10 Tips While Hiring a Florida Foreclosure Attorney

How Bad Is the Foreclosure Problem?

Florida posted the nation’s highest state foreclosure rate for the third consecutive month in July and August according to RealtyTrac. One in every 328 housing units with a foreclosure filing during the month — more than three times the national average—were in foreclosure. 

Florida foreclosure activity increased 8 percent from the previous month and was up 7 percent from a year ago.

Florida Ties Top Metro Foreclosure Rates
With one in every 230 housing units with a foreclosure filing in July, Jacksonville, Fla., posted the nation’s highest foreclosure rate among metropolitan statistical areas with a population of 200,000 or more.

Florida cities accounted for 7 of the 10 highest metro foreclosure rates with Miami leading

every other metro area in the country for the first quarter.

1. Eight other Florida cities posted foreclosure rates among the top 10 highest nationwide: Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Pompano Beach at No. 2 (one in every 250 housing units with a foreclosure filing)
2. Port St. Lucie at No. 3 (one in 256 housing units)
3. Ocala at No. 4 (one in every 294 housing units)
4. Palm Bay-Melbourne-Titusville at No. 5 (one in every 296 housing units)
5. Tampa-St. Petersburg-Clearwater at No. 7 (one in 334 housing units)
6. Orlando-Kissimmee at No. 8 (one in 344 housing units)
7. Pensacola-Ferry Pass-Brent at No. 9 (one in every 345 housing units)
8. Sarasota-Bradenton-Venice at No. 10 (one in 394 housing units).

The only metro outside of Florida with a top 10 foreclosure rate was Albuquerque, N.M., at No. 6 with one in every 331 housing units with a foreclosure filing in July.

The average Florida foreclosure sale price is $129,176 and nationally, $189,293.

The South Florida metro area, which includes Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties, had the highest foreclosure rate in the country for the first three months of 2013.

10 Tips When Hiring a Foreclosure Defense Attorney

If you have been served with a foreclosure notice and you are behind on your mortgage payments for any reason at all you should immediately—without question and no waiting—call an attorney at Lanigan and Lanigan. Contact Eric Lanigan who has practiced law since 1976 and has seen an array of foreclosure issues and many many cases. Roddy Lanigan has been practicing Florida law since 1976. Together they provide clients with aggressive representation.

If you are struggling to pay for your home due to a change in your employment, medical condition, divorce, you should contact an experienced foreclosure attorney.

1. A foreclosure lawyer can sort out your options. Clarifying the financial upside and downside of each scenario. Then, you get to decide what you’d like to do when you know the options.
2. Fighting banks is difficult: If you have been trying to work with the lender and aren't getting anywhere on your home refinancing, you’re not alone. Eric Lanigan of Lanigan and Lanigan said that less than 5 percent of loans are eligible for refinancing.
3. You are on your own: The banks and lenders do not care about you or your rights or your interests, only their profits which is why they will move forward with your foreclosure forcing you to fight back by hiring an attorney.
4. Don't rely on do-it-yourself tactics to save your family home: Reading about foreclosure and tactics taken by others including friends and family members cannot suffice for the knowledge that an experienced real estate attorney will provide. There is no substitute for sound legal advice. 
5. You can’t do what you see online: Watching videos, reading or interpreting information on legal self-help cannot sufficiently provide you with advice on the laws which change constantly. 
6. Don’t risk foreclosure: So you think you've found an angle, or heard of a friend or neighbor who tried something and got rid of a foreclosure lawsuit? You can't possibly defend your home from a bank or lender who hires the best foreclosure firm that money can buy. There's no reason to risk it all to try to save money. You can lose it all and likely will lose if you try a case on your own. 
7. Judges don't give you a break: Just because you’re the little guy fighting the big bad bank a judge will NOT give you any help. In fact, some judges are tougher on you because it’s highly likely that you’ll waste the courts’ time.
8. Attorneys are educated, trained and knowledgeable in the law. A layperson could never compete with an attorney because of information found, read, researched online. Why would you risk your family home to save few dollars by trying to do it yourself. If you go up against a bank and its high-priced very skilled lawyers you will lose.
9. Hire the best attorney you can afford: You get what you pay for and you will rely on the lawyer to defend and resolve a foreclosure action. If you hire the cheapest lawyer, you’re not going to get topnotch representation. You’ll get cheap and minimal work. Foreclosure is intensive and most of it is paperwork and reliant on research.
10. Attorneys don’t give discounts or work for free: If you’re paying very little and are promised the world, reconsider working with the attorney who said they’re giving you a break, discount or free help. Why would any attorney worth hiring give you a discount if the work and labor and litigation is going to be difficult and very labor intensive for them? The banks have made many mistakes and it is very likely that there are problems within your paperwork and the processing of the foreclosure. This will mean litigation and it also means that your attorney needs to be a skilled litigator.

Find out what to do by calling to setup a meeting with Eric Lanigan and Roddy Lanigan to determine your options in your foreclosure. Call 407-740-7379 to make an appointment. Eric and Roddy Lanigan of Lanigan and Lanigan are experienced attorneys who provide aggressive representation with a personal touch.