Art. 2340.Payment of Debt Prior to Adjudication

Adjudication, as this chapter uses the term, refers to the moment the sheriff strikes the property to the winning bidder at the sale, closing the auction to that bidder. It has nothing to do with a court ruling; it is the procedural act that ends the bidding and marks the point after which the sale's momentum can no longer be reversed by payment.

Until that moment arrives, Article 2340 gives the debtor a way out. Regardless of how far the sale has already progressed, whether the property has been advertised, appraised, and put up for bid, or bidding is actively underway, the debtor can halt everything by paying the sheriff the judgment in full, together with interest and costs. None of the earlier steps in the process lock the debtor into losing the property so long as full payment arrives before the property is struck to a bidder.

That deadline matters because of what follows adjudication. Article 2342 requires the sheriff to pass a formal act of sale to the purchaser after adjudication happens, and the chapter that follows this one explains that adjudication itself transfers the debtor's rights in the property to the purchaser. Once that moment passes, Article 2340's window to stop the sale by payment has closed.