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Judgments Come With An Expiration Date; Or Do They?

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You have been successful and obtained a California judgment against your adversary. However, you have been unsuccessful in collecting on it. Should you be concerned about the passage of time? After all, interest on judgments is generally 10% annually in California.

The answer is, it depends. If you have a civil judgment, it must be renewed through the courts every ten years. If not, it will become unenforceable (California Code of Civil Procedure Section 683.020). Renewal is accomplished by submitting an application for renewal to the court prior to the expiration of the ten year period (California Code of Civil Procedure Section 683.120).

However, if you have a family law judgment (or order), it never expires (California Family Code Section 291). This is a very useful quality, if you should find, for example, that your ex-spouse’s parent has died and that ex-spouse is about to come into enough money to satisfy that more than 10 year old judgment or order……

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