It is the same subtraction that produces a surplus, run in the other direction: the judgment, minus what the sale brought in. But where surplus is arithmetic the clerk performs, a deficiency is something a court has to be asked for and may simply decline to enter. Section 702.06 puts it in the sound discretion of the court, and caps it on an owner-occupied home at the judgment minus what the property was actually worth — not at what it sold for.
There are two numbers here, and almost every page on the internet shows only the first. One is what the subtraction from the bid suggests a lender could ask for. The other is the ceiling section 702.06 puts on an owner-occupied residential deficiency. The gap between them is the whole point.
Section 45.031(8) is quoted constantly, almost always to argue that the bid settles what the property was worth. Read the whole subsection and it says close to the opposite.
“The amount of the bid for the property at the sale shall be conclusively presumed to be sufficient consideration for the sale. … If the case is one in which a deficiency judgment may be sought and application is made for a deficiency, the amount bid at the sale may be considered by the court as one of the factors in determining a deficiency under the usual equitable principles.”
The presumption exists so that a low price cannot be used to unwind a completed judicial sale. It answers the question “was there enough consideration for this transfer to stand?” — a title question. It is not a finding about market value.
The final sentence tells the court to treat the bid as one of the factors in determining a deficiency, under usual equitable principles. A statute that made the bid conclusive on value would not need that sentence at all.
Any party may serve an objection to the amount of the bid within 10 days after the clerk files the certificate of sale. Timely objections are heard by the court. Serving them does not cloud the purchaser's title in any manner.
A shortfall after the sale is not a deficiency judgment. It is the precondition for asking for one.
If the bid met or exceeded what the judgment ordered paid, there is no shortfall and nothing to pursue. If it exceeded it, the question is the opposite one — whether there is a surplus, and who is entitled to claim it.
A deficiency is not entered automatically with the final judgment. Section 45.031(8) speaks of a case “in which a deficiency judgment may be sought and application is made for a deficiency.” Many lenders never apply — particularly where the loan was insured, sold, or charged off.
Section 702.065(1) points the same way from the other side: where the mortgagee waives the right to recoup a deficiency in an uncontested case, the court is to enter final judgment within 90 days of the close of pleadings. A waiver is a thing that appears in real judgments, and it is worth reading yours to see whether it is in there.
Section 702.06 is unusually direct about this: entry of a deficiency decree “for any portion of a deficiency, should one exist, shall be within the sound discretion of the court.” Not the lender's election, and not a calculation that follows from the sale.
For owner-occupied residential property the amount “may not exceed the difference between the judgment amount, or in the case of a short sale, the outstanding debt, and the fair market value of the property on the date of sale.” Where a plaintiff credit-bids far below value, that ceiling is what stops the low bid from turning into a large personal judgment.
There is a rebuttable presumption that a residential property is owner-occupied if a homestead exemption for taxation was granted according to the certified rolls of the latest assessment by the county property appraiser before the foreclosure was filed.
Section 702.06 preserves a separate common-law action, and then closes it in the same breath.
The statute says the complainant “shall also have the right to sue at common law to recover such deficiency, unless the court in the foreclosure action has granted or denied a claim for a deficiency judgment.” That final clause is the part that matters to a homeowner. Once the foreclosure court has ruled on a deficiency claim — in either direction — the separate suit is off the table.
So a denial in the foreclosure case is not a loss postponed to another courtroom. And a lender that would rather preserve its options has a reason not to ask the foreclosure court at all, which is one explanation for a deficiency arriving later as an apparently unrelated lawsuit on the note.
The fast-track path does not change this. A final judgment entered on an order to show cause under section 702.10 is in rem relief only — it decides the property, not a personal obligation — but the statute is explicit that this “does not preclude the entry of a deficiency judgment where otherwise allowed by law.” An in rem judgment is not a release. See how the show-cause procedure compresses the schedule.
Florida recodified its limitations statute, and a great deal of published material still cites the old subsection numbers.
An action to enforce a claim of a deficiency related to a note secured by a mortgage against residential property that is a one-family to four-family dwelling unit must be brought within one year.
The period “shall commence on the day after the certificate is issued by the clerk of court or the day after the mortgagee accepts a deed in lieu of foreclosure.” A deed in lieu therefore starts the same clock without any sale at all.
The five-year limit on an action founded on a written instrument carves out only “an action for a deficiency judgment governed by paragraph (6)(g).”
A deficiency on commercial property, on vacant land, or on a residential building larger than four units is not governed by (6)(g) — so the one-year rule is not the one that applies to it.
Every question on this page is answered by documents already in the court file. None of this requires guessing.
Deficiency is the far end of the timeline. Most of what decides it happened earlier.
The same subtraction with the opposite sign. If the bid exceeded the judgment there is no deficiency at all — there is a fund, a waterfall, and a claim deadline that is not the 60 days you have read about.
The 120-day federal floor, the six Regulation X duties, and the show-cause procedure that produces an in rem judgment. Check which of them applied to your loan.
All seven stages, from the first missed payment to the day redemption closes under section 45.0315 — which is the last moment the deficiency question can still be avoided entirely.
How the sale and the certificate of title differ, who is entitled to surplus, and the four rules that decide most outcomes.
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