North Carolina Court Rules That Secured Lender Failed To Include Granting Language In Security Agreement

LexisNexis (March 24, 2020, 4:43 PM EDT) -- In a recent bankruptcy court decision from North Carolina, a secured lender was wiped out because it never obtained a security agreement that included a grant of a security interest by the debtor to the secured party (not just an affiliate). In In re Jarvis, 2020 Bankr. LEXIS 19 (Bankr. W.D. N.C. January 2, 2020), the debtor, Jacob Jarvis, sought to exercise his role as a hypothetical lien creditor under Section 544 of the Bankruptcy Code. Because the secured creditor did not have a security agreement which ran to it and contained a grant of a security interest, the debtor was able to avoid the creditor’s security interest under the strongarm clause....