On November 17, 2022, the Court of Appeals issued a decision in Federal Natl. Mtge. Assn. v. Jeanty, 2022 NY Slip Op. 06539, holding that making mortgage payments is an acknowledgement of a debt that restarts the running of the statute of limitations, explaining:
In this mortgage foreclosure action, plaintiff contends that Supreme Court erred in concluding that the complaint was untimely inasmuch as Maxi Jeanty (debtor) made four payments between August 2009 and March 2010 on account of the mortgage debt which were effective pursuant to General Obligations Law § 17-107 (1) to make the statute of limitations begin running anew on the date of the last such payment. We agree. Plaintiff met its prima facie burden on its motion, insofar as is relevant here, by submitting evidence that, after entering a Home Affordable Modification Trial Payment Plan (the Plan), the debtor made a total of seven payments from April 2009 through March 2010, each in an amount exceeding that of the regular installment payments required under the loan documents prior to the acceleration of the debt in August 2008. The first three payments were required pursuant to the Plan, but the remaining four were not. Those four payments established circumstances amounting to an absolute and unqualified acknowledgment by the debtor of more being due, from which a promise may be inferred to pay the remainder. In response, the Jeanty defendants failed to raise a triable issue of fact. Those defendants submitted no evidence which calls into question whether such a promise may be inferred from the debtor’s acknowledgement of the debt. Because the six-year statute of limitations began running anew in March 2010, the action was timely commenced in March 2015.
(Internal quotations and citations omitted)