A borrower spent nearly two decades fighting one missing note - the court refused to hear it again
On August 11, 2026, the Connecticut Supreme Court affirmed a strict foreclosure on Hartford's Park Place Towers and refused to let the borrower reopen it.
The case ran for nearly two decades. Underwood Towers Limited Partnership leased land from the city of Hartford in 1985 to build the two high-rise apartment buildings, financed by a $35 million loan from The Connecticut National Bank, insured by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Underwood defaulted in 1990 and signed a second mortgage and a note, "Note A," in favor of HUD. It defaulted again, and in 1996 signed a further note, "Note B," and reworked the second mortgage.
In January 2006, LPP bought the second mortgage, Note A and Note B. It never received the original Note B - only a lost note affidavit, a sworn statement that the note had gone missing. LPP filed to foreclose in December 2006.
Underwood and its management agent, CDC Management Corporation, argued LPP could not foreclose because it could not enforce the lost note under the Uniform Commercial Code. The trial court rejected that in 2019, relying on a 1996 ruling that a note and the mortgage securing it are separate instruments - so a party can foreclose in equity by proving it owns the debt, even without authority to enforce the note. The court ordered strict foreclosure and awarded damages of $1,766,057 against Underwood and $408,588 against CDC. The Appellate Court affirmed.
On remand, the defendants raised the same standing argument again, saying a newer decision had quietly overturned the 1996 rule. The Supreme Court held it had not, and that res judicata barred a repeat of a question already resolved on appeal. It did not revisit the underlying standing question.
The judgment was affirmed. One issue - how a debt of roughly $76 million tied to Note A ranks against other claims - returns to the trial court.
