The Business Divorce Law Report
A recent amendment to New Jersey’s limited liability company law changes the rights of creditors seeking to collect a judgment from a member of a limited liability company, eliminating the creditor’s right to foreclose the member’s interest.
Foreclosure of LLC Member Interests Eliminated
This particular aspect of the Revised Uniform Limited Liability Company Act (RULLC) is one of the more controversial provisions of the newly enacted statute because it eliminated a key asset protection aspect of LLCs. Under the prior statute, a creditor’s right was limited to a “charging order.” The amendment to the statute simply restores the prior law.
Under most state limited liability company statutes, a creditor has the right obtain a charging order that provides that when an LLC distributes money to its members, the debtors share goes to the party holding the charging order. It only works if any money is actually distributed to the members.
The RULLC was based on a model act devised by the Uniform Law Commission and contained a provision that allowed judgment debtors to foreclose an interest under certain circumstances. What that meant was that if the judgment creditor was being paid, it had a right to seek a foreclosure of the interest, meaning that it would be sold at a judicial auction.