Judica County Radio: Legal Questions from the Listeners

Coming up on this edition of Judica County Radio, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners Whitaker and Hamer law firm and practicing attorneys here in North Carolina, your hosts. We'll get into some listener questions, a boundary line dispute. We'll talk about that. Also legal questions in and around condominiums. There are a lot of them. We'll get to those. And also a default on a credit card and you're being sued.

What can you do? That's all coming up next on Judica County Radio. Whitaker and Hamer presents Judica County with Joshua Whitaker and Joseph Hamer. Welcome in to Judica County Radio, your hosts, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. They're the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm. They're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.

They've got offices conveniently located for you in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay-Varina, Gastonia and in Morehead City. I'm Morgan Patrick. My privilege to go back and forth with the attorneys each and every day. It's always legalese. And also on the program, we give you an opportunity at a complimentary consult.

We'll explain that as we move through. You can call at any time and grab one. 800-659-1186.

That's 800-659-1186. We're going to get into listener questions. But before we do that, gentlemen, I want to explain to our radio listeners that we kind of get together virtually.

We have three different studios. And it looks like Joe's joining us from the library. And we're going to get into some questions. Joe's joining us from the library. And Josh is joining us from what looks to be his upstairs office.

It's like a bunker. I'm in my studio, but I just want to ask Joe, Joe, what's the latest book you've read off those shelves? I do a lot of the dictionary, you know, like words. And I like just picking one and learning it every day.

That's the type of student of the game of English that I am. You know, this is a fake backdrop. And I turned it on. I can't turn it off now because we're recording. So this is what you guys get. This is what we're rolling with. Yeah, it makes me look sophisticated.

Yeah, we can do the virtual background. So I do like the library look. Thank you. It makes me feel more sophisticated.

You sound smarter already. Thank you. I've been working on that, man, every day. Reading these books behind me. Before we get into legalese like we always do, how was your week?

And since, Joe, you're on a roll, why don't you start us off? It was great, man. Life is a blessing. I'm so happy to be alive. Nothing but positivity. So Josh can come in and crush us.

I did. You know, we're in the studio a little bit earlier than we used to be. So we're we're coming in fresh off the Super Bowl.

So we're, I'm a little I'm a little tired today. And, and I wasn't I wasn't a negative headspace this morning. But I've had some Coca Cola and what the Super Bowl you didn't care. I had some Coca Cola. I didn't care.

What a horrible game. Yeah, I didn't. I didn't care. I dislike both teams. But that's usually the way it is.

Right. And I mean, I usually you just like you dislike one more than the other man. There's no way you dislike them equally. I don't like the Eagles. I you know, I in my mind, I kind of try to think about them as like the Randall Cunningham Reggie White Eagles because I can get behind that Eagles team. Sure.

So that's kind of what I tried to do last night. Even though Reggie White's been dead for a long time. Reggie White passed away in Charlotte a long time ago. Yeah, well, well, that's sad, man.

I'm upset at everybody. I don't I mean, I watched that game last night. And I'm just like, everybody was so on the Chiefs for the three Pete. And again, we taped this during the week. But and can when can I say three Pete without getting sued by Pat Riley? Oh, yeah, I saw that. Yeah, well, he owns the phrasing.

But anyway, yeah, I mean, Philadelphia from the kickoff to the end of the game, it was pretty much an education for the Chiefs. I'm excited, man. I really want to get you know, it's it's my boys have gotten into into watching baseball, right? We're almost baseball season's almost almost here. And so that's what I'm gonna do. I'm just gonna look forward to the Braves, right? Baseball, get focused. You think? Yeah, I've never it's never been for me, man. No offense to you.

I'm glad you like it. Josh, do your boys play? I've got no my kids all went football basketball. So they they they did the pop in the popcorn or they did the the tee ball and things like that.

But they never they never stuck with it. And to be honest, they're, they're built for basketball and football. So if you could put Mikey back in tee ball, man, crush it. Yeah, he put Mikey out there against some six year olds and tee ball. But we're a year old grown man body.

I think he'd have some success and getting getting getting geared up for that. But uh, no, we got a good we got a good show. You know, we we tried to talk about legal things and we try to gear this show the whole point of this show is to talk about things that you know, the average person might end up dealing with. And, and so we've picked handpicked some some questions that we get here at the firm. And I'm excited about those today because we there's one we get a ton, Joe boundary line disputes. And so we get all kinds of questions on boundary line disputes. And so we're going to talk about that today. I'm sure you're pretty jazzed. I can't wait, man. And when you told me we're going to talk about it, my blood pressure got really high because I get so excited about boundary lines.

And I'm just trying to not hyperventilate right now. Because what a topic, man. What a topic. I think we're going to spend some time talking about condominiums. So condominiums kind of just keeps getting back. This show is going to take me out.

We're going to talk about those how they're created just some things I've gotten some questions this week on on condominiums and they kind of present their own legal challenge when when it's not really a boundary line dispute, but when an upstairs neighbor springs a leak and it affects a downstairs neighbor how that all works out. And, you know, we always get that call to, you know, folks. This always reminds me of Dusty Rhodes. You know, Dusty Rhodes when he talked about hard times. Yeah. Close personal friend of mine, Dusty Rhodes.

So, yeah, I know. Well, if you're if you're listening to us and you've never heard it before, give it a Google. Dusty Rhodes has a promo. He did back in the 80s and wrestling.

He talked about hard times. It's very, very famous. I won't try to do it. I won't try to do my show. I think anybody who knows it wants you to do it.

But that's my impression. We get we get calls on on things like people not being able to pay their credit card right now, being able to pay their car note default. And so we basically just want to have a conversation about some listener questions we get regarding default and what happens, you know, when the creditor sues you or repossesses things. And and so I figure we talk about that.

But that is that's our goal today. Joseph is to talk to people. Like I said, we get these questions all the time. My hope is that us talking about them are helpful to the folks who tune in. And, you know, like like Morgan said, we talk to people all the time about these kind of things, that this is a situation that you're facing. You know, we always offer up just, you know, I call it a free consultation, but, you know, just take, you know, 10 or 15 minutes to kind of talk to you about your problem and see if we can get you in the right direction. See if it's something that, you know, we can let you know what this what what kind of, you know, how an attorney might be able to help you when it may cost you and just kind of get you going in the right direction. And so, like I said, these questions come out of a lot of these type of consult.

So that's that's the plan today anyway, Morgan. All right, so the consults can be acquired by simply calling this number 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Leave your contact information briefly what the call is about and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch and they'll set up one of those complimentary consults at one of their offices located in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina, Gastonia or in Morehead City. And it's an opportunity for you to get your legal questions answered. 800-659-1186. There's no cost.

There's no obligation. 800-659-1186. So when we return on Judica County radio, it will be listener questions and we will tackle boundary line disputes. We'll also talk about some legal questions in and around condominiums. A lot of condominium owners are up against some some interesting situations and how you handle it legally.

And then also, if you defaulted on a credit card and you're being sued, what steps can you take? Those are all questions coming up on this edition of Judica County radio. We're back right after this. Welcome back into Judica County radio. Your hosts are Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. They're the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.

They've got offices located convenient for you in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina, Gastonia and in Morehead City. I'm Morgan Patrick. Each and every week it's legalese. They talk it. And we also give you a chance at some consults. So we walk it as well.

And these are complimentary. All you've got to do is call eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. That's eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six. Leave your contact information briefly what your legal question is about and you get a complimentary consult from Whitaker and Hamer. They will be in touch with you again.

That's eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. So, gentlemen, we're getting into listener questions. Josh, where are you going to start? Well, I just want to remind everyone who's listening, you know, we're the firm has and Morgan, you always do this. You tell them where our offices are.

And we were talking about where we were from today. We're not all in the same place. So I am on the third floor of the Garner office here on Highway 70. That's that's where I'm set up.

And Joseph, where are you? One twenty one East Main Street, downtown Clayton. Right. So you're up on that level of precision. But yes, the second the second floor of our historically relevant downtown Clayton office.

That's right. And so we we we really work hard. You know, we're we're a statewide law firm here in North Carolina. We're only licensed. Well, we're licensed to practice in North Carolina. One of our attorneys is licensed to practice in North Carolina and South Carolina. But we do practice law kind of statewide North Carolina and cover most of the areas of practice where if you need an attorney, more than likely we we can assist you. So, you know, we do this show kind of to give you information and so that you are aware of us. You know us. If you if you need some help, you know, you know who to call.

You can call Whitaker and Hamer. And so that's kind of why we do it. And in that in that vein, we're going to go ahead and get started with our first listener question. And this question comes in a lot of different ways.

I mean, I'm giving them all these questions. They're all coming in under boundary disputes. But basically what happens is someone's going to sell their their house to a buyer.

They get their house under contract. That buyer has a survey done. And lo and behold, that survey shows a boundary line dispute. Right. So that survey may show your neighbor's fences on your property, your neighbor's driveways on your property, your neighbor's decks on your property. I've seen this come up where a corner of a house is on your property.

Right. So this is a this is a boundary line issue where someone you got to property owners, properties coming together. And you've got a you've got a dispute because you got it.

What we call an encroachment. And this is when it usually comes up and they're never pleasant. Joseph, you know, you don't this is bad news. You don't want to get they are not they're not pleasant, man.

It's not a good time. It's always I mean, you can you can love your neighbor to death and you can be the friendliest neighbor on the planet Earth. And you find out you got a boundary line issue. And so it's usually a little bit tricky, a little bit sticky. And I guess it's good for us to talk about how do we how do we even get there?

Right. Like, how do you even get to the point that you you know that you've got this issue and that's going to be someone has gotten a survey, essentially. That's what's taking place. And whether it's you got the survey and you figure out that someone's encroaching on you or someone next to you got a survey and figured out you're encroaching on them. There's going to be a survey involved.

And and that's how the issue is going to pop up. And I think it's important to talk about the fact that when you purchase property in North Carolina, you don't have there's no requirement to get a survey. You're not required to do it. Obviously, it's good practice because we're sitting here doing an entire radio segment on what can go wrong if you don't do that.

But you're not absolutely required to. So you purchase property, you get no survey, whether you get a survey later or someone else gets a survey and discovers that you're encroaching on them. You're you're going to have an issue on your hands at some point.

And and so I guess the initial piece of advice without getting into the nuance of what the actual boundary issues could be is get a survey. Yeah. And like just said, usually this comes up because somebody, you know, a property owner has got a buyer. Right. So you've got someone who's interested in buying your property.

And so they're they're going out and getting a survey. Maybe you and your neighbor have lived there side by side for 20 years and just never got a survey, didn't know, thought everything was OK. And then the survey shows up and shows an encroachment and encroachments can be all different things. And some are some are harder to get around than others. You know, one that you see often is offense encroachment. Not the end of the world. Right. Joe, would you say offense encroachment? No, offense encroachment isn't in the world. And just to touch on that, you know, we see it from time to time.

We do a lot of real estate transactional work. And it's not uncommon for someone to get their survey back and find out that they've got offense encroachment. I'd say the vast majority of the time those are going to be minor, you know, in the sense that there's it's going to be negligible in terms of how much space is being taken up there. And, you know, anytime you've got an encroachment right, anytime someone's encroaching on you or you're encroaching on someone else, if that person or if you wanted to play hardball and be very difficult, you know, in the absence of an easement, that person doesn't have a right to have that that on your property. So you could press that issue and essentially have whatever it is moved or removed in some fashion for sure. But what we see a lot of the time, especially if it's negligible, especially if it's between reasonable people who get along, a lot of times we'll see or we'll prepare ourselves what's called an encroachment agreement, which is essentially just putting something on notice that acknowledges the existence of that encroachment and kind of reserves the right to do something about it in the future as needed. Yeah, I guess the biggest concern you have, the encroachment itself is concerning because you you want to resolve it.

Right. A buyer's not going to buy or didn't have to buy your property if there's a there's a, you know, a major encroachment on the property. So you're usually these folks want to get it resolved.

And again, depending on do you have a neighbor who wants to work with you or do you have a neighbor that you haven't talked to in 10 years? You know that you actively dislike, you know, and that can kind of dictate. But but you want to resolve it. And like Joseph said, you know, you can come to an agreement. An encroachment agreement can just say, hey, your fence can stay there as long as it's in good shape. What we're really worried about is adverse possession. Right. And and we haven't talked about adverse possession in a long time.

But but I don't want to go I don't want to go too far in that road. But if you fence in a piece of property and meet certain factors and own it for long enough, then there's an argument that you could have possessed it adversely possessed it. Yeah. The law builds that in just to touch on it without, again, getting into the nuance. It's a it's a mechanism by which the law allows someone who has has taken care of property, even though if they didn't, they weren't the record owner for X period of time. There's a lot of elements that have to be met. But yeah, that's a it's a it's a real fear that could occur where, you know, if someone believes they own your property for long enough and they meet these elements, then the law can impose that they can basically say, yes, they do own that portion of your property.

Yeah. And adverse possession doesn't happen a lot. It's it's it's something to be aware of. And that's kind of what you're worried about. Somebody's fenced in the back acre of your property and it's been that way for 21 years.

Maybe you've got you've got bigger issues. But, yeah, an encroachment agreements, an easy way where everybody can agree, hey, I own this property. Your fence is over the line. You're cool with it.

I'm cool with it. And you can go about your business. But sometimes it doesn't work out that way. Sometimes it's a bigger issue.

You know, like I said, I've seen I've been doing this 20 some years. And so we've seen where someone's built a house right over a over a boundary line. And that's not supposed to be able to happen, but it happens. And that's bad news.

And if it's your house. Yeah, it's it's tough, man. And it's not a good situation for anybody involved. And you're looking at a much hairier, stickier situation that that that encroachment agreement is. You know, you're looking at a tough situation, man.

Yes. If you've got that or you've got like like a decent sized, you know, shed warehouse or pool. And, you know, once you start laying down concrete driveway, like once you start laying down concrete and encroaches, it's kind of a more expensive issue to to deal with. You know, if it's a fence, fences can be moved.

Decks can be moved, you know. But the house is bad. And the reason the house is worse is because if you if your property straddles and touches someone else's property, whatever portion of your property that is on their property is immediately subject to all their their bad juju there.

If they get a judgment against them, if they've got a deed of trust that's foreclosed, technically, there's a portion of your house that's being foreclosed on a mortgage or a lien that you had nothing to do with. So it's an absolute nightmare scenario. You know, the firm we've done tens of thousands of closings. I think the actual numbers somewhere in the sixty five to seventy thousand closings since we've since we opened our doors in 2004. And so we've seen about everything that can that can go wrong. And we've seen over the years, you know, people are spending a lot of money at their closing usually. Right. You've got some cost and no one wants this cost to be greater than they have to be.

But one consequence is that people are less likely to pay the money. Timing's an issue, too. But money, I think, is the biggest issue to get a survey.

But if if the property hasn't been surveyed in a while, a survey can either give you a lot of peace of mind. Right. Yeah. OK.

There's nothing wrong. That's great. Or it can alert you of a big issue before you buy the house. Because once you buy the house, it's your issue. It's your issue. That's right.

Right. And if you don't get a survey, title insurance isn't going to help you out. If you get a survey, you know, and a good survey from a good surveyor is going to show everything that's there. But let's just say you got a bad surveyor.

They miss something. And another surveyor comes down the line and finds it. You know, you're going to be indemnified.

The title company is going to step in and help you out with that. But in the absence of some survey, it's you. You're you're on your own. So let me ask a question, guys. So somebody comes into your office and they're they're going to do a land transaction, a house transaction.

Is this like one of the first things that you say? Look, look, I mean, we have to make sure everything's above board as far as property lines. We need a survey. Yeah, we do that. We tell them we send it we send a letter to folks and we we at least make you sign that you've read it, whether you've read it or not. You know, it's a lot of good information in there.

It's very important. But but one of the things we do is we strongly recommend a survey and we lay out all of the potential issues that are attendant with not getting a survey. But again, you don't have to get a survey to to purchase real property in North Carolina. It's just best practice.

And you're going to avoid any of these potential issues. And I think a lot of people see it. And a survey these days runs, what, around seven hundred, eight hundred dollars somewhere in that range.

Yeah, for like an average lot size. And so a lot of people think, well, I'm going to pay seven, eight hundred bucks to find out nothing's wrong. And a lot of folks just don't want to do that. A lot of people don't want to pay that that kind of money just to find out that there's nothing wrong and they don't see the benefit.

But I'm here to tell you, like Josh said, as someone who has seen it go bad. It's it's a very especially when you're purchasing a three, four hundred thousand dollar house. You know, it's it's not a bad idea. It's actually a great idea. I would highly recommend it.

I was going to say long run would be very cost effective. Again, just dot nice across and tease. We're talking about boundary line dispute. That was our first listener question into the program today.

We've got more to come. We're going to get into the legal questions in and around condominium ownership if something happens, if you're in a condo situation. Again, this is Judica County radio. Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners, Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm are your hosts. They're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. And during the course of the show, we do offer up complimentary consults. All you've got to do is call eight hundred six five nine one one eight six.

That's eight hundred six five nine eleven eighty six. Leave your contact information briefly. What your calls about and they'll line you up for one of those complimentary consults. And you can have those at the offices and they are located in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina, Gastonia and in Morehead City. You have to choose one.

You can't have them at all. Right. So you'll have one of those complimentary consults.

Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. When we return, we'll dive into condominiums and some of the legal issues that ownership is facing. That's all coming up next on Judica County radio.

We are back on Judica County radio. Your hosts are Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners, Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm. They are practicing attorneys here in North Carolina. They've got offices conveniently located for you in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland.

Forty forty two Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Verina, Gastonia and in Morehead City. And during the course of the show, we do offer up complimentary consults. You can call at any time and grab one. Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. You're facing a legal situation. You've got some questions. Get one of those consults.

Eight hundred six five nine one one eight six. I'm Morgan Patrick. And now we are back to our listener questions. We encountered and tackled a boundary line dispute in our first portion of the program. And now we're transitioning into condominiums or legal questions in and around ownership. If something happens, Josh. Yeah.

I want to talk about and it's good that we're doing this right after we talk about boundary issues. Right. So if you're gonna go buy a house on an acre. Right. And you get your survey, the surveyor is going to show you where your acre is.

Right. It's going to show you, you know, where your acre is compared to your neighbors. They'll show you where any utility easements are.

You know, it will show you where shed is offenses, where your house is situated. Right. So the survey is it's kind of a snapshot of this property you're buying. And and we get we get calls on condominiums a lot because kind of condo you have a neighbor. Right. Condo.

You can have an upstairs neighbor or downstairs neighbor neighbors in every direction. That's right. Josh, I know how much that excites you. So we'll say that same acre. Right.

We'll say somebody bought a house on an acre. Right. But but say that same acre, somebody decided to build an eight story condo. Right. Condo building.

And so they don't really get a survey, though, they get up, they get a plat. They have to draw up the building because when you buy a condo, you're not buying real property. You've got no you've got no real piece of that. And again, let's clarify, that's for the person that's for the individual who is purchasing one of the individual condominium units.

That's right. So the builder is going to take the acre. That builder would own the acre. He's going to build this condo and he's going to sell the condo. So he's created let's say there's 50 condos, 50 condominiums in this in this building.

He's going to sell them to 50 different owners. Right. But when you you own a condo, you don't own the real property itself. You own space.

Just the space. Yeah. You own the air in your condo. Right. You own the interior walls.

And so what they do, they kind of have to do. It's it's not really a survey. It's more of a drawing. But if you get out of the way, if you own a part, if you own condo unit 101 of Whittaker Hamer Condos, you're going to go down the register of deeds and there's a plat. And it tells you unit 101. You're on the third floor. You've got 20 feet ceilings. Right.

And this is your space. And that's how you identify a condo. Right.

And so but you can still have you can still have issues with your neighboring condo owners, but you wouldn't necessarily get a survey. Right. So we had a call a lot of times on, hey, my upstairs neighbor had a leak in her wall. The water came down into my unit. I've got all this.

I've got all this damage. Right. So you still have neighbor issues with a condo. But it's just interesting to me when you buy a condo and there's a lot of great reasons. I'm not I'm not I'm there's a reason for condos. Right.

That's right. I'm not coming down hard on condos. There's great reasons to have one. You got a bone to pick with condos. You know what I hate? I hate condos. No, but like we'll say you got an acre like right on right on right on the ocean. Right.

Yeah. And so you can build a nice house and sell it to one person or you can give 50 people the chance to own a condo there on that piece of property. So it maximizes the value of property. But ownership of a condo just has different issues than ownership of, let's say, a detached single family residential dwelling.

Right. So I get a lot of calls like was my what's my condo responsible for? They responsible for replacing bad windows? Are they responsible for cleaning the shared debt? Are they responsible for my trash?

Are they you know what? Because that's that's what you do. You have a condo association. You pay to the condo association.

Condos are usually responsible if your house if the condo unit burns down, they're going to rebuild it. Right. Yeah. They're required to keep insurance. There's.

Yeah. And and I think what you're getting at, Josh, is what how do you know? Like, you know, how do you know what what the condo what the association's responsibilities are? What are your responsibilities? And the answer to that question is going to be like so many other things in the law is it depends. And what it's going to depend on is if you've got a condo, the law imposes the fact that you will 100 percent have a condominium declaration that's going to contain all the relevant terms and answer all of those questions that you may have. But when you and when you buy a condo, there's going to be a disclosure. And it's going to be important to know what you're responsible for, what you're not responsible for. There's some general things that that the condo association is going to be responsible for, some general things that they can do. But you'll you'll definitely want to know what's required of you, what condo dues are, how much can condo dues go up every year? You know, they're paying for insurance.

They're paying usually for trash removal. So those are all those are all good questions to ask before you buy a condo. And those should be disclosed to you, too. But you might have to do some you know, I have to ask a little bit of follow up questions and just be.

Just be cognizant, cognizant, cognizant, cognizant. You got to start tagging us in when you get one of these words, you know, this would be tough. Big word, big word.

It'd be like tag team hot tag me in to finish the word. But but that's it. And like I said, I get a lot of questions after people have already bought a condo about how to deal with certain issues. And I can just tell that maybe they didn't understand. Somebody did them a disservice when they bought the condo, didn't kind of set the stage really well and give them all the information that maybe they probably needed before they they bought a condo. But yeah, condos, man, very exciting topic. I love the idea of just owning air.

I think that's a really cool concept. And your idea of owning some air at the beach, that's what better place to own air than the beach beachfront? Legal questions in and around condominiums and ownership thereof and things you need to be aware of before you enter into a purchase. Again, just do your due diligence. Ask these questions ahead of time. Again, work with professionals that do this on a daily basis and get those questions answered. And again, speaking of getting your questions answered, if you've got a legal question, maybe it's in along the lines of, you know, purchasing a condominium, a real estate question. You can always grab a complimentary consult with Whitaker and Hamer.

And how do you do that? You call this number 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Leave your contact information briefly what the call is about, what you need some answers to. And an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch for that complimentary consult. Again, the number to call 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. We'll continue with listener questions here on Whitaker and Hamer's, you know, again, Judica County radio. An opportunity for you to get some knowledge. The next thing up is going to be what if you default on a credit card and you're being sued?

What steps can you take? We'll talk about that when we return on Judica County radio. We are back on Judica County radio, your host, Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer. They're the managing partners at Whitaker and Hamer law firm. They're pricing attorneys here in the great state of North Carolina.

They've got offices conveniently located for you in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Puke Wave Arena, Gastonia and in Morehead City. I'm Morgan Patrick each and every week. It's back and forth on legalese, just different legal topics, maybe some listener questions. Again, how things are being handled.

And again, you got to understand this, too. Your situation that you're going through is unique to you. You need to make sure you're getting some customized advice, some legal advice when it comes to that situation. Take advantage of the complimentary consults. If you have such questions about something you're going through, call the number 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186.

That'll connect you with Whitaker and Hamer. You can grab one of those complimentary consults. Again, come in and talk about your situation. Gentlemen, we've been handling listener questions. We talked about boundary line disputes. We've talked about condominium ownership and some of the legal questions that go along with that and how you handle it.

And now you're going to move into credit cards. Josh? You know, sometimes when me and Joseph talk about this stuff, the law, it's not always exciting. You don't think so? To other people, to attorneys it is. It gets me going, man. It gets me going. To attorneys it is.

I'm sweating right now. So we really try hard not to be boring when we're talking about these things, but I feel like sometimes we can't help it. So if we bored you at all today, I apologize. But we're going to get into something that maybe is slightly – it's still the law.

It's still the law. So this is – we get this question a lot. And so we get this question a lot where people have come on hard times. There's all kinds of reasons why things might happen, but they have got – I think, Morgan, we talked about credit cards, right? But this could be a car note. It could be any number of things, but just kind of consumer debt. You've got a credit card. You've got a car loan. And you're not going to be able to pay it.

Things aren't going well. You're not going to be able to make your minimum payment. And so we call that a default, right? So you've signed a note. When you buy a car, you sign a note. When you get a credit card, you sign a credit card agreement. And if you don't make payments as scheduled, then you are in default.

And so when you're in default on a credit card, what happens is they bug you for a while, right? And then eventually – They'll shut you down. They'll shut you down to future advances.

That's right. You're not going to get any future advances. It's going to obviously damage your credit rating. But eventually they're going to try to get you to pay. But eventually it's going to go to an attorney and that attorney is just going to sue you for default, right? So you're going to get served with a complaint. And you've got 30 days to answer that complaint. And if you don't answer it, they're going to move forward.

We're talking about a default, an entry of default, meaning you didn't answer. And they're going to try to get a default judgment for whatever is owed. And then they're going to try to levy that judgment against whatever you may own.

That judgment becomes a lien on all the property you own. And that's assuming you don't respond, right? But what defense do you have if you just aren't paying, you know?

Yeah. And this is where we should say, you know, if you get in this position – and this is not one of our practice areas. We do not – our firm does not practice bankruptcy. Most of the firms that practice bankruptcy focus on bankruptcy.

And it kind of becomes your whole practice area. But if you get in this position, I would recommend highly that you go talk to a bankruptcy attorney about what steps, because bankruptcy might have some things that can solve your issue on consumer debt. Some people don't want to go that route, and that's kind of what this conversation is for. If you go the bankruptcy route, there's a whole other conversation to be had.

Here, though, when you're in default, you can work out – and this goes for anything. You know, if you get sued – if you get sued, meaning somebody has hired an attorney, right? They've got a complaint against you. You've got to answer a complaint. You can work out a settlement. Yeah, a lot of times – and that goes – I mean, that works here, but that works for, you know, any time you've got someone who sends you to collections that you owe money. There's a lot of times that, especially when you're dealing with professional debt collection companies or attorneys that do it for a living, there's a lot of times where they realize something is better than nothing. And so I would strongly encourage anybody who's in that situation to at least attempt to settle.

Offer some form of settlement if you can. Or they may work with you and set up a payment plan. Like, you know, it's not always the case that these folks are just trying to get one over on you or be completely unfair. Now, they're a company.

They have to make money. So there's only going to be so much leniency. But I definitely encourage anybody who has a situation like that to see what can be done for you if you can. Yeah, and I find a lot of people when they get this complaint, right, the sheriff usually is the one that serves you with a complaint. So if you're not used to the sheriff coming up to your house, right, it's kind of a jarring thing to have law enforcement show up and serve you with a complaint.

That starts a clock. And unless you get additional time from the court, you've got 30 days to answer that, and it moves fast, you know. And especially if you've got to contact an attorney, get on their schedule. It's just something you have to move quickly on.

You can't let it linger because I think things kind of spin out of control fast, you know. And we see a lot of people who, again, are kind of in a position where they're having some difficult times, and it's not something that you're wanting to have to deal with. But it's a lot easier to deal with the attorney at this stage than have to deal with, like, if they sell this debt off to, like you said, a professional debt collector later on. But I think a lot of people don't understand the civil litigation process. You get this complaint, you've got 30 days to answer it, you can answer it, and then there's some discovery, there's some things that happen. If you don't answer it, then they're just going to get whatever they're asking for, right? If you don't answer, they're going to get their attorney's fees, they're going to get anything they ask for within reason and have a judgment against you in 60 to 90 days, and then they're going to start moving to collect. And a lot of times, a lot of times, these people do want you to answer and do want you to talk to them and see if there's any way it can be resolved. You know, a judgment against you is not worth a lot of money to them in the long run. Because a lot of times, if there's anything at all, you know, it's just worth having a conversation. But like you said, that goes for everything. Anytime you're sued for anything, settlement is always on the table. And maybe the parties start out far apart, but as they talk more and figure out what you have and you don't have, but there's always some discussion that can be had.

Yeah, you made a good point, man. The fact that a judgment against you is going to require, they're going to have to spend money on an attorney, they're going to have to go through, it's less efficient, it's a lesser option to the potential of settling with you. So there is a vested interest for these folks to settle, and don't get me wrong, they will 100% sue you, especially these bigger companies, they're going to sue you, they're going to win, they're going to get a judgment against you.

But to your point, Josh, they will also work with you because it is, that is a lot of times going to be a more efficient option for them in the long run. Yeah, and again, to settle, that does involve paying something. If you can't pay anything, then consulting with a bankruptcy attorney is probably a good bet. Because if you can't pay them anything, then you can't settle. And that might be the issue, that might be why you haven't been paying the monthly payment and you're in default.

And so if that's the case, then speaking with a bankruptcy attorney is probably the best path forward. But if you have the ability, yeah, talking about it is the way to go. But litigation scares a lot of people, and I think a lot of people think litigation is a slow process, and it can be. We've been involved in cases that go on for years and years, you know, bigger cases, but these cases move really quick from complaint to judgment if you don't respond and you don't take some proactive steps to delay them.

So I think that surprises a lot of people how quickly nonpayment to judgment happens. And there may be a number of our listeners out there that might be going through something like this, and they've got those types of questions, and letting something like this linger, stagnate if you will, not the best advice right there. So make sure you're doing your due diligence, you're asking these questions, you're getting those questions answered. There's going to be an opportunity during the course of this show to grab a complimentary consult. Maybe you've got a debt situation, a creditor situation, you've got some questions about it. You can always grab one of the consults, 800-659-1186.

That's 800-659-1186. And again, leave your contact information briefly with what the call is about, and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch. You're listening to Judica County Radio. We're going to take a short break. I want to remind you the offices for Whitaker and Hamer are located in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay-Varina, Gastonia, and in Moorhead City for your convenience.

We're back right after this. Welcome back in to Judica County Radio. Your hosts are Josh Whitaker and Joe Hamer, managing partners Whitaker and Hamer Law Firm. They're practicing attorneys here in North Carolina.

They've got offices conveniently located in Raleigh, Garner, Cleveland, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay-Varina, Gastonia, and in Moorhead City. I'm Morgan Patrick. We go back and forth on legal topics. You're going to have questions about your own situation possibly.

Well, we have an answer for you. It's called Complimentary Consult at Whitaker and Hamer, and all you've got to do is call 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. Leave your contact information briefly what that call is about, and an attorney with Whitaker and Hamer will be in touch to set up one of those complimentary consults. So, so far today, we've talked about boundary line disputes, we've talked about legal questions concerning condominium ownership, things do arise, and then defaulting on a credit card and you're sued.

What steps can you take? Josh, we've got more questions, and of course, this will be our last segment of the show. Before we get to anything important, when as a nation are we going to come together and move the Super Bowl to Saturday? Super Bowl Saturday? Or just make the Monday after a holiday, too.

That's a possibility, right? You know, I stayed up late for me because my boys wanted to watch the Super Bowl. That's after 6.30 p.m. Yeah, 9 to 10 o'clock, that's my bewitching hour.

After Jeopardy, Josh is a corpse, basically. So I stayed up, and I slept enough, I'm here, I'm doing it, I'm doing all the things I'm supposed to do. You look great, man, you look radiant. Fantastic. But it would be nice to take it easy. Yeah.

To take it easy, just give me the portion. That's kind of what we're doing, man, right now. That's kind of what we're doing, we're not having to, we're not digging trenches, brother.

We're sitting here talking to each other. I would suggest being an attorney, maybe a well-worded letter to Roger Goodell's office, the National Football League, and just suggest, hey, have you ever thought about one of the pillars of your league, the Super Bowl Sunday tradition, why don't we move it to Saturday? I write them letters all the time already. I get real fired up during the game, and I just pin a letter, send it to them. I mean, it's not like they don't play NFL games on Saturday. We play them on almost every day of the week, Monday, Thursday. They're on Saturday on the holidays, Saturdays, and then, of course, Sunday. Yeah. It seems like it would be easy.

It seems like it would be easy to do. Or even a Friday. Do it a Friday. Well, I guess you don't get all day. I know they want to take up the whole day and get the whole weekend in, but give us something, man. I turned the TV on, and it was game day, and it was like on this eight-hour edition of game day. It's like, that's got to be tough to do, man. We've got to do an hour of this show, and I feel like that's tough sometimes. I know as every year passes, I know the way I watch TV, the way I take in media, I get harder and harder to reach from the Super Bowl's perspective, but I feel like I got almost no until the day of the Super Bowl.

I don't think I really heard that much about the Super Bowl. I don't know if that was just me being harder and harder to reach by traditional advertising. Yeah, I think that's what it is, man. Your algorithm is very specific now, man. They've cultivated it. Heavy cultivation.

They know you well, man. Because I feel like 10 years ago, you were beat over the head with the Super Bowl every day until the Super Bowl, and I really didn't even get anything. Well, I mean, back in the day, we had just a handful of sources for our information.

We would actually pick up a newspaper and read it. The old USA Today, they had a two-week run up to the Super Bowl, so there were multiple stories from so many different angles each and every day. ESPN, still there, obviously, but now we have every streaming source you could possibly imagine, NFL Network, CBS Sports, Fox Sports, NBC Sports. They're all doing their version of Super Bowl coverage, and after two weeks, it's like, holy cow, can we just play the freaking game. You know what it is, man, too, Josh, is your team's not in the game, and I think the algorithms have gotten so good at tailoring content specifically to you that if neither of these teams are really in your wheelhouse, you probably see less stuff about it, because you're not the target audience. Yeah, 10 years ago, I probably watched a lot more Sports Center, things like that, than I do now. When was the last time you watched Sports Center? It's been a while. Yeah, you don't have to anymore. You used to be the only thing you could do.

How else would you find anything out? Yeah, get the highlights. I remember as a younger man watching the same Sports Center multiple times in a row. I remember the day Alonzo Mourning got traded.

I remember the day Alonzo Mourning got traded from the Hornets. I watched that Sports Center three times in a row in shock. Yeah, highlights, man. How else would you see highlights?

That was the only way to do it, and now it's very easy to see them. They're everywhere, you know? Yeah, I know what's going on with the Hornets.

I get a lot of that information. I know what's going on with the Panthers and the Bills, NC State Athletics. I'm very clued in to what's going on, but the Super Bowl just didn't even exist. I almost forgot it was Super Bowl Sunday.

And then my kids were like, hey, what are we eating for Super Bowl Sunday? What are we doing? What are we... Okay. I was like, I don't know. Yeah, you're like...

I like the idea of you just not feeding your kids, man. So it's the beginning of 2025. We're in February, so we made it through January, but I still... I don't want to harp on this.

I don't want to drive people crazy. But this is the perfect time. If you've never had an estate plan done, this is the time to do it. If you've got an estate plan but you haven't done it since your 28-year-old was two years old, right? It's time to look at it again.

And we always do this this time of year. We offer folks free estate planning consults, right? And so that's a... You never had one before.

You need to start from scratch. We meet with you for free. If you've got one and you need it reviewed, possibly you need it updated, maybe it's time to talk about a trust, maybe it's time to talk about what retirement looks like, or providing for grandkids instead of the last time you did it when you were providing for your underage children at the time, right? So we don't charge you for that. We get information from you. We talk to you about it. We make recommendations. Well, this is the time of year we see a lot of people getting their estate plan done.

Yeah, that's right, man. And it's always... We see a lot this time of year, but I'd like to add, man, there's no bad time to do it if you haven't done it. It's especially for the extremely low cost of nothing to come and sit down and talk to us. Absolutely free.

You can't beat that price. And we're not saying we'll do your estate plan for free. Everybody's estate plan is different, but we can be very upfront with you about what we charge, what things cost, but there is no cost to just talk about it.

See what can be done, see how we can address your concerns, put you in a better position in 2025 than you were in 2024. Well, maybe we do kind of want to scare people. It's a situation where if you don't have an estate plan and things go south and it's out of your control. I know, Josh, you probably have dealt with this situation too, trying to be reactive as opposed to proactive in getting the estate plan done early.

Then you've got people coming to you that they're facing a situation where an estate's in probate, and once it's in there, it's a little bit harder to deal with. Yeah, that's what we always tell people. We always tell people, we're all going to die. Everybody's going to die. Me, Morgan, my friend Joseph there, we're all going to die, and you're not going to know.

You're not going to know when that happens. So it's one of the few things that we have to prepare for in advance, and not doing it makes life much more difficult when it happens, especially if you've got young children, especially if you've got a spouse that depends on you. By getting that stuff in order, I can't overstate how often I see things go wrong for folks who didn't plan. Often. Yeah, sometimes you get lucky and everything falls right in place.

Not a lot of times does that happen. So I do want to encourage you to start 2025 off. Give us a call. Let us get with you on a state plan.

Let's put you in a good position, and you don't have to worry about it for the rest of 2025. It's all done. Opportunity to grab a complimentary consult is right now, 800-659-1186. That's 800-659-1186. That will get you in touch with Whitaker and Hamer. Leave your contact information briefly what the call is about, and an attorney with the firm will be in touch, and they'll line up that complimentary consult. Maybe it's a question about estate planning, very important to have it.

And again, it's not painful. You can really get this started and do it very, very quickly. Again, and you've got it in writing. 800-659-1186, that's 800-659-1186. They'll line you up for one of those complimentary consults with Whitaker and Hamer. And a quick reminder, office is located convenient for you in Raleigh, Garner, Clayton, Goldsboro, Fuquay, Farina, Gastonia, and in Morehead City.

Josh, Joe, I'm Morgan Patrick. Again, another edition of Judica County Radio is in the books, and guess what? We'll see you on the radio next week. Judica County is hosted by attorneys licensed to practice law in North Carolina. Some of the guests appearing on this podcast may be licensed North Carolina attorneys. Discussion on this podcast is meant to be general in nature, and in no way should the discussion be interpreted as legal advice. Legal advice can only be rendered once an attorney, licensed in the state in which you live, has the opportunity to discuss the facts of your case with you. The attorneys appearing on this podcast are speaking in generalities about the law in North Carolina and how these laws affect the average North Carolinian. If you have any questions about the content of this show, you can direct such inquiry to Joshua Whitaker at jmwatmwhlaw.lawyer.