse shape than when they started.
The criteria to qualify for and secure a forced sale date postponement are relatively easy to meet. The option is only applicable to homestead residences. Under law, only one homestead residence is permitted per resident. The homestead property can have from one to four units and must be the owners primary residence.
In order to postpone a forced sale, the home owner must fill out an official Affidavit of Postponement. Within 15 days of the date of sale, the homeowner must file or provide copies of the affidavit to three different parties; the county office of the county in which the property lies, the office of the sheriff charged with conducting the sale, and the mortgage holders real estate attorney.
The new Minnesota foreclosures regulations reduce the so-called redemption period. For homeowners who lose their property in a forced sale and have not taken advantage of the postponement option, the redemption period is 6 months. That is, you have six months to come up with the balance due on a mortgage after the property has been sold. If you fail to pay off the balance within the allotted time period, the lender can and will force you into bankruptcy.
Under the terms of the new statute, homeowners who are successful in postponing a forced sale date but are unsuccessful in bringing the mortgage current within the 5 month postponement period have their redemption period reduced from five months to five weeks. This is a comfort to lenders because it means the Minnesota foreclosures process is not lengthened the time it takes for the process to be completed.
Under these new Minnesota foreclosures regulations, no homeowner may request a second postponement under any circumstances. This applies even if the mortgage was successfully brought up to date within the postponement period. This means that if the homeowner gets behind on their mortgage a second time, only the lender can authorize the postponement of a forced sale date
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