In Baker v. Bank of America, N.A., No. 5:13-CV-92-F, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 9578 (E.D.N.C. Jan. 27, 2014), the United States District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina held that even if a consumer timely exercises his or her right to rescind a loan transaction under the Truth in Lending Act (TILA), 15 U.S.C. § 1601, et. seq. — i.e., during the three-day statutory “cooling-off” period — that exercise does not automatically cause the loan to be rescinded.  Rather, the court held, if a consumer’s notice of rescission is met with silence by the lender, the consumer must also file a lawsuit in order to complete the rescission before the statute of limitations expires (in this case, the statute of limitations was determined to be four years).   The Baker case provides a thorough interpretation of the effect of the statutory three-day “cooling-off” period, for which, it was noted in the decision, case law is “exceedingly sparse.”
Continue Reading Does A Consumer’s Exercise of a Rescission Right Mean that the Loan Is Automatically Rescinded? Perhaps Not, According to One Federal Court, If the Consumer Does Not Also File a Lawsuit for Rescission