I'm in UK; friend in US owes me substantial sum of money. WWYD?

In My Humble Opinion
21

OK, don’t laugh, but in all seriousness: Judge Judy.

In case you don’t know, Judge Judy is a television show where plaintiffs and defendants square off, and Judge Judy makes the final determination - up to $5,000.

However, the reason you should go on Judge Judy is because the producers pay the judgement - so even if your friend hasn’t got a nickel in his account, you could still get paid at least $5,000 of the money owed you! Certainly worth the price of an airline ticket to LA. You just need your “friend” to agree to at least go on the show with you and be honest. Bring any documentation you have, and chances are very good you will walk out of there with $5,000. Getting at least half the money back is better than nothing, and it might even be kind of fun to do.

Seriously - go the Judge Judy route - there is real money waiting to be paid out to you.

22

This is actually a really good idea. The OP would get $5k, the deadbeat gets his debt forgiven (since the show pays the judgment), and he gets a little dose of public (and televised!) humiliation. The only hitch would be getting his lazy ass to wherever they film the show. Judge Judy may film in LA, but I think Judge Pirro films in NYC. The OP could shop around her story to the various producers; there are at least three identical judge shows. Maybe one will even cover the guy’s airfare.

The only other hitch is determining how much of the 5k the OP would lose to American taxes.

I guarantee the producers would love this story for their show–British plaintiff, a strong whiff of sex and betrayal. This is gold!

23

I find the line “6000 in your money,” unusually humorous.

Whatever could that strange and mysterious symbol that looks like a squiggly L represent?

24

There are statute of limitations on securing a judgement, which I believe is 4 years in Florida. You’ve been taking the passive approach with the hope that he’ll just come around, and that needs to stop now or you won’t be able to recover the money at all.

Do you have proof other than a Skype conversation that this was a loan? If not, that would be my first order of business. Get him to acknowledge in writing that a loan exists, even if it’s just an email where he replies back that he doesn’t have any money now.

Then I’d contact a lawyer in Florida and ask how much it would cost you for him to represent you, and how you can avoid paying in person. You may still end up with nothing (you can’t get blood from a turnip) but if he holds a steady job, you may be able to garnish his wages.

What a mess.

25

IMHO, the only way to see any of the money is to stay friendly with the guy. If you sued him, you would spend a lot of money to get a judgment against him, which is just a debt of a different sort, and he would still have no aility to pay it. So, you’d be in the same spot you are in now except you will have spent money on a lawyer and have really pissed this guy off.
Just keep up that subtle and friendly persuasion. Maybe make up some money troubles to guilt the guy into “helping you out.”

26

This is my interpretation of the situation as well. If he was married at the time he was “comforting” the OP with sex, as the mention of the “soon-to-be-ex-wife” implies, that only makes it more likely in my mind that this man is an opportunist, who probably isn’t the best candidate for living up to his obligations and responsibilities.

27

It’s too bad the OP isn’t from South Korea - then she’d be owed 10 million in “her money”, and YaraMateo would probably be howling for the deadbeat’s blood.

28

I love the Judge Judy idea!

29

The cost of litigation to recover the money is going to be at least equivalent to the amount in question. Even if you were in the US, it would cost you a couple of grand just to get a judgment, let alone get it enforced. It’d cost you a couple grand more to engage a garnishment attorney.

YaraMateo’s post is almost indescribably douchey, but the underlying point is sound: don’t lend money to friends unless you don’t care about getting it back. I’ll add another: don’t lend money to people outside your jurisdiction if you do care about getting it back, at least not without sufficient collateral.

30

What about a collection agency? You could see if some collection agency is willing to buy the debt, for, say, $2000 USD and then you can get on with your life and let them harass your ex-bf.

31

She could aslo check the pockets of her jeans to see if she accidentally left, say, $1 million in them.

32

Rand has it right here. The only way the OP will ever see her money is by employing the exact same combination of social manipulation and guilt that extracted the funds in the first place.

The chances that pusuing a formal legal matter will be worth it, are slim to none.

33

In other words, the OP has a snowball’s chance in hell of getting a collection agency to buy a debt which may or may not actually be legally enforceable. Among the OP’s problems:

-Although the loan terms are in writing, the deadbeat friend didn’t sign anything, and under several scenarios a loan contract must be signed by the party against which it is to be enforced.

-It’s not clear from the OP what the governing law for this debt would be. Inter-country contracts are governed by the various UNIDROIT accords, but as far as I know there isn’t one for personal loan contracts. Under UK law, the contract was formed in the UK, assuming the OP was there when she received acceptance. Under Florida law, the contract was formed in Florida.

34

Hi again, folks. Thank you all for the advice which, as I said before, has really helped to straighten out my thinking. I think a well known phrase involving getting blood out of a stone really does apply here. There seems little point in running up legal fees, court costs etc when at the end of the day I’ll probably just have thrown good money after bad.

I am intrigued, though, by the Judge Judy suggestions. We do get the show over here, and it is one of my little guilty pleasures. And I have actually said to him at one point “Don’t make me end up dragging you onto Judge Judy”, but that was meant in jest. You see, I thought that all that would happen would be - after Judy ripping me a new one about not lending to friends, and calling him a loser, a user and a deadbeat - she would say “Judgement for the plaintiff in the amount of $10,000”, bang her gavel, and that would be it - I still wouldn’t get my money if he simply doesn’t have it. Anyone any more info (or even experience) of going down that route?

Another route I have suggested to him (which he has blatantly ignored) is that he, quite simply, borrows the money from somewhere else, notably his girlfriend. She wasn’t on the scene when all this transpired, but they’ve now been an item for over two years, and although they don’t live together she has declared her undying love for him on his Facebook wall. She is apparently in the $150K per year earning bracket (which he told me one evening with just a little bit too much glee, if you ask me). Is it unreasonable of me to push this angle further?

Oh, and just to clarify the timelines around the romantic versus financial entanglements:

August 1981: I meet him at a party in Edinburgh. We are both 17. Two years of stormy, angst-ridden teenage relationship ensues.
2001: Ah, the internet. I’d always wondered what happened to him. Tracked him down, he was living in London with wife and kid. One meeting and many emails over the next few years.
2005: He moves (with wife and kids) to US. (He was originally born in US, moved to UK when he was 11, kept US passport).
2006: He leaves his wife and kids.
November 2007: I email him that my marriage is ending. He immediately phones me and invites me over. I figure “what the hell”.
January 2008: My first visit to Florida, steamy stuff, much Skype ensues.
May 2008: Return visit to Florida. He asks for loan (by email) just prior to visit, we discuss while I’m there, I transfer money from my bank account to his on my return to UK.

For those that haven’t read the whole thread, I feel I must stress yet again that I 100% believed that this was a short-term loan until he got his Divorce settlement. This was not a sum of money he was going to struggle to pay back. Imagine if you had a friend who had, for example, just inherited their Father’s house, but couldn’t access the funds until the house was sold and all the paperwork was sorted. They are absolutely, definitely coming into a sum of money and just need short term help, or their current rent arrears would mean eviction. Would you still apply the “Don’t lend money you can’t afford to lose” adage, or would you help them out?

35

Threads like these remind me that ‘never loan money to a friend’ needs to be on the list of things I teach my kids.

Scougs, I am sorry you have had to learn this the hard way.

36

Hey Scougs, can I borrow some money? I’ll definitely have the money to pay you back in six months.

Has it ever occurred to you that he might be a liar? That he lied about the money he was supposed to receive, and never intended to pay you back? Odds are this guy is broke, but he might be lying about his financial situation just because he doesn’t want to pay you back.

You seem like a nice person who was taken advantage of by a not nice person. But, I think most people would agree that you were not close enough to this man to loan him such a large amount of money. I don’t suppose you’ll be making the same mistake again. It sucks to be screwed over by anybody, especially somebody you thought cared about you.

37

He wasn’t going to struggle to pay it back because he had no intention of paying you back.

Go to Judge Judy’s website and use the submit a case link.

38

Sigh. Yes, it has frequently occurred to me that he lied to start with. And that is more hurtful than you can imagine. Our relationship was a pretty intense one at that time.

I don’t think he’s lying now, though. He’s a freelance journalist, and I can search his byline and see how pathetically little work he’s getting.

Yes, I won’t be making the same mistake again, which is a shame for any friends of mine whobare honest, reliable, and may need financial help at some point.

39

I don’t want to sound like I’m coming down on you, because you haven’t done anything wrong. You did something nice, and as the saying goes, no good deed goes unpunished.

That said, as a rule of thumb people generally don’t have more money after divorces.

40

Well, my husband did. He got our second home, but because it was worth a lot less than our main home, I had to give him a pile of cash as well. Coloured my thinking somewhat. But I digress.

I suppose the fact I keep feeling the need to justify my actions speaks volumes. Gah. I’m getting angry now.