Legal Question in Real Estate Law in Singapore

Re: Can a Singapore Court enforce a deficiency judgement in CA

Assuming a judgment is granted against you in the foreign country, it (the judgment) would then have to be domesticated here in California, before any enforcement activity could be done against you.

To do this, a new lawsuit would have to be filed under the Uniform Foreign Money-Judgments Recognition Act to establish a domestic judgment (here in California). To defend against the case, you would argue, among other things, that the judicial system in Singapore lacks fundamental due process protections afforded the citizens of the United States. The California court will not order that the judgment can be domesticated here unless certain conditions have been established by the creditor, and one of those conditions is that the creditor must establish that the judgment was obtained without violating due process. I am not familiar with Singapore law, but I imagine that you could make a decent argument that due process is lacking.

In addition, though the California antideficiency statutes would not apply directly, you could also argue that the substantive due process protections afforded by them are not available to you in Singapore, and thus, the judgment should not be domesticated.

Good luck. We are judgment enforcement litigators, so if you ever need assistance wtih this in the future, please feel free to call or email.

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