Collecting a Judgment in Washington: The Ten-Year Clock and the Ninety-Day Window

How long does a Washington judgment last?

Ten years. You have that long to issue an execution, a garnishment, or other legal process to collect or enforce, counted from entry of the judgment or from the filing of the judgment in this state. RCW 6.17.020(1).

Then it stops. Ten years after the date of entry the judgment ceases to be a lien or charge against the estate or person of the judgment debtor, and no suit, action or other proceeding may ever extend the lien past that, except as the statute itself provides. RCW 4.56.210(1). Judgments for accrued child support and for obligations imposed in a criminal sentence run on their own clocks. RCW 6.17.020(2), (4).

What has to be done before the ten years runs out?

This is the one thing on this page worth a calendar reminder. Within 90 days before the original ten-year period expires, the judgment holder may apply to the court that rendered the judgment, or to the court where it was filed as a foreign judgment, for an order granting an additional 10 years in which process may issue. RCW 6.17.020(3).

It is a window, not a deadline. The statute describes it in one direction, as the ninety days before the original period expires, and timeliness is one of the few things the court reviews. After the ten years there is nothing left to extend, because RCW 4.56.210(1) has already ended the lien and barred any proceeding to continue it.

The debtor has little to say about the application. It is granted as a matter of right, subject to review only for timeliness, full or partial satisfaction, or errors in the judgment summary amounts. RCW 6.17.020(3). It is not an occasion to relitigate the case. The order carries an updated judgment summary, and the filing fee is a recoverable cost.

The lien follows, and the trigger date can move

Extend the judgment and the lien continues for another ten years. RCW 4.56.210(3). Perfection and priority are not altered and nothing has to be rerecorded, though a judgment transcribed to other counties stays perfected there only if a certified copy of the extension order is filed with each of those clerks. RCW 6.17.020(6).

A district court judgment transcribed to superior court is the trap. The original district court judgment is not extended, and the petition goes to the superior court within 90 days before the ten years expires, measured from the date the transcript was filed there rather than from the district court judgment. RCW 6.17.020(3).

There is also an outside limit, and one extension reaches it. Subject to the exceptions the statute names, no judgment is enforceable for more than 20 years from entry in the originating court. RCW 6.17.020(7).

Does the judgment accrue interest while I wait?

Yes, and the rate depends on what kind of judgment it is. RCW 4.56.110 sets out categories rather than one number, so the first question is which category yours falls in.

A judgment founded on a written contract that provides for the payment of interest until paid at a specified rate bears interest at the contract rate, but only if that rate is set forth in the judgment. RCW 4.56.110(1). That proviso is worth checking against the face of your own judgment before assuming the contract rate is running.

Two categories are flat: twelve percent on unpaid child support, RCW 4.56.110(2), and nine percent from entry on a judgment for unpaid consumer debt as that term is defined in RCW 6.01.060. RCW 4.56.110(5).

Two are formulas against a published index. A judgment founded on the tortious conduct of individuals or other entities, and a judgment for unpaid private student loan debt, each bear interest from entry at two percentage points above the prime rate published by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System on the first business day of the month preceding entry. RCW 4.56.110(3)(b), (4). Where the tortious conduct is that of a public agency the formula is instead two points above the equivalent coupon issue yield on twenty-six week treasury bills, taken from the first bill market auction in the month preceding entry. RCW 4.56.110(3)(a).

Everything else takes the residual rule, which is a pointer and not a number: the maximum rate permitted under RCW 19.52.020 on the date of entry. RCW 4.56.110(6). And where a verdict was reinstated or affirmed on review, interest dates back to the date of the verdict rather than the date of entry. RCW 4.56.110(3), (6).

How does a judgment become a lien on the debtor's real property, and where?

The debtor's real estate, including land the debtor acquires later, is bound to satisfy a judgment of a Washington superior court, district court, Court of Appeals or Supreme Court, or of a federal district court sitting in this state, unless the land is exempt by law. The judgment is a lien on it for up to ten years from entry. RCW 4.56.190.

Where the lien attaches is what creditors get wrong. A superior court judgment is a lien on the debtor's land in that same county from the time the county clerk files it on the execution docket. RCW 4.56.200(2). For land in a different county, and for judgments of the Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court, or a federal court sitting elsewhere, the lien runs only from the filing of a duly certified abstract of the judgment with the county clerk where the land is. RCW 4.56.200(3). A district court judgment gets there by its own route. RCW 4.56.200(4), (5).

So a judgment entered in Spokane County does nothing at all to the debtor's forty acres in Klickitat County until an abstract is filed with the Klickitat County clerk. If the debtor owns land in three counties, perfecting the lien is a three-county errand.

What the lien does not reach

Personal property is not covered. It is held only from the time it is actually levied upon. RCW 4.56.190. And where the debtor owns land jointly or in common with someone else, the lien reaches the debtor's interest only, and only that interest can be levied on and sold. RCW 4.56.190; RCW 6.17.170.

What does filing a judgment from another state actually do?

It puts the judgment on a Washington docket and makes it enforceable here as though a Washington court had entered it. An authenticated copy of the judgment may be filed with the clerk of any superior court in any county of this state, and the clerk treats it in the same manner as a judgment of a Washington superior court. RCW 6.36.025(1). A foreign judgment, for this purpose, is any judgment, decree or order of a court of the United States or of any state or territory that is entitled to full faith and credit here. RCW 6.36.010(1).

The equivalence is close to complete. A judgment so filed has the same effect as a Washington superior court judgment, carries the same defenses and the same proceedings for reopening, vacating, staying or extending, and may be enforced, extended or satisfied the same way. RCW 6.36.025(1). There is also a district court route, RCW 6.36.025(2), and either way the lien is governed by chapter 4.56 RCW and RCW 6.17.020, RCW 6.36.025(3), so the ten years and the ninety-day window apply to it too.

You are not required to use the chapter. It carries a section headed "Optional procedure," which leaves unimpaired the creditor's right to bring an action to enforce the judgment instead of proceeding under the chapter. RCW 6.36.160. Filing is the quick route, not the only one.

Interest on a filed foreign judgment follows the law of the state where it was rendered, not the Washington schedule below, and the court adds the cost of the authenticated copy and Washington court costs. RCW 6.36.140.

What has to be filed with it, and what can the debtor do about it?

Two documents and a short wait stand between the filing and any enforcement. At the time of filing, the creditor or the creditor's lawyer files an affidavit with the clerk giving the name and last known post office address of the debtor and of the creditor, and the filing and expiration date of the judgment in the originating jurisdiction. RCW 6.36.035(1).

Promptly after that, the creditor mails the debtor notice of the filing at the address given, with the creditor's name and address and that of the creditor's lawyer in this state if there is one, and files proof of mailing with the clerk. RCW 6.36.035(2). No process issues until a period measured from the proof of mailing has run, which is ten days in superior court and fourteen in district court. RCW 6.36.035(3)(a), (b). Until the affidavit and the mailing are done and on file, the period that has to elapse before you can enforce has not begun.

Filing here also does not buy time the judgment no longer has at home. Nothing in that section extends the expiration date of a foreign judgment beyond its expiration date under the law of the jurisdiction where it originated. RCW 6.36.035(3)(c). The affidavit is where the court reads that date, which is why the statute asks for it.

What the debtor can raise

Because the filed judgment carries the same defenses and the same proceedings for reopening, vacating or staying as a Washington judgment, RCW 6.36.025(1), the filing opens a Washington case. If the debtor shows an appeal is pending or will be taken, or that a stay of execution was granted, the court shall stay enforcement until the appeal ends or the stay lapses, on proof the debtor has furnished the security the rendering state required. RCW 6.36.045(1)(a). The debtor may also show any ground on which a Washington judgment would be stayed, and get a stay on the same security required here. RCW 6.36.045(1)(b).

What is execution, and how does it issue?

Execution is the process that turns a judgment into a seizure. Within the ten years the holder may have an execution, a garnishment, or other legal process issued to collect or enforce the judgment. RCW 6.17.020(1). Execution produces a writ, the writ goes to the sheriff, and the sheriff is required to execute it without delay. RCW 6.17.160.

How the sheriff levies depends on what is being taken, and the statute prescribes a method for each kind of property. Real property is levied on by recording a copy of the writ, with a description of the property, with the recording officer of the county where the land is. RCW 6.17.160(1). Personal property capable of manual delivery is levied on by taking it into custody, and where it may be concealed in a building the sheriff may publicly demand delivery and, if the order of execution so directs, cause the building to be broken open. RCW 6.17.160(2).

Money held in court and intangible property each have their own method again. RCW 6.17.160(4), (7). A writ pointed at the wrong category is the usual waste. On a judgment filed under chapter 6.36 RCW, sale under the levy may be held any time after final judgment and not earlier, apart from perishable goods. RCW 6.36.130.

Garnishment of wages or of a bank account is the other common way a judgment gets enforced. It runs on its own statute, chapter 6.27 RCW, and how a writ of garnishment is obtained, served and answered is a subject in itself that this page does not take on.

How do I find out what the debtor owns?

Chapter 6.32 RCW is the part of this most judgment holders have never heard of, and it is usually worth more than a speculative writ. At any time within ten years after entry of a judgment of twenty-five dollars or more, unless the time has been extended under RCW 6.17.020(3), the court may on the creditor's application order the debtor to appear before the judge, or a referee the judge appoints, and answer concerning the judgment. RCW 6.32.010(1). The tool lives inside the same ten years as everything else here, and rides the same extension.

There is a cheaper paper version. The court may instead order the debtor to answer written interrogatories under oath in a form the court approves, and taking that route waives nothing, because a creditor who uses it keeps the right to an examination in person. RCW 6.32.015.

It reaches past the debtor, which is the provision worth the most. Once an execution has issued and come back wholly or partly unsatisfied, any person or corporation can be ordered in and examined on proof that they hold personal property of the debtor worth twenty-five dollars or more, owe him that much, hold title to real estate for him, or simply have knowledge concerning his property interests. RCW 6.32.030. That last clause is wide, and it is how a creditor gets to question a bank, an employer, a bookkeeper or a business partner under oath.

The judge can also stop the property moving while this happens. An injunction order may restrain any person or corporation, party to the proceeding or not, from transferring, disposing of or interfering with the debtor's property, or with the particular property or debt someone has been called to be examined about, and it can issue at the same time as the examination order. RCW 6.32.120.

What you learn can be turned into money in the same proceeding. On affidavit proof that someone owes the judgment debtor, the judge may permit that person to pay the sheriff on account of the debt, up to the amount that will satisfy the execution, and may then direct the sheriff to apply it on an execution in the creditor's favor. RCW 6.32.070; RCW 6.32.100.

Appearing is not optional. A person who refuses, or without sufficient excuse neglects, to obey an order of the judge or referee or to attend on a subpoena may be punished as for contempt. RCW 6.32.180. A creditor who has served these proceedings is entitled to costs of service, notary fees and a twenty-five dollar appearance fee, plus reasonable attorney fees if the debtor fails to answer or appear. It runs both ways, and a creditor who starts the proceeding and then does not show up owes the appearing debtor the same. RCW 6.32.010(3).

What the chapter does not do is widen what you can take. It does not authorize seizure of, or interference with, property expressly exempt by law from levy and sale, property held in trust for the debtor where the trust was created by or funded from somebody other than the debtor, or the debtor's earnings for personal services to the extent they would be exempt against a garnishment of the employer. RCW 6.32.250.

What does the debtor get to keep?

A good deal, and a creditor who has not worked this out before paying a sheriff is budgeting on a number that does not exist. The lien statute binds only real estate that is not exempt by law, and Washington exempts a lot.

The homestead

The homestead is the real or personal property the owner, or a dependent of the owner, uses as a residence, and it has to be actually intended or used as the principal home. RCW 6.13.010(1). A mobile home can qualify whether or not it is affixed to the land and whether or not the lot belongs to the owner.

The exempt amount is not a flat number, and this is the part worth reading slowly. The homestead exemption amount is the greater of $125,000 or the county median sale price of a single-family home in the preceding calendar year. RCW 6.13.030(1). In a county where that median is above $125,000, the median is the exemption. A court determining it uses data from the Washington Center for Real Estate Research, or from a successor entity designated by the Office of Financial Management. RCW 6.13.030(2). There is also one narrow case with no dollar limit at all, involving another state's judgment for unpaid income tax on retirement benefits received while the person lived in Washington. RCW 6.13.030(1)(c).

Up to that amount, and except in the cases below, the homestead is exempt from attachment and from execution or forced sale for the owner's debts, and it is presumed valid to the extent of everything claimed until a creditor contests it. RCW 6.13.070(1), (4).

So the lien on a residence works differently from the lien described earlier. A judgment against the owner of a homestead becomes a lien on the value of the homestead property in excess of the homestead exemption, and it does so from the time the judgment creditor records the judgment with the recording officer of the county where the property is located. RCW 6.13.090. Equity below the exemption is not reachable, and the recording is what starts the lien on what is above it.

The exemption does not apply at all against judgments on certain debts, which is where a creditor sometimes has more room than it expected. Among them are construction, labor, material supplier and vendor liens against that same property, debts secured by a mortgage or deed of trust on it, child support and maintenance obligations, and association liens. RCW 6.13.080.

Personal property

Chapter 6.15 RCW exempts a list of personal property from execution, attachment and garnishment. RCW 6.15.010(1). The items that matter in most collections are household goods, appliances, furniture and home and yard equipment up to $6,500, a motor vehicle up to $15,000, and the tools, instruments, materials and supplies of a trade up to $15,000. Wearing apparel is exempt outright, with a $3,500 ceiling on furs, jewelry and personal ornaments.

Then there is a general allowance for other personal property, outside bankruptcy, of up to $3,000, and the cash inside it is capped much lower. Of that $3,000, bank accounts, savings and loan accounts, stocks, bonds and other securities are limited to $500 for most debts, $2,000 where the debt is consumer debt, and $2,500 where it is private student loan debt. RCW 6.15.010(1)(d)(iii)(A). Part of each of those is automatically protected, which means a levy or a garnishment does not reach it even if the debtor claims nothing. Beginning July 1, 2027, those figures are adjusted and published every three years by the Department of Revenue to track the consumer price index for all urban consumers, rounded to the nearest $25. RCW 6.15.010(1)(d)(iii)(B).

Retirement money is close to untouchable. A pension from the federal government, and the right to a pension, annuity, retirement allowance, disability allowance or death benefit under an employee benefit plan, along with any fund created by such a plan, are exempt from execution, attachment, garnishment or seizure under any legal process whatever. RCW 6.15.020(2), (3). An employee benefit plan is treated as a spendthrift trust regardless of whether the debtor could withdraw from it. RCW 6.15.020(5). The exceptions are child support collection actions and certain state tax collection.

Two definitions do real work here. Value means the reasonable market value of the debtor's interest, exclusive of liens and encumbrances, so a financed car counts only for the equity in it. And each spouse is entitled to the exemptions separately, which means the figures above can double. RCW 6.15.010(2), (3).

How the claim gets made, and how a creditor tests it

The debtor selects the exempt property, not the sheriff and not the creditor. RCW 6.15.060(1). A debtor claiming personal property exempt against an execution delivers to the levying officer, before sale, an itemized list of the property claimed exempt together with an itemized list of everything he owns, verified by affidavit, and the officer tells the creditor. RCW 6.15.060(3)(a).

The creditor then has seven days. A creditor who wants to object must give notice of the objection to the officer no later than seven days after the officer gave notice of the claim, or may instead demand an appraisement of the property. If those seven days pass with neither, the officer releases the claimed property to the debtor. RCW 6.15.060(4).

Against a garnishment the claim runs on a different track and a tighter clock. RCW 6.15.060(3)(b). The debtor may claim the exemption in the manner the statute creating it specifies, or by delivering or mailing a claim of exemption to the clerk of the court that issued the writ and mailing a copy to the creditor, no later than twenty-eight days after the date stated on the writ. RCW 6.27.160(1). A creditor wanting to object then has seven days from receiving the claim to serve a declaration of the facts behind the objection together with notice of a hearing, and that hearing must be noted for a date no later than fourteen days after the claim arrived. RCW 6.27.160(2).

That hearing carries a cost risk in both directions. The court shall award costs to the prevailing party and may award an attorney fee if it concludes that the exemption claim, or the objection to it, was not made in good faith, and the debtor carries the burden of proving the exemption, including documenting the source and amount of the funds. RCW 6.27.160(2). A creditor who decides not to object has ten days from receiving the claim to obtain and deliver a release to the garnishee, and failing to do that exposes it to fifty dollars on top of the debtor's actual damages. RCW 6.27.160(3).

Where this goes wrong

The judgment runs out of time while nobody is counting. This is the big one. The file goes in a drawer because the debtor has nothing worth chasing, and the ninety-day window opens and closes years later with nobody looking at it. No court sends a reminder. The creditor who calls in year eleven because the debtor finally bought a house is calling about a judgment that is no longer a lien or charge against him.

A sister-state judgment is filed with nothing beside it. The authenticated copy goes to the clerk and that is treated as the whole job, with no affidavit, no notice mailed to the debtor and no proof of mailing. Since no process issues until ten days after the proof of mailing is filed, a bare filing is a judgment sitting on the docket that cannot be enforced, usually discovered when the writ is refused.

The extension goes to the wrong court, or is measured from the wrong date. For a district court judgment transcribed to superior court the petition belongs in the superior court and runs from the transcript date. A wrong trigger date costs the same as having filed nothing.

The lien is assumed to cover land wherever the debtor owns it. It does not, until a certified abstract is filed with the county clerk where that land is.

The house is treated as equity worth chasing before anyone has done the homestead arithmetic. The judgment reaches only the value above the exemption, and in a county where the median sale price is high there may be nothing above it at all.

Nobody finds out what the debtor owns. Every method of levy presupposes that you know which asset you are pointing the sheriff at, and chapter 6.32 RCW exists so that a creditor does not have to guess at it. A judgment, a willing sheriff and no asset information produce a bill and nothing else.

What a lawyer does here

Most of it is dates and filings in the right order, and the dates are not where people assume. The ten years runs from entry for a judgment rendered here, and from the filing date for one filed here out of another state. A district court judgment moved up to superior court runs from the transcript date instead. Getting the trigger right is what makes the ninety-day window findable, and the window gets docketed years before anyone would otherwise open the file.

On the foreign judgment side the order of operations is the work: the authenticated copy, the affidavit carrying the originating dates, the mailed notice, the proof of mailing, then the wait counted from the right document. On the enforcement side it is working out which asset is actually reachable and by which method, and valuing the judgment as it stands today rather than as entered, since partial satisfaction is one of the few things a court looks at on an extension.

I am an independent attorney in downtown Spokane, at 601 W. 1st Ave., Suite 1400. My practice is civil litigation, real estate, land use, and business and regulatory work, and judgment collection and enforcement is handled alongside it, in Washington superior and district courts, most often in Spokane, Klickitat, Kittitas, Benton, Franklin and Yakima counties. I am admitted in Washington, WSBA #55307, and in Oregon, OSB #242384, which is directly relevant here, because judgments cross that state line in both directions. I represent clients throughout Washington.

If you are holding a judgment that has not been collected

If you are holding a Washington judgment and do not know how much time is left on it, or you have a judgment from another state against someone who is now here, my office offers a free initial consultation by appointment in downtown Spokane. Bring the judgment itself, or the county and the cause number, and the date it was entered, because that date is where every other answer starts.

Disclaimer

This article is general information about Washington law, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Law changes, and how it applies depends on facts specific to your situation. If you have a question about your own circumstances, speak with a lawyer.