Judgment – Homestead Exemptions

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WI Court of Appeals – District IV

Case Name: Jeffery D. Anderson, et al., v. Anderson Tooling, Inc.,

Case No.: 2020AP898

Officials: Fitzpatrick, P.J., Blanchard, and Nashold, JJ.

Focus: Judgment – Homestead Exemptions

This is a dispute between a judgment creditor, Anderson Tooling, Inc. (“ATI”), and married judgment debtors, Jeffery and Lori Anderson, regarding statutory homestead exemptions claimed by the debtors. The Andersons each claim an exemption as protection from a judgment lien that would otherwise attach to the Andersons’ residential property in Dodge County. See WIS. STAT. §§ 806.15(1) (addressing judgment liens), 815.20(1) (addressing homestead exemptions) (2019-20). In 2015, ATI entered a money judgment against the Andersons, from an Iowa state court, in the judgment and lien docket for Dodge County. In 2019, the Andersons sued ATI in Dodge County Circuit Court, seeking a declaratory judgment that the Anderson’s property was their homestead and that this entitled them to execute a recordable release from the judgment lien under § 815.20(2). The circuit court granted summary judgment to the Andersons. ATI appeals.

There is no dispute that the Andersons’ Dodge County property was their homestead when ATI entered the Iowa judgment on the Dodge County docket, and that this exempted the Andersons’ equity interests in the residential property from a judgment lien as of that moment in time. See WIS. STAT. § 815.20(1). ATI alleges, however, that in 2019 the Andersons ceased to occupy this property as their homestead. Based on this allegation of fact, ATI argues that the Andersons invalidated (in statutory terms, it “impaired”) the exemptions. See § 815.20(1).

We assume without deciding that the following premise advanced by ATI is an accurate statement of law: when a Wisconsin homestead exemption is valid as of the time when a judgment is entered on the judgment and lien docket, the exemption can then become “impaired” because the judgment debtors abandon the homestead, allowing the docketed judgment to become a lien attaching to the residential property at issue. Having made that assumption about the law, we conclude that summary judgment in the Andersons’ favor was appropriate because there is no genuine issue of fact that could be resolved to show that the Andersons impaired their exemptions through abandonment of the homestead after docketing.

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Derek A Hawkins is Associate Corporate Counsel, IP at Amazon.