Nationstar Mortgage LLC v. Torrey Pines Ranch Estates Homeowners Association

CourtDistrict Court, D. Nevada
DecidedFebruary 19, 2021
Docket2:16-cv-00375
StatusUnknown

This text of Nationstar Mortgage LLC v. Torrey Pines Ranch Estates Homeowners Association (Nationstar Mortgage LLC v. Torrey Pines Ranch Estates Homeowners Association) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Nevada primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Nationstar Mortgage LLC v. Torrey Pines Ranch Estates Homeowners Association, (D. Nev. 2021).

Opinion

1 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 2 DISTRICT OF NEVADA 3 Nationstar Mortgage, LLC, Case No.: 2:16-cv-00375-JAD-BNW

4 Plaintiff

5 v. Order Granting Summary Judgment on Quiet-title Claims 6 Torrey Pines Ranch Estates Homeowners Association; NV Eagles, LLC; and Nevada 7 Association Services, Inc., [ECF Nos. 64, 67]

8 Defendants

9 10 Nationstar Mortgage, LLC initiated this quiet-title action to challenge the effect of the 11 2013 non-judicial foreclosure sale of a home on which it claims a deed of trust.1 The bank sues 12 the Torrey Pines Ranch Estates Homeowners Association (the HOA), who authorized the sale to 13 foreclose on its lien; the HOA’s foreclosure agent Nevada Association Services; and current 14 owner NV Eagles LLC, seeking a declaration that the foreclosure sale did not extinguish 15 Nationstar’s security interest. Nationstar and NV Eagles have filed competing motions for 16 summary judgment. I find that Nationstar is entitled to partial summary judgment in its favor 17 because its obligation to tender the superpriority portion of the lien is excused. So I grant 18 summary judgment on the quiet-title claims in favor of Nationstar, dismiss Nationstar’s 19 remaining claims and theories as moot, deny NV Eagles’s motion, and give NV Eagles until 20 March 5, 2021, to wind up its claims against third party defendant Lloyd Henderson. 21 22 23

1 ECF No. 25 (amended complaint). 1 Background 2 A. The foreclosure sale 3 Lloyd J. Henderson purchased the condominium home at 6217 Newkirk Ct. in Las 4 Vegas, Nevada, in 2007 with a $603,000 loan secured by a deed of trust.2 The home is located 5 within the common-interest community known as Torrey Pines Ranch Estates and governed by

6 its Declaration of Covenants, Conditions, and Restrictions and Reservation of Easements.3 The 7 Nevada Legislature gave homeowners’ associations a superpriorty lien against residential 8 property for certain delinquent assessments and established a non-judicial foreclosure procedure 9 to enforce such a lien in Chapter 116 of the Nevada Revised Statutes.4 After the assessments on 10 this home became delinquent, the HOA, through its agent Nevada Association Services, Inc. 11 (NAS), commenced non-judicial foreclosure proceedings on it under Chapter 116 in November 12 2010.5 13 When Nationstar’s predecessor-in-interest learned of the impending foreclosure sale, its 14 attorneys, Miles, Bauer, Bergstrom & Winters, LLP, sent a letter to the HOA through NAS. That

15 letter stated Miles Bauer’s position that the nine months of assessments predating the notice of 16 delinquent assessment comprised the superpriority portion of the association’s lien, but that it 17 was “unclear” based on the information available to Miles Bauer how much those nine months of 18 assessments were for this property.6 Whatever it was, Miles Bauer “offer[ed] to pay that sum 19

20 2 ECF No. 64-1 (deed of trust). 3 ECF No. 64-13. 21 4 Nev. Rev. Stat. § 116.3116; SFR Investments Pool 1 v. U.S. Bank (“SFR I”), 334 P.3d 408, 409 22 (Nev. 2014). 5 ECF Nos. 64-3 (notice of delinquent assessment lien); 64-4 (notice of default and election to 23 sell); 64-5 (notice of foreclosure sale). 6 ECF No. 64-6 at 6. 1 upon presentation of adequate proof of the same by the HOA.”7 Miles Bauer sent a second letter 2 a couple of weeks later, saying that it was familiar, based on communications on other 3 properties, with NAS’s belief that sending the bank a statement of the HOA’s account for the 4 property would violate the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), and Miles Bauer offered 5 a Nevada Real Estate Division Advisory Opinion on how to calculate the superpriority portion of

6 the lien.8 NAS didn’t respond to those letters, Miles Bauer never made a tender, and the 7 property was sold at foreclosure on May 31, 2013, to Underwood Partners, LLC for $40,000.9 8 Four months later, Underwood transferred the property to NV Eagles.10 9 B. The parties’ claims 10 As the Nevada Supreme Court held in SFR Investments Pool 1 v. U.S. Bank in 2014, 11 because NRS 116.3116(2) gives an HOA “a true superpriority lien, proper foreclosure of” that 12 lien under the non-judicial foreclosure process created by NRS Chapters 107 and 116 “will 13 extinguish a first deed of trust.”11 Nationstar brings this action to save its deed of trust from 14 extinguishment. It asserts claims for quiet title, breach of NRS 116.1113, wrongful foreclosure,

15 and injunctive relief.12 16 The statutory breach and wrongful foreclosure claims are pled as contingent ones that are 17 entirely dependent on the court determining that the HOA’s sale extinguished the deed of trust.13 18 19 7 Id. 20 8 Id. at 8. 21 9 ECF No. 64-10 (foreclosure deed). 10 ECF No. 64-12 (grant, bargain, sale deed). 22 11 SFR I, 334 P.3d at 419. 23 12 ECF No. 25 (amended complaint). 13 See id. at ¶¶ 59, 67. 1 Injunctive relief is not an independent cause of action—it’s a remedy for a true claim. Here, it is 2 pled as a pre-trial remedy in conjunction with Nationstar’s quiet-title claim,14 so I do not 3 construe it as a separate claim. The quiet-title claim is the type recognized by the Nevada 4 Supreme Court in Shadow Wood Homeowners Association, Inc. v. New York Community 5 Bancorp—an action “seek[ing] to quiet title by invoking the court’s inherent equitable

6 jurisdiction to settle title disputes.”15 The resolution of such a claim is part of “[t]he long- 7 standing and broad inherent power of a court to sit in equity and quiet title, including setting 8 aside a foreclosure sale if the circumstances support” it.16 For its part, NV Eagles asserts a quiet- 9 title counterclaim against Nationstar and a third-party quiet-title claim against Henderson, 10 seeking declarations that the foreclosure sale wiped out the interests of both parties and NV 11 Eagles took the property free and clear of their encumbrances.17 12 C. The competing summary-judgment motions 13 Discovery has closed18 and Nationstar and NV Eagles move for summary judgment— 14 Nationstar seeking judgment on its quiet-title claim only, and NV Eagles asking for judgment on

15 all claims, including its own.19 Nationstar offers three reasons why I must hold that the HOA’s 16 foreclosure sale did not extinguish its deed of trust: (1) its tender of the superpriority amount was 17 excused because NAS had a well-known policy at the time to reject Miles Bauer’s payments for 18

19 14 See id. at ¶¶ 69–75. 20 15 Shadow Wood Homeowners Ass’n, Inc. v. New York Cmty. Bancorp, 366 P.3d 1105, 1110– 1111 (Nev. 2016). 21 16 Id. at 1112. 22 17 ECF No. 6 (NV Eagles’s answer, counterclaim, and third-party complaint). 18 See ECF No. 47 (noting that discovery closed 8/20/2019). 23 19 ECF Nos. 64, 67. NAS has not participated in this action since mid-2016; Henderson has not responded. 1 only the superpriority lien amount; (2) unfairness plus a grossly inadequate sales price compel 2 the court to set aside the sale under the Nevada Supreme Court’s holding in Nationstar Mortg. 3 LLC v. Saticoy Bay LLC Series 2227 Shadow Canyon20; and (3) the statute under which this 4 HOA foreclosure sale occurred was unconstitutional.21 The HOA opposes the motion, arguing, 5 inter alia, that the facts of this case do not entitle Nationstar to have its tender excused.22 NV

6 Eagles also opposes the motion and filed its own summary-judgment motion.

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Nationstar Mortgage LLC v. Torrey Pines Ranch Estates Homeowners Association, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/nationstar-mortgage-llc-v-torrey-pines-ranch-estates-homeowners-nvd-2021.