Spring 2022 Course Schedule

Secured Transactions (LAW-840-001)
David Snyder

Meets: 03:00 PM - 04:20 PM (MW) - Yuma - Room Y403

Enrolled: 41 / Limit: 65

Administrator Access


Notices

There are no notices at this time.

Description

In ordinary language, this course is about the law of lending and borrowing money, especially when there is collateral involved. More precisely, the course covers the law of secured lending, focusing on loans secured by personal property as governed by Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code. Students are introduced to the creation, perfection, priority, enforcement, and avoidance of security interests, and to the policies underlying the system of secured credit. Some attention is given to basic principles of finance and business, and to the extent time allows, to loans secured by real property (mortgages) and to transactional lawyers' roles and skills. The course also covers some general principles of bankruptcy law as they relate to security interests. No prior knowledge of business, finance, economics, or bankruptcy is required.

Textbooks and Other Materials

The textbook information on this page was provided by the instructor. Students should use this information when considering purchases from the AU Campus Store or other vendors. Students may check to determine if books are currently available for purchase online.

The required coursebook is the *eighth edition from 2016* (not the ninth edition from 2020) of Lynn M. LoPucki et al., Secured Transactions: A Systems Approach (2016). It is part of the Aspen Casebook Series from Wolters Kluwer. The ISBN is 978-1-4548-5793-8. Be sure to get the eighth edition. Other editions will not work.

You are also required to have a statutory supplement. Probably the best is again from Aspen Publishers, Comprehensive Commercial Law Statutory Supplement (Ronald Mann, Elizabeth Warren & Jay Westbrook eds.). I think Aspen has a deal so that if you buy the course book (which is required), you can get the supplement cheaply. But other reasonably new commercial law statutory supplements from Aspen or other publishers (e.g., West and Foundation Press) are likely to work fine, perhaps with occasional exceptions that can be remedied without undue trouble. If you can get an old supplement cheap or free, by all means do so. As long as the supplement is comprehensive (having all of the UCC and Bankruptcy Code) and was published in the last few years, it should work well enough.

First Class Readings

For the first class, read the introduction (pp. xxxi-xxxvii) and the epigraph (p. xxxix) and prepare all of Assignment 1 (pp. 3-21). Also read the syllabus.

For the second class, prepare Assignment 2 (pp. 22-39), skipping Problems 2.3, 2.6, 2.7, and 2.8.

After the second class, assume that we will cover 1½ assignments per class. Be sure to consult the preparation notes before preparing so you will know what problems to skip. The preparation notes, as well as a list of key concepts for each assignment, will be posted separately.

Syllabus

Use your MyAU username and password to access the syllabus in the following format(s):