Fraudulent Transfer & Conveyance Recovery
In Florida.

A debtor who moves assets out of their own name has not made your problem go away; they have changed its shape. Florida law lets a creditor claw back the transfer, reach the person who received the property, and put it back within reach of the judgment.

Undoing the transfers a debtor made so you would not get paid

You are owed money. You have a judgment, or you are about to get one. And somewhere between the day the debt went bad and today, the debtor's assets stopped being the debtor's. The building is in a sister's name. The trucks belong to a new LLC. The bank account that used to pay you is empty, and a different company at the same address is now cashing the checks.

That is a fraudulent transfer. Florida also calls it a fraudulent conveyance; the two phrases mean the same thing. This page is about what it is, why it matters to the money you are trying to collect, and how it gets undone.

What a fraudulent transfer is

A fraudulent transfer is a debtor moving property out of their own name so a creditor cannot reach it. The property does not have to leave town. It usually goes to a relative, a business partner, a friend, or a company the debtor controls, and the debtor keeps using it. What changes is the paperwork: the title, the deed, the membership interest, the account holder.

Florida law does not require you to prove the debtor sat down and planned it. Under Chapter 726 of the Florida Statutes, the Uniform Fraudulent Transfer Act, a transfer can be set aside in either of two situations. The first is a transfer made with actual intent to hinder, delay, or defraud a creditor. Courts look for what the statute calls badges of fraud: the transfer went to an insider, the debtor kept possession or control, it happened right after a demand or a lawsuit, the debtor was already insolvent or became insolvent because of it, and the debtor got little or nothing in return. The second situation needs no intent at all. If the debtor gave the asset away, or sold it for far less than it was worth, at a time when the debtor could not pay debts as they came due, the transfer is constructively fraudulent and can be undone on that basis alone.

Why this matters to your debt

A judgment is a court's ruling that the debtor owes you. It is not money. Money comes from assets, and every collection tool the court gives you, from garnishment to levy to a lien on real estate, only works against property that is still in the debtor's name. A debtor who has moved everything out looks, on paper, like there is nothing to collect. That is the point of the transfer.

Fraudulent transfer recovery is how a creditor claws the property back. When a court sets a transfer aside, the asset is treated as though it never left, and it becomes available to satisfy your judgment. Where the asset itself is gone, the person who received it can be held liable for its value. Either way, a debt that looked uncollectible becomes collectible again, and a debtor who believed the problem was solved learns that it is not.

The clock matters. For a transfer made with actual intent, a claim under Chapter 726 must generally be brought within four years of the transfer, or within one year of when it was or reasonably could have been discovered, whichever is later. A constructive fraudulent transfer claim carries the four-year limit. Assets that are hard to trace today are harder next year.

Just suppose

The following is an illustrative example, written to show how the process works. It is not a real client, a real matter, or a promise of any result.

Imagine you run a small container-drayage operation out of Little Haiti in Miami: two tractors, a rented yard, and a steady run between PortMiami and the warehouses along NW 79th Street. For fourteen months you hauled for a freight broker who paid slowly, then paid less, then stopped. When the balance hit $47,500 you sent a demand letter. Two weeks later you filed suit, and eventually you won a judgment for the full amount plus interest and costs.

Then the collection work began, and it went nowhere. The broker's company had no bank balance to garnish. The three box trucks it had owned were now titled to a new LLC formed the month after your demand letter, managed by the broker's brother-in-law. The small warehouse the broker used as an office had been deeded to that same brother-in-law for "ten dollars and other good and valuable consideration." The broker still parked there every morning.

That set of facts is the textbook fraudulent transfer, and Florida gives a creditor two ways at it. Under Chapter 726, a creditor can sue the brother-in-law and the new LLC directly to set the transfers aside: the transfers went to an insider, the timing tracks the demand letter, the debtor kept control, and nobody paid fair value. Under Florida's proceedings supplementary statute, section 56.29, the creditor can instead bring the brother-in-law and the LLC into the existing judgment case, without filing a new lawsuit, raise the Chapter 726 claims there, and ask the same court that entered the judgment to order the property back or hold the recipients liable for its value. For personal property, like the trucks, that went to a relative within a year before the lawsuit was served, the statute puts the burden on the debtor's side to prove the transfer was legitimate. In our example, the creditor uses proceedings supplementary, subpoenas the title records and the deed, and the brother-in-law, faced with explaining a ten-dollar warehouse under oath, settles for the trucks and a payment schedule secured by the property.

Different facts produce different outcomes. What stays constant is the sequence: find the transfer, prove it was not for value or was meant to defeat you, and bring the asset back within reach of the judgment.

How the recovery works in Florida

The work starts with information, not filings. The debtor's own testimony at a post-judgment deposition, the fact information sheet a Florida court can order a judgment debtor to complete, and subpoenas to banks, title companies, and county records usually tell the story. We are looking for the transfer, the recipient, the date, and what changed hands in return.

From there the path depends on the facts. A Chapter 726 action is a lawsuit against the recipient, available before or after judgment, and it can include an injunction to freeze the asset while the case is decided, the appointment of a receiver, or an order allowing execution directly against the transferred property. Proceedings supplementary under section 56.29 is faster where a judgment already exists, because the recipient is added to the case you already won. Where the asset has been moved through a series of companies, or offshore, the same principles apply and the investigation simply runs longer.

A recipient who paid fair value and did not know about the debtor's purpose has a defense, and the law protects that person up to what they actually paid. That is why proving the price, or the absence of one, is the center of most of these cases.

Common questions

Does the debtor have to be bankrupt or insolvent?

No. A transfer made with actual intent to defeat creditors can be set aside regardless of solvency. Insolvency matters for the constructive fraudulent transfer theory, where it substitutes for proof of intent.

The property went to the debtor's spouse. Can that still be undone?

Often, yes. A transfer to a spouse, child, parent, or business the debtor controls is a transfer to an insider, which is one of the strongest badges of fraud. The recipient's relationship does not protect the transfer; it usually helps prove the case.

What if the recipient has already sold or spent it?

The court can enter a money judgment against the recipient for the value of what was transferred. The asset does not have to exist in its original form for the creditor to recover.

How long do I have?

Generally four years from the transfer under Chapter 726, extended to one year after discovery for transfers made with actual intent. Proceedings supplementary is available for as long as your judgment is enforceable, but the one-year burden shift for personal property transferred to relatives runs from when the lawsuit was served. Waiting narrows every option.

The discipline behind the result

Fraudulent transfer recovery is investigative work followed by procedural work, and both have to be done exactly. We trace the transfer, document the badges, choose the statute that fits the facts, and pursue the recipient the same way we pursue everything, by the book, so the order holds up and the asset actually comes back. If you believe a debtor has moved property to keep you from being paid, the sooner we look, the more there is to find. Call (813) 288-1881.