A court judgment is the result of a civil lawsuit and dictates the amount the winning party may legally recover from the losing party. After a successful lawsuit, the plaintiff becomes a "judgment creditor" and often enjoys greater provisions under the law to collect the original debt the defendant owed.
Significance
After a judgment, a judgment creditor can file with the court for a writ of garnishment. A writ of garnishment allows the creditor to garnish the debtor's bank accounts or employee wages. Before putting a writ of garnishment into practice, however, the judgment creditor must know where the debtor works and banks.
Considerations
Some states, such as Pennsylvania, only allow forced collection through garnishment for certain creditors such as the federal government. Thus, private creditors may file a lawsuit and win a court judgment, but cannot use legal resources to collect the debt.
Effects
After a court enters a judgment into the county's public record, representatives of the credit bureaus will also record the judgment when doing public records searches. This results in the judgment appearing on the debtor's credit report for seven years or longer, depending on the amount of time the judgment is enforceable in his state of residence. Judgments hurt credit scores.
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