creditor

A person to whom a debt is owing by another person who is the "debtor." Rooney v. Inheritance Tax Commission of Kansas, 143 Kan. 143, 53 P.2d 500, 501.

One who has a right to require the fulfillment of an obligation or contract. Murphy v. Jos. Hollander, Inc., 131 N.J.L. 165, 34 A.2d 780, 783.

One to whom money is due, and, in ordinary acceptation, has reference to financial or business transactions.

The antonym of "debtor." Erickson v. Grande Ronde Lumber Co., 162 Or. 556, 92 P.2d 170, 177.

The word is susceptible of latitudinous construction. In its broad sense the word means one who has any legal liability upon a contract, express or implied, or in tort; in its narrow sense, the term is limited to one who holds a demand which is certain and liquidated.

In statutes the term has various special meanings, dependent upon context, purpose of statute, etc.

The term "creditor," within the common-law and statutes that conveyances with intent to defraud creditors shall be void, includes every one having right to require the performance of any legal obligation, contract, or guaranty, or a legal right to damages growing out of contract or tort, and includes not merely the holder of a fixed and certain present debt, but every one having a right to require the performance of any legal obligation, contract, or guaranty, or a legal right to damages growing out of contract or tort, and includes one entitled to damages for breach of contract to convey real estate, notwithstanding the abandonment of his action for specific performance.

Under U.C.C., term includes a general creditor, a secured creditor, a lien creditor and any representative of creditors, including an assignee for the benefit of creditors, a trustee in bankruptcy, a receiver in equity and an executor or administrator of an insolvent debtor's or assignor's estate. U.C.C. No. 1-201(12).

Under Bankruptcy Code, term includes entity that has a claim against the debtor that arose at the time of or before the order for relief concerning the debtor. Bankruptcy Code, No. 101.

"Creditors" subject to Federal Truth-in-Lending Act are those who regularly extend or arrange for extension to consumers of credit for which a finance charge is required. Garza v. Chicago Health Clubs, Inc., D.C.I11., 347 F.Supp. 955, 963.

Classification

A creditor may be called a "simple contract creditor," a "specialty creditor," a "bond creditor," or otherwise, according to the nature of the obligation giving rise to the debt.

@ attaching creditor

One who has caused an attachment to be issued and levied on property of his debtor.

See attachment

- creditor

@ certificate creditor

A creditor of a municipal corporation who receives a certificate of indebtedness for the amount of his claim, there being no funds on hand to pay him

@ confidential creditor

A term sometimes applied to creditors of a failing debtor who furnished him with the means of obtaining credit to which his real circumstances did not entitle him, thus involving loss to other creditors not in his confidence

@ creditor at large

One who has not established his debt by the recovery of a judgment or has not otherwise secured a lien on any of the debtor's property.

@ domestic creditor

One who resides in the same state or country in which the debtor has his domicile or his property.

@ execution creditor

One who, having recovered a judgment against the debtor for his debt or claim, has also caused an execution to be issued thereon.

See execution.

@ foreign creditor

One who resides in a state or country foreign to that where the debtor has his domicile or his property.

@ general creditor

A creditor at large (supra), or one who has no lien or security for the payment of his debt or claim.

@ joint creditors

Persons jointly entitled to require satisfaction of the same debt or demand.

@ junior creditor

One whose claim or demand accrued at a date later than that of a claim or demand held by another creditor, who is called correlatively the "senior" creditor.

Creditor whose claim ranks below other creditors in rights to the debtor's property. For example, a creditor with an unperfected security interest in a property is a junior creditor to one holding a perfected security interest.

@ principal creditor

One whose claim or demand very greatly exceeds the claims of all other creditors in amount is sometimes so called.

@ secondary creditors

One whose claim is secondary to preferred creditor(s).

@ subsequent creditor

One whose claim or demand accrued or came into existence after a given fact or transaction, such as the recording of a deed or mortgage or the execution of a voluntary conveyance.

See also junior creditor.

@ warrant creditor

A creditor of a municipal corporation to whom is given a municipal warrant for the amount of his claim, because there are no funds in hand to pay it

@ creditor beneficiary

A third person to whom performance of promise comes in satisfaction of legal duty. A creditor who has rights in a contract made by the debtor and a third person, where the terms of the contract obligate the third person to pay the debt owed to the creditor. The creditor beneficiary can enforce the debt against either party.

Where performance of a promise in a contract will benefit a person other than the promisee, that person is a creditor beneficiary if no purpose to make a gift appears from the terms of the promise in view of the accompanying circumstances and performance of the promise will satisfy an actual or supposed or asserted duty of the promisee to the beneficiary, or a right of the beneficiary against the promisee which has been barred by the Statute of Limitations or by a discharge in bankruptcy, or which is unenforceable because of the Statute of Frauds. Restatement, Second, Contracts

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