PALM BEACH COUNTY — A foreclosure filed by Citimortgage Inc. on a Florida couple's property has been sent back to a lower court by the 4th District Court of Appeal, according to the May 31 opinion.
The appeals court affirmed the foreclosure judgment in Angela Panosyan and Sergey Panosyn’s appeal against the bank's foreclosure case. But it did not agree with the lower court when it came to the amount the Panosyans owed on the foreclosure.
The plaintiffs fought the trial court’s ruling to grant Citimortgage the foreclosure.
In the opinion, the appeals court reversed and remanded evidence for the amounts the plaintiffs owe in interest and escrow.
“Those awards were not proven by competent substantial evidence," the opinion states.
Citimortgage requested $258,213.36 in damages. The amount includes the principal balance, interest and the escrow advanced balance. The bank attempted to provide evidence of the amount owed when it presented two loan payment histories on its behalf. It subsequently had a witness read the proposed judgment that was not submitted into evidence.
The appeals court ruled that the principal balance in the final judgment did have enough evidence to support the amount. It credited the loan payment history as sufficient. But when it came to the interest and the escrow advance awards, the court said the bank failed to prove the amounts.
Therefore it reversed and remanded the judgment to “properly establish the correct amount due and owing.”
The court used Hovannesian v. PennyMac Corp., a 2016 case from the 4th District Court of Appeal, and Peuguero v. Bank of Am. in the appeals court from 2015 to prove its case when it came to its decision to pause it until the exact amount owed could be displayed with sufficient evidence.