806.15.Lien of judgment; priority; statute may be suspended.

Under Section 806.15, a judgment properly entered in the judgment and lien docket, showing the debtor’s residence, becomes a lien for ten years from the date of entry on all of that debtor’s real property in the county where the judgment was rendered, excluding homestead property exempt from execution. The lien reaches property the debtor owns at the time of entry and property the debtor acquires within that ten-year period.

Two situations can pause the running of that period. If the collection of the judgment or the sale of the property is delayed by law, and the creditor enters a dated notation such as “enforcement suspended by injunction” on the docket, the delay period after that entry does not count toward the ten years. And when an appeal is pending and the required bond or deposit to stay execution has been given, the trial court may, on motion after notice to the creditor, direct the clerk to enter “secured on appeal,” which stops the judgment from being a lien during the appeal. If the judgment is affirmed or the appeal is dismissed, the clerk enters “lien restored by affirmance” or “lien restored by dismissal of appeal,” dated, and the lien is restored — an entry that can be replicated in any other county where the judgment is docketed.

The section also limits the lien’s reach into a debtor’s spouse’s property. A lien under this section does not attach to property held by a person who is the judgment debtor’s spouse or former spouse and that is not also held by the debtor, unless the spouse is a named defendant, the spouse is named in the judgment itself, the underlying obligation is one determined to be a marital obligation, and either the property was expressly determined available to satisfy the obligation at the time the judgment was entered in the docket, or the property was acquired after that entry.

If a lien attaches this way to property that is exempt from execution and no execution has yet been issued, a person with an ownership interest in the property may seek a declaratory judgment if the judgment owner fails, within ten days of a demand, to execute a recordable release of the property from the lien.