Unlike garnishment and garnishment of bank accounts, which in the case of non-governmental entities always require a personal judgment against the debtor by debt collectors, recovery can and usually does occur without any court action. Repos can sneak up and take your car in the dead of night, or flock to your home, with a law enforcement officer or your permission, and take a washing machine or other consumer goods without a warrant. How can this happen?
Recovery is a “contractual” right. That means that when you bought the item, you signed a contract that stipulated that the debt you incurred was a “secured” debt (secured by specific property, including the item you were buying, and sometimes other items as well). It also gave the seller the right to take the item back without suing him first if he stopped making payments. For non-governmental entities, if you didn’t give the company the right to take things, they are not allowed to do so without a court order, and doing so is criminal. Even if you owe them the price of the thing, the legal “title” or right to it stays with you until a court takes it away from you.
If a company seizes property without any contractual right to do so, it is called a “conversion.” If you have the right in general, but for some reason this right has not been perfected (for example, because you were not provided a contractually required waiting period), it is called “improper recovery.” Because recovery is sometimes done in secret by private individuals, the rules are generally quite strict that recovery agents cannot cause a “breach of the peace.” That is, they cannot hit you, or even touch you. They cannot use any kind of force at all. You don’t need to respect their command to “give them the keys” or get out of the way when they try to get away from your car. In many, if not all, states, any unwanted contact during a recovery is an assault and a breach of the peace that makes the recovery unlawful. Therefore, I used to advise my clients to block recovery agents with their bodies. It is questionable whether he has the right to initiate contact or defend the property in question with violence.
Of course, this rule changes if the repossessors bring the police with them. Repossession may be illegal, and police presence may also be illegal, but police presence itself is considered coercive, so you can sue for wrongful repossession without having to stand in front of the police.
After repossession, the company that has repossessed the property typically files an action in court to “restore” title to the property. In my experience, these actions are essentially never contested, but if for some reason the repossession was “wrongful,” that would generally be a defense to the transfer of title sought by lienholders.
Most states have very specific “redemption rights” for items that have been properly repossessed. You can find these for your state on Google, the term “right of redemption” and the object seized and the name of your state. These rights are usually expensive to invoke, as they typically provide for full payment of late payments in the contract plus various fees. But sometimes people have the means and the need to redeem their property from repossession agents. In most, if not all, states, you would have that right, which would normally be exercised by intervening in the court action brought by the company repossessing the property to restore title.
Repossession usually happens to the permanently willing, the poor, who often do not litigate to protect their rights. For this reason, even lien officers can be careless in their actions (or even indifferent to the law). This may give you the opportunity to avoid repossession or force the company to return the items to you.
