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COURT SHOULD NOT HAVE CONVERTED THE MOTION TO DISMISS TO A MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT, BANK’S LETTER SEEKING TO REVOKE THE ACCELERATION OF THE MORTGAGE BEFORE THE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS FOR A FORECLOSURE ACTION RAN OUT WAS NOT DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE UPON WHICH A MOTION TO DISMISS COULD BE BASED (SECOND DEPT).

The Second Department, reversing Supreme Court, determined the bank’s (Citimortgage’s) motion to dismiss the plaintiff’s action to cancel and discharge a mortgage should not have been granted. The bank started a foreclosure action in 2009 and the statute of limitations expired on March 17, 2015. On March 13, 2015, the bank sent a letter to plaintiff purporting to de-accelerate the loan and re-institute the loan as an installment loan. The Second Department determined the motion to dismiss should not have been converted to a motion for summary judgment and the March 13, 2015, letter did not constitute documentary evidence sufficient to dismiss the complaint. There was no proof when the letter was mailed and it could have arrived after the statute of limitations expired:

Here, the Supreme Court should not have converted Citimortgage’s motion pursuant to CPLR 3211(a) to dismiss the complaint to one for summary judgment without providing “adequate notice to the parties” (CPLR 3211[c]…). None of the recognized exceptions to the notice requirement is applicable here. No specific request for summary judgment was made by any party, the parties did not deliberately chart a summary judgment course, and the action did not exclusively involve issues of law which were fully appreciated and argued by the parties … . …

“In order for evidence submitted in support of a CPLR 3211(a)(1) motion to qualify as documentary evidence,’ it must be unambiguous, authentic, and undeniable. Judicial records, as well as documents reflecting out-of-court transactions such as mortgages, deeds, contracts, and any other papers, the contents of which are essentially undeniable, would qualify as documentary evidence in the proper case. However, neither affidavits, deposition testimony, nor letters are considered documentary evidence within the intendment of CPLR 3211(a)(1)” … . Furthermore, “[a] lender may revoke its election to accelerate the mortgage, but it must do so by an affirmative act of revocation occurring during the six-year statute of limitations period subsequent to the initiation of the prior foreclosure action”… . Soroush v Citimortgage, Inc., 2018 NY Slip Op 03724, Second Dept 5-23-18

​FORECLOSURE (COURT SHOULD NOT HAVE CONVERTED THE MOTION TO DISMISS TO A MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT, BANK’S LETTER SEEKING TO REVOKE THE ACCELERATION OF THE MORTGAGE BEFORE THE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS FOR A FORECLOSURE ACTION RAN OUT WAS NOT DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE UPON WHICH A MOTION TO DISMISS COULD BE BASED (SECOND DEPT))/CIVIL PROCEDURE (DISMISS, MOTION TO, COURT SHOULD NOT HAVE CONVERTED THE MOTION TO DISMISS TO A MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT, BANK’S LETTER SEEKING TO REVOKE THE ACCELERATION OF THE MORTGAGE BEFORE THE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS FOR A FORECLOSURE ACTION RAN OUT WAS NOT DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE UPON WHICH A MOTION TO DISMISS COULD BE BASED (SECOND DEPT))/DISMISS, MOTION TO (CIVIL PROCEDURE, COURT SHOULD NOT HAVE CONVERTED THE MOTION TO DISMISS TO A MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT, BANK’S LETTER SEEKING TO REVOKE THE ACCELERATION OF THE MORTGAGE BEFORE THE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS FOR A FORECLOSURE ACTION RAN OUT WAS NOT DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE UPON WHICH A MOTION TO DISMISS COULD BE BASED (SECOND DEPT))/DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE (DISMISS, MOTION TO, COURT SHOULD NOT HAVE CONVERTED THE MOTION TO DISMISS TO A MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT, BANK’S LETTER SEEKING TO REVOKE THE ACCELERATION OF THE MORTGAGE BEFORE THE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS FOR A FORECLOSURE ACTION RAN OUT WAS NOT DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE UPON WHICH A MOTION TO DISMISS COULD BE BASED (SECOND DEPT))/CPLR 3211 (COURT SHOULD NOT HAVE CONVERTED THE MOTION TO DISMISS TO A MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT, BANK’S LETTER SEEKING TO REVOKE THE ACCELERATION OF THE MORTGAGE BEFORE THE STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS FOR A FORECLOSURE ACTION RAN OUT WAS NOT DOCUMENTARY EVIDENCE UPON WHICH A MOTION TO DISMISS COULD BE BASED (SECOND DEPT))

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