Texas Judgment Enforcement: 6 Things a Creditor Can Seize and 4 They Cannot

The Week After a Texas Judgment Is Signed

Texas collection has a specific rhythm, and it is not the one merchants expect from reading about other states. There is no single instrument a creditor’s lawyer signs that freezes everything at once. Instead there are three separate machines: a writ of execution that sends an officer to your property, a garnishment suit filed against your bank as a new defendant, and a turnover proceeding that puts a receiver between you and everything else you own. They run in parallel, they are filed by different clerks, and they have different deadlines.

The other thing to understand is that Texas is unusually protective of individuals and unusually indifferent to companies. The state constitution shields a paycheck absolutely and the homestead without any dollar limit, while the operating account of a small trucking company or restaurant is exposed to a routine writ. If the judgment names both your company and you personally as guarantor, you are living under two very different sets of rules at the same time.

The six categories below are ordered by how quickly they usually arrive. After them is a section on the four things a creditor cannot get to, which is where most of the useful conversation happens, because knowing what is off the table changes what a settlement is worth to both sides.

1. The Operating Account, Through a Separate Lawsuit

Garnishment in Texas is not a form. It is a new case. Under Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code §63.001(3), a writ of garnishment is available where the plaintiff has a valid, subsisting judgment and makes an affidavit stating that, within the plaintiff’s knowledge, you do not possess property in Texas subject to execution sufficient to satisfy it. Section 63.002 says the clerk of a district court, a county court, or the business court, or a justice of the peace, may issue the writ, with the business court added effective September 1, 2025.

Service is what locks the money. Section 63.003(a) provides that after service of the writ the garnishee may not deliver any effects or pay any debt to you, and subsection (b) makes any payment or delivery made in violation void as to the amount necessary to satisfy the plaintiff’s demand. Section 63.008 routes service on a bank through Tex. Fin. Code §59.008. Under Tex. R. Civ. P. 659 the writ commands the garnishee to answer at or before 10:00 a.m. on the Monday next following the expiration of twenty days from service, so your bank has an answer date and you have a window.

You are entitled to notice and to a fast hearing. Tex. R. Civ. P. 663a requires the defendant to be served with the writ, the application, the affidavits and the court’s orders as soon as practicable after the garnishee is served, with a bilingual warning displayed in at least twelve-point type on the face of the writ telling you your money has been frozen. Tex. R. Civ. P. 664a lets you move to dissolve or modify on any ground, and requires a motion on grounds other than personal property exemptions to be heard promptly and determined within ten days of filing.

2. Equipment and Rolling Stock, With You Choosing First

The writ of execution is the oldest tool in the box and the one that puts a constable in your yard. Tex. R. Civ. P. 621 provides that judgments of the district, county and justice courts are enforced by execution or other appropriate process, returnable in thirty, sixty or ninety days as the plaintiff requests. Rule 627 says the clerk issues execution after the expiration of thirty days from the signing of a final judgment, or thirty days from the order overruling a timely motion for new trial.

There is one accelerator worth knowing about. Rule 628 permits execution before the thirtieth day if the plaintiff files an affidavit that you are about to remove personal property subject to execution out of the county, or are about to transfer or secrete it to defraud creditors. Moving equipment in the weeks after a judgment is the single most reliable way to hand your creditor that affidavit, which is one more reason to route any asset decision through counsel rather than a dispatcher.

When the officer arrives, Rule 637 requires him to first call on you, or your agent in the county, to point out the property to be levied on, and the levy is made first on what you designate. If in the officer’s opinion your designation will not sell for enough, he can require more. Rule 639 makes a levy on personal property by taking possession where you are entitled to possession. Rule 643 confirms that goods already pledged or mortgaged can still be levied on and sold subject to the existing security interest, which is how a funder with a UCC-1 and a judgment ends up in front of everyone else.

3. Real Property, One County at a Time

A Texas judgment does not attach to land automatically. Under Tex. Prop. Code §52.001, a first or subsequent abstract of judgment, once recorded and indexed in accordance with the chapter and while the judgment is not dormant, constitutes a lien on and attaches to any real property of the defendant located in the county where it is recorded, other than property exempt from seizure under ch. 41 or the constitution. That includes real property acquired after the recording, so the lien reaches forward as well as back.

Section 52.002 lets the creditor’s own attorney prepare the abstract, verified by the preparer, rather than waiting for the clerk. Section 52.003 lists what it must show, including your birthdate, the last three digits of your driver’s license and social security numbers where available, the amount of the judgment and the balance due, and the rate of interest. Section 52.004 requires the county clerk to record it immediately and note the date and hour of receipt, which is what fixes priority against other liens.

Duration is where files get won. Under §52.006(a) a judgment lien continues for ten years following recording and indexing, and if the judgment becomes dormant during that period the lien ceases to exist. There is one exception at §52.006(b) for judgments in favor of the state or a state agency, which do not go dormant and whose liens run twenty years with a renewal option. A private funder does not get that. Whether the underlying judgment is still alive is a question you can answer from public records, and the answer is often no.

4. What Your Customers Owe You, and What They Learn

The same garnishment machinery that reaches a bank reaches anybody who owes your company money. The writ commands the garnishee to answer under oath what, if anything, it is indebted to you and was when the writ was served, what effects of yours it holds, and what other persons within its knowledge are indebted to you. That last clause is why a garnishment aimed at one customer sometimes produces a list of others.

The commercial damage is the part that outruns the dollars. A broker or shipper served with a garnishment writ learns that your company has an unsatisfied judgment, and learns it in a document from a court rather than a rumor. Under §63.003(a) that customer cannot pay you while the writ is live, and under §63.003(b) a payment made anyway is void as to the amount needed to satisfy the demand, so the safe move for your customer is to pay nobody. Receivables stop moving even where the garnishment ultimately fails.

For the customer, the exposure is real. Tex. R. Civ. P. 667 allows a default judgment against a garnishee who does not answer, for the full amount of the judgment against you plus interest and costs. Rule 668 allows judgment against a garnishee shown to be indebted to you. Rule 677 taxes costs, including reasonable compensation to the garnishee, against the plaintiff where the garnishee is discharged on its answer. None of that makes the phone call to your best account easier.

5. Your LLC Distributions, and Not One Thing Inside the Company

Where the judgment is against you personally and the asset is your membership interest, Texas gives the creditor a charging order and stops there. Tex. Bus. Orgs. Code §101.112(a) lets a court charge the membership interest of a judgment debtor member, and subsection (b) limits the creditor to the right to receive any distribution the debtor would otherwise be entitled to receive on that interest.

The three limiting subsections are the ones to know. Section 101.112(c) makes the charging order a lien that may not be foreclosed on under the code or any other law. Section 101.112(d) makes the charging order the exclusive remedy by which a judgment creditor of a member may satisfy a judgment out of that membership interest. Section 101.112(f) says a creditor of a member has no right to obtain possession of, or exercise legal or equitable remedies with respect to, the property of the limited liability company.

Since September 1, 2023, subsection (g) has applied all of that to single-member limited liability companies as well as multi-member ones, which closed the argument creditors had been making for years. The practical result is that a charging order against an operating company that does not distribute produces nothing, which is why sophisticated creditors treat it as a pressure device rather than a collection device, and why it usually shows up alongside a turnover motion rather than instead of one.

6. Anything a Receiver Can Reach, Which Is the Real Weapon

The turnover statute is where Texas collection actually happens. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code §31.002(a) entitles a judgment creditor to aid from a court, including a justice court, through injunction or other means, to reach property, including present or future rights to property, that is not exempt. Subsection (b) gives the court three tools: order you to turn over non-exempt property along with all documents and records related to it, apply the property to the judgment, or appoint a receiver with authority to take possession of it, sell it, and pay the proceeds over.

Two amendments made it considerably sharper. Since June 15, 2017, subsection (h) permits a court to enter or enforce a turnover order without identifying the specific property subject to turnover, which means a creditor no longer has to know what you own before it asks. And subsection (e) entitles the creditor to recover reasonable costs including attorney’s fees, so the motion is close to free for the funder and expensive for you. Subsection (c) backs the order with contempt.

The limits are genuine but narrow. Subsection (f) prohibits a court from entering or enforcing an order requiring the turnover of proceeds of, or the disbursement of, property exempt under any statute, including Tex. Prop. Code §42.0021 for retirement accounts. Subsection (g) provides that where property is held by a financial institution in your name as customer, a receiver’s rights do not attach until the institution is served with a certified copy of the receivership order in the manner specified by Tex. Fin. Code §59.008. And §31.0025 bars any order requiring turnover of wages before they are paid.

And 4 Things They Cannot Reach: Start With Your Paycheck

Article XVI, §28 of the Texas Constitution states that no current wages for personal service shall ever be subject to garnishment, except for the enforcement of court-ordered child support payments or spousal maintenance. That is not a dollar exemption or a percentage cap. It is a categorical bar, and it is the single largest difference between defending a judgment in Texas and defending one in almost any other state. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code §63.004 repeats it and directs that the garnishee be discharged as to any debt for current wages.

Two more provisions close the gaps. Tex. Prop. Code §42.001(b)(1) places current wages for personal services outside the aggregate personal property cap entirely, so wages do not consume any part of the $100,000 or $50,000 allowance. And §31.0025 provides that, notwithstanding any other law, a court may not at any time before a judgment debtor is paid enter or enforce an order requiring the debtor or anyone else to turn over the wages, in any form, including paycheck, cash or property. That was written to stop creditors from using the turnover statute to do what the constitution forbids.

Where it stops is the bank teller. The protection is for current wages, and a deposit that has cleared into your personal checking account is an account balance. A writ of garnishment can reach that balance, and your position then depends on what exemptions you claim and how quickly. If you draw a salary from your own company and a guaranty judgment exists against you personally, the account is the exposure, not the payroll run.

They Cannot Reach: The Homestead, and the Affidavit That Clears the Lien

Tex. Prop. Code §41.001(a) exempts the homestead from seizure for the claims of creditors except for encumbrances properly fixed on it, and §41.001(b) lists what can be fixed: purchase money, taxes, work and materials contracted for in writing under §53.254, an owelty of partition, a refinance of an existing lien, a home equity extension of credit meeting art. XVI, §50(a)(6), and a qualifying reverse mortgage. A judgment on a business guaranty appears nowhere on that list.

Size is set by §41.002. An urban homestead is not more than ten acres in one or more contiguous lots with improvements, used as a home or as both a home and a place to exercise a calling or business. A rural homestead is not more than 200 acres for a family or 100 acres for a single adult. Subsection (c) makes a homestead urban if it is inside a municipality or its extraterritorial jurisdiction or a platted subdivision and served by police protection, paid or volunteer fire protection, and at least three of electric, natural gas, sewer, storm sewer and water.

The abstract of judgment does not attach in the first place, because §52.001 excludes real property exempt under ch. 41 or the constitution. In practice the lien still clouds title, and §52.0012 gives you a way to clear it: record a homestead affidavit in substantially the statutory form together with a certificate of mailing, and send the creditor notice by registered or certified mail. If the creditor does not record a contradicting affidavit within thirty days after the certificate of mailing is filed, a bona fide purchaser or mortgagee may rely conclusively on your affidavit for a ninety-day period that begins on the thirty-first day.

They Cannot Reach: Retirement Money and Insurance Value

Tex. Prop. Code §42.0021(b) exempts a person’s interest in and right to receive payments from a qualified savings plan, whether vested or not, from attachment, execution and seizure, in addition to the ch. 42 personal property allowance and with no dollar cap. Subsection (a) defines the term expansively: employer, government and church plans, plans for the self-employed, simplified employee pensions, individual retirement accounts and annuities including inherited ones, Roth IRAs including inherited Roths, health savings accounts, Coverdell accounts, Texas prepaid tuition and savings trust accounts, any state’s §529 plan, and any state’s §529A ABLE program.

There are edges. Subsection (d) removes excess contributions under Internal Revenue Code §4973 and their earnings from the exemption. Subsection (e) protects amounts distributed from a plan for sixty days after distribution, and continues the exemption indefinitely if the amounts qualify as a rollover contribution. Subsection (f) excludes an unfunded, unsecured employer promise to pay deferred compensation. And §31.002(f) prohibits a turnover order that would require disbursement of property exempt under §42.0021, which forecloses the receiver route.

Life insurance is governed by a separate chapter and is broader than most people assume. Tex. Ins. Code §1108.051(b) makes insurance and annuity benefits, including the cash value and proceeds of a policy, fully exempt from garnishment, attachment, execution or other seizure, from application by any legal or equitable process to pay a debt of an insured or beneficiary, and from a demand in a bankruptcy proceeding. Section 1108.001 confirms these are in addition to the Property Code exemptions, and §1108.052 applies them regardless of who is named beneficiary.

They Cannot Reach: Property That Belongs to Somebody Else

The most common misconception we hear is that a judgment against the operating company reaches the owner, or that a judgment against the owner reaches the company. Neither is automatic. A judgment names parties, and enforcement reaches the property of the named judgment debtor. Where the creditor wants to cross that line it has to plead and prove something more, and that is a separate fight with its own evidence and its own cost.

On the company-to-owner direction, a personal guaranty is what usually supplies the missing link, so read who signed and in what capacity. On the owner-to-company direction, Tex. Bus. Orgs. Code §101.112(f) states plainly that a creditor of a member has no right to obtain possession of, or otherwise exercise legal or equitable remedies with respect to, the property of the limited liability company. That is why the charging order exists.

The same principle covers property in your possession that you do not own. Leased equipment, a customer’s goods in your warehouse, and a trailer titled to another carrier are not yours to lose. Tex. R. Civ. P. 637 gives you the first designation of what is levied on, which is the moment to say so, and Tex. R. Civ. P. 679b gives an individual judgment debtor a formal route to prove up a claim after the fact. If your personal exemptions are the live question, we take them apart on the Texas exemptions page.

How to Claim an Exemption Before Anything Is Sold

Texas added a formal procedure for this in 2022, and it is the most useful thing to happen to judgment debtors here in years. Tex. R. Civ. P. 679b implements Tex. Gov’t Code §22.0042 and applies whenever a post-judgment turnover order, an order appointing a receiver under §31.002, a writ of garnishment, a writ of execution or any other post-judgment order results in the freeze or seizure of personal property of an individual judgment debtor.

The creditor or receiver must serve you with the Notice of Protected Property Rights, the instructions, and the Protected Property Claim Form approved by the Supreme Court of Texas, within three business days after it has notice that your property has been frozen or seized. Rule 679b(b)(1) then bars the receiver or officer from selling the property or distributing proceeds for fourteen days after service, or seventeen if service was by mail.

File the form and the machinery stops. Under Rule 679b(c) the court must hold a hearing, and the receiver or officer must not sell or distribute until the court determines your claim. You carry the burden of proving the exemption and the value of the property, and a signed Protected Property Claim Form counts as a sworn statement that satisfies that burden if it is not challenged. The court must determine the claim within ten days of filing absent good cause, and if it finds the property exempt, it must order release within three business days.

Who Should You Call? Our Top-Rated Business Debt Firms

One firm on this list works the entire lifecycle of a business debt file, from stopping the daily debits through attorney-led negotiation, UCC lien removal, and a signed release. The other two cover broader debt categories that often sit alongside the advances. Choose accordingly.