Use This As a Guide to Create Your Own Business Plan

Use this as a guide to create your own Business Plan.

PREPARE

MAKE A PLAN ON HOW YOUR GOING TO GET TO THE TOP

AND DO IT!

This should not replace your “Goal Setting” outline

ABC Judgment Recovery

Business Plan

Date: Jan 1, 2012

Joe Sample —Owner

1.0 Executive Summary

ABC Judgment Recovery (ABC) will be a debt buyer of unpaid court judgments and the enforcer of judgment(s) won in small claims courts in and around southern California. The main areas will be the Los Angeles County, Orange County, and San Diego County court houses where judgments have been awarded to a plaintiff, but have not been satisfied.

A judgment is when a judge decides in favor of a plaintiff, or on rare occasions a defendant, ordering the losing party to pay a certain amount of money to the winner; this usually includes any fees that were required by the winner to pay. The winner of the suit then becomes the judgment creditor and the loser the judgment debtor. Payment arrangements are made in the courtroom with the entire conversation recorded and placed in the case file for permanent record. The debtor then pays as agreed and all is well.

But rarely does it occur this way. Approximately 80% of all judgments go unpaid or only partially satisfied. If the debtor doesn’t pay like agreed upon in court there is little the creditor can do. Very few know how to, or have the time, or resources to file more paperwork, and pay more fees to get the judgment satisfied.

This is where ABC comes in. A judgment can be bought or sold just like any other thing of monetary value. A judgment creditor can sell or assign his/her judgment to basically anyone. By having the judgment creditor sign an Acknowledgement of Assignment form and filing it with the court, the judgment then becomes property of ABC, and we now become the Assignee of Record in the eyes of the court and have the right to enforce the judgment to the fullest extent of the law.

The business plan will be part of ABC’s regular business planning process. It will be updated, at a minimum, annually. The business will be established and acting as a sole proprietorship.

So far to date, ABC, is in the research and development stage. It plans to start marketing for judgments, purchasing all necessary

equipment within the next 3 months.

The keys to success that have been identified are:

1.) Research. Finding cases that have not been satisfied in the courts are of the utmost importance. ABC will focus on judgments that are at least 6 months old to 3 years at the beginning.

2.) Marketing. Writing to the original Judgment Creditor and getting them to call in and inquire. Marketing campaigns will consist of targeting both individuals and businesses that have been awarded court judgments.

3.) Population. We will focus on smaller small claims judgments rather than larger civil judgments at the beginning. Civil judgments usually involve an attorney and may involve more detail in signing over the rights to ABC. The plaintiff’s address is usually not listed in the case file on larger judgments as many of these are litigated by attorneys, hired by the plaintiff.

4.) Referrals. There’s no better marketing than word of mouth. Once we become more established and people hear about who we are and what we do, we expect referrals to come in with increased frequency. Most likely they will be from businesses that we contact, such as rental complexes, dentists, lawyers/paralegals, rent-to-own furniture etc.

1.1 Objectives

ABC Judgment Recovery will start out as a part-time venture for the principal owner/founder Joe Sample. Co-Owner Mary Sample will also start out on a part-time basis.

Owner and Co-Owner plan to keep their full-time jobs at Bee Group and Wal-Mart respectively while getting ABC up and running. Owners have set the modest goal of matching the regular wages of Wal-Mart, currently at $1500 per month, while working part-time.

The wages and bonuses earned from Bee Group and any other income will primarily go to funding ABC.

Once the goal of $1500 per month has been earned for 3 strait months, Co-Owner will then leave employment from Wal-Mart and commit to the business full-time.

Owners fully expect first month or second month income to be minimal. Several reasons have been found to cause such delays:

1.) Part-time work. Researching case files will take a while to build up to a satisfactory amount of workable/enforceable inventory.

2.) The solicitation letters have about a 30-50% response rate. Not everybody will respond immediately. Could be months after initial contact. Situations change, things happen.

3.) Primary funding is from full-time job. But owner has other bills to pay to support current housing and family obligations.

4.) Lack of Knowledge. Learning how the court systems operate and their procedures will take time to learn. Just like any other job there is a learning curve.

ABC has set the goal of $1500 to be obtained by the month of July. No income is expected in February, March or April, as we will still be in the R&D stage. Also we will be purchasing any items needed to run the business sufficiently, and doing case file research and marketing. We fully expect by the end of April to be running day-to-day operations on a part-time basis.

1.2 Mission

ABC Judgment Recovery is a judgment enforcement company dedicated to collecting and enforcing unpaid court judgments. We will enforce judgments that have not been satisfied as seen in the eyes of the courts in primarily Los Angles, Orange, and San Diego Counties in the State of California.

Our purchase/assignment process we will be geared toward any person(s), or business(es), that has won a judgment and was awarded a monetary amount of at least $750 in a court of law.

Our marketing plan will initially include individual(s) and business(es) with unpaid judgments won in small claims courts. We intend to grow the business and establish ourselves as a leader in judgment enforcement in the southern California area.

As people and business discover our niche, we expect and intend the business will receive referrals to work off of. We expect to be register with the Better Business Bureau and conduct ourselves in accordance to their rules and regulations.

We will also conduct ourselves under the laws set forth by the State of California, any sister State and their local counties and municipalities, if we encounter a judgment there.

2.0 Company Summary

ABC Judgment Recovery is a newly created partnership business founded by Joe Sample. The partner is Mary Sample. Mr. Sample has wanted to open his own business for a while now. He has a background in collections which is kind of a sister field. This business plan will be the framework for getting the business underway and getting the service out to the public.

At this point, ABC is in the research and development stage with plans to get the appropriate licenses, paperwork, and approvals needed to start at the beginning, or middle of March.

2.1 Company Ownership

Joe Sample of Los Angeles, CA is currently the Owner and Founder of ABC Judgment Recovery. Mary Sample has a significant stake in ABC; however the amount is undecided at this point.

2.2 Company Locations and Facilities

The main company address will be a private mailing address located in the Los Angeles area. This type of address is commonly used for this type of business and helps to provide privacy of the true owner’s personal residence address.

ABC Judgment Recovery will be using a mailing address of 123 Main Street, #404 in Los Angeles, California 90210.

At this time, the actual business will be conducted from a home office inside the personal residence of Joe Sample.

3.0 Services

ABC Judgment Recovery is in the market of enforcing judgments. As previously stated our goal is to help the judgment creditor(s) that has not been able to collect monies due to them from the judgment debtor(s) by purchasing the judgment allowing us to enforce the court ordered judgment thereby providing us funds to complete the purchase agreement based on the true value of the judgment.

We will enforce judgments that have not been satisfied as seen in the eyes of the courts. We will search out judgments that have not been satisfied for at least 6 months to five years. Our expectations are to restore hope to those that have given up on collecting the debt that was owed to them, and that they worked so hard to get a judgment on.

When a judgment creditor contacts us we fully expect to get the rights of judgment assigned to us. The judgment creditor will never pay anything up front, except maybe a notarized signature on one of the court documents legally turning the judgment over to us, which costs about $ 10.00. To help offset this original cost incurred by the judgment creditor, ABC Judgment Recovery will present a purchase agreement in which an immediate $10 payment is promised to be paid to the judgment creditor (referred to as the Seller) within 10 days of receiving the signed documentation required to complete the purchase of the uncollected court judgment.

We make our money based on a percentage of what we collect from the judgment debtor. As of right now, our fee structure for single judgment holders is 50% of what we collect, no matter how old or large the judgment is. We have a sliding scale for multiple judgment holders, but we will always start the negotiations at 50% of what we collect, and we will never go below 35%. 50% has been discovered to be the industry’s standard. The smallest judgment that we will collect as of right now is $750. In California, the maximum for a small claims suit is $10,000. There may be exceptions that cause us to enforce a judgment smaller than $750. If that is the case we simply will negotiate for a larger percentage.

Judgments accrue interest from the day they awarded at the state’s simple rate. Currently, California’s rate is 10%, unless otherwise agreed upon by the parties in court. Newer judgments interest may not add up to much, but with older ones can get quite large.

A purchase agreement that states the terms will be sent to the judgment creditor and returned to ABC, signed. This purchase agreement will explain how the value of the judgment is being determined and outline how payments will be submitted to the “Seller” (the original judgment creditor).

Not all judgments that have been assigned to us will be collected. Even before the judgment is assigned to us, if we discover after preliminary checking that it is unwise to proceed in the enforcement of it, we will simply inform the creditor of our intentions not to proceed at the present time, but may resume in the future if we determine it to be prudent. But if we accept the assignment and then discover that at that time we cannot satisfy the judgment, then we will simply put it aside and try it again in 2-3 months to see if the debtor s situation has changed.

What we will be sending the judgment creditor when we deem it prudent to proceed is: (referred to as an AOA packet)

A cover letter, on ABC letterhead, providing clear instructions

An “Acknowledgment of Assignment”

A “Purchase Agreement”

A Debtor Information Sheet (DIS)

A Business Card

A description of our general procedures to enforce judgments follows.

We will go to a nearby small claims courthouse; pulling any and all small claims case files. We will look through those files looking for judgments that have not been satisfied or have been represented by an attorney. Any ones that we find, we will write the plaintiff’s information down. The required information needed from the court record is only the plaintiff’s name and address.

We then submit a solicitation letter to the plaintiff(s) describing and offering our services.

When the plaintiff(s) responds, we will conduct a 15-20 minute phone interview asking for some particulars on the uncollected court judgment. We will then provide the plaintiff with either our fax number or email address to send us a copy of the court judgment so we can proceed with a “no-cost, no-obligation” case assessment to determine if the judgment meets all the criteria needed to present a purchase offer to the plaintiff.

To eliminate on acquiring uncollected judgments that have high risk and poor outlook of being collected, we will provide a “no-cost, no-obligation” case assessment. This assessment will include a (4) point check of the following searches to be completed in-house by ABC:

1. Confirm Validity of Judgment: Review the date of the judgment to ensure the judgment has not expired per State law. Every state has laws relating the length that a judgment is valid for. Although, judgments can be renewed to extend this length, it is important to make sure each and every judgment ABC acquires in currently valid. This information can be located on the copy of the court judgment itself, which will be provided to ABC from the plaintiff and may also be verified by court record, if needed.

1. Confirm Ownership of Judgment: Confirm that the judgment has not been assigned or sold to another third party entity. This will be one of the questions asked during our initial phone interview with the plaintiff and again, could be verified by court record, if needed.

1. Bankruptcy Search: Confirm that the judgment debtor has not filed bankruptcy and discharged the debt. This search can be done several ways either by phone with an automated “voice case information system” ( or online by accessing “Pacer” (

1. Death Record Search: Confirm that the judgment debtor is not deceased. This search will be completed by performing a through “Google” search by judgment debtor name, any known addresses and phone numbers. ABC will also run the debtor through a death record search online with

Judgments that pass all 4 checks of the “case assessment” will be deemed worth going after. An AOA packet will be prepared and delivered to the judgment creditor (also known as the plaintiff) for immediate consideration and signature. Delivery of this AOA packet may be done via email, by regular first-class mail with the U.S. Postal Service or in person.

Once we receive the signed AOA packet back, we will complete the purchase agreement by submitting any promised immediate payment to the original judgment creditor (also known as the Seller) and file the signed “Acknowledgment of Assignment” with the appropriate court; the judgment is now ours to enforce as we see fit.

Before incurring any out-of-pocket costs on investigative fees on a file, we will send out a “demand” letter to the judgment debtor’s last known address informing him/her that the judgment is now ours and all communication must come through our office. We will also inform them that file has been suspended allowing them time to contact our office to see if a voluntary payment plan can be entered in lue of enforcing the judgment. We will provide time limits on the letter as well as all required language (Miranda) per Federal and State Laws.

If no contact is made from the judgment debtor, we will proceed and use our skip tracing techniques to find the debtor and decide which asset(s) would be easiest to go after to enforce the judgment.

Assets that we will regularly seize are:

Bank Accounts

Wages
House
Rental Property
Business Income
Vehicles
Personal Property
Business Property/ Equipment

Security Deposits

Property owed to our debtor

The easiest way to satisfy the judgment would be putting a levy on a bank account. But if that s not possible or they seem to be living paycheck to paycheck, garnishing wages would be the second choice of ABC. This is a much longer process, but will provide us with a residual income every month until the judgment is satisfied. We will first research to make sure that there are no garnishments currently on the debtor, or in line ahead of us. Usually only one can be in place on a debtor at a time. Visiting or contacting the county sheriff does this; where we will also look for any Writs of Execution, which tell the sheriff to levy on any assists owned by the debtor.

Then we will also look for any liens that have been placed against any property owned by the debtor, this is done at the Secretary of State s office. We will need to determine if there is enough equity in the asset(s) after any homestead exceptions, mortgages, and any prior liens are paid, if there is then we will place our own lien against the asset(s).

We will then file the appropriate forms with the courts. Every one of the legal actions that we can take against a debtor requires a fee to be paid to the suitable outfit. All of which is recoverable.

Next we will direct the county sheriff to seize the asset(s) of the debtor.

When the judgment has been satisfied in full, we will proceed to remove all liens and/or garnishments in place at the time, then file a Notice of Satisfaction with the appropriate court.

3.1 Sales Literature

Included in the appendix of this plan you will find copies of solicitation letters for individuals and business.