Dallas Team Secures Trial Win for National Mortgage Servicer Client

Dallas, Tex. (February 12, 2025) - Dallas Partner Mark Cronenwett and Associate Vivian Lopez of the firm's Financial Services Litigation Team recently secured a win in a bench trial in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas, Houston Division, for a national mortgage servicer client.

At issue in the case was whether the statute of limitations had expired while the mortgage borrower for a $1 million property had litigated claims concerning the right to proceeds from an insurance claim and the disbursement of escrow advances to pay outstanding ad valorem property taxes.

That litigation resulted in a settlement where the mortgage borrower released all his claims, which included a last-minute supplemental claim that foreclosure was barred by limitations. The District Court agreed with the Lewis Brisbois team's position that this supplemental claim was, indeed, a claim for recovery by the mortgagee borrower and not just a defense to a foreclosure action. As such, the mortgage borrower had released his challenge to the timeliness of the client’s foreclosure action, and foreclosure was ordered to proceed. This was a great win for Lewis Brisois’ client, saving the secured property for foreclosure after the mortgage borrower’s repeated efforts to delay and distract the state and federal courts from the reality that he had not made a mortgage payment in years and was using the courts to avoid his obligations on the mortgage loan agreement.