Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed Executive Order 20-180. While most coverage focused on the extension of the foreclosure and eviction moratoriums, servicers and investors should note that the language covering which cases are affected, and at what stage, changed dramatically.
Where the initial order (EO 20-94) suspended and tolled “any statute providing for a mortgage foreclosure cause of action,” the new order revised that language to suspend and toll “any statute providing for final action at the conclusion of a mortgage foreclosure proceeding.” The moratorium was further limited to cases arising from non-payment by a single-family mortgagor.
Our interpretation is that the new order prohibits only the pursuit of writs of possession on mortgagor-occupied properties — a reminder, as the court put it in Ober v. Town of Lauderdale-by-the-Sea, that “in a foreclosure lawsuit, the final judgment is not the end of the road, but merely a way station to the final result.”
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