Timeshare Foreclosure

We have a timeshare in the USA that is deeded. Because of job situation we cannot make payments and they are threatening foreclosure.

We are Canadian citizens who lived in the USA for 3 years.

Can they collect this money from us since we now live in Canada?

Will this impact credit ratings in Canada?

Will this affect our ability to travel into the USA?

Thank you

Yes to the first question, although whether they will go to the hassle of going after you in a foreign jurisdiction is open to question.

Maybe to the second question, the US and Canada do use the same credit bureau companies.

Possibly but probably no to the last question, depends on whether they put in a complaint and the flight to avoid payment is a criminal offence. If it's just civil, i.e. they file against you for the money, then that doesn't stop you from travelling to the US. If they file suit in the jurisdiction where you lived and win, there may be criminal penalties if you don't comply with whatever the court says you're supposed to do. Basically anything that rises to the level of a criminal offence might get you denied entry to the US.

The point is that as far as the court and the bank know, that jurisdiction was your primary residence so they will file suit there. The collection agency will try and track you down though. But collecting from someone in a foreign country is hard.

If a criminal offence is committed in the US and you flee and then try to come back for a visit, they can detain you and turn you over to the appropriate authorities then and there.

So if the bank files a criminal suit against you, you could be arrested on any future attempt to visit the US.

Thanks Steven does it change the situation if we have lived in Canada for 3 years and did not leave to avoid payment.

Also the timeshare was purchased while we were living back in Canada, does that change things.

Thanks again the info is very helpful

Yes to the first question, although whether they will go to the hassle of going after you in a foreign jurisdiction is open to question.

Maybe to the second question, the US and Canada do use the same credit bureau companies.

Possibly but probably no to the last question, depends on whether they put in a complaint and the flight to avoid payment is a criminal offence. If it's just civil, i.e. they file against you for the money, then that doesn't stop you from travelling to the US. If they file suit in the jurisdiction where you lived and win, there may be criminal penalties if you don't comply with whatever the court says you're supposed to do. Basically anything that rises to the level of a criminal offence might get you denied entry to the US.

The point is that as far as the court and the bank know, that jurisdiction was your primary residence so they will file suit there. The collection agency will try and track you down though. But collecting from someone in a foreign country is hard.

Thanks Reba does it change the situation if we have lived in Canada for 3 years and did not leave to avoid payment.

Also the timeshare was purchased while we were living back in Canada, does that change things.

Thanks again the info is very helpful

If a criminal offence is committed in the US and you flee and then try to come back for a visit, they can detain you and turn you over to the appropriate authorities then and there.

So if the bank files a criminal suit against you, you could be arrested on any future attempt to visit the US.

If they're aware you live in Canada, they will come after you there, at least in theory. I used to work in a job in the US where I dealt with a lot of debt collectors in Florida, and when someone skipped to Canada it was always the "oh crap, what do we do now" scenario. But they did turn it over to debt collectors in Canada if they could. That was back during the last property crash in the early 1990s.

Given the advances in computer technology I suspect it will be easier to track you down, especially if you had anything on the paperwork to indicate you live in Canada. Collecting however is a different matter. If they've got your house, that is your major asset (as far as they're concerned), really you need to sort it all out with the bank rather than worrying about whether they're going to come after you.

A lot of these subprime mortgages were largely unsecured so they may have no claim on any of your other assets. No point letting a court give them a claim on your other assets because you violated the agreement and subject yourself to penalties. Just makes matters worse.

I read an article on MSN today about statute of limitations on debt, it was pretty interesting. From what the article said, even after the STL has run out, a collections agency can re-sell the debt to another agency and then they can start hasseling you all over again (not entirely legally, but they do it). Fun wow! And if you call a debtor to find out when the statute runs out, they can re-start the clock to 0.

Check state law. They're all different.

From what the article said, even after the STL has run out, a collections agency can re-sell the debt to another agency and then they can start hasseling you all over again (not entirely legally, but they do it). Fun wow! And if you call a debtor to find out when the statute runs out, they can re-start the clock to 0.

Yep, that's what they did in Florida. They were chasing people on default payments ten years later. Only when no-one would buy the debt would it stop.

In fact I actually had this happen to me, automated phone calls for years and years and I couldn't understand what the damn thing was saying to me, "if you are garbled garble please garble this is garble collection agency".

After five years of those phone calls they sold the debt to someone else and an actual person phoned me up and it turned out they were after my neighbour and they'd got the apartment number wrong. I spoke to her and it was just some payment on some furniture she'd forgotten to make and because they had the wrong address she never got any demands for payment.