How Long Does a Judgment Last in Georgia: 7-Year Rule and Renewal

In Georgia, a judgment lasts seven years from the date it is entered. After that, it goes dormant and no court will enforce it, unless the creditor took specific steps within the seven-year window to reset the clock. Even a dormant judgment is not necessarily dead: Georgia law gives the creditor three more years to revive it. Miss both windows and the judgment is permanently unenforceable, though the underlying debt itself is a separate question.¹

The Seven-Year Clock

Georgia gives creditors seven years from entry of the judgment to enforce it through the courts. If nothing enforceable is on record when that period ends, the judgment becomes dormant. A dormant judgment cannot support wage garnishment, a property levy, or any other court process to compel payment.¹

Dormancy is not the same as extinguishment. The debtor still technically owes the money, and the creditor can accept voluntary payments or negotiate. What the creditor loses is the court’s help collecting. For a debtor, a dormant judgment can still surface in financial background checks and complicate certain transactions, but it cannot be actively enforced.

What Happens If the Debtor Leaves Georgia

Time the debtor spends outside Georgia may not count toward the seven years. Under Georgia’s tolling statute, when a defendant is absent from the state, the period of absence does not run in the debtor’s favor.² Someone who relocates for several years and then returns may find the judgment still alive.

How Creditors Keep a Judgment Alive Past Seven Years

A creditor who wants to enforce a judgment beyond seven years does not need to sue again. The core step is issuing a writ of fieri facias, usually called a fi.fa., and having it recorded on the general execution docket (GED) in the county where the judgment was entered. Recording within the first seven years starts a fresh seven-year period.¹

After the initial fi.fa. is on the docket, the creditor still has to act inside each new seven-year window. Georgia recognizes two ways to do that:

A sheriff or other officer authorized to levy and return executions makes an entry on the fi.fa., and the clerk records that entry and its date on the general execution docket.
The creditor files a written notice with the clerk describing an active court proceeding to enforce the judgment, including the case name, court, and nature of the action, and the clerk records the notice on the GED.

Each properly recorded entry starts a new seven-year clock.¹ A diligent creditor can chain these entries together and keep a judgment enforceable for decades. The recording fee for a fi.fa. in most Georgia superior courts is around $25.

Reviving a Dormant Judgment

If the creditor misses the seven-year window, the judgment is not automatically gone. Georgia allows a dormant judgment to be revived within three years after it becomes dormant. The creditor can revive it either by filing a new action or through a procedure called scire facias.³ Once the three-year revival period passes, the judgment is permanently unenforceable.

How Scire Facias Works

A scire facias is a court writ ordering the debtor to show cause why the dormant judgment should not be revived. It must be issued from and returned to the court in the county where the original judgment was obtained. The clerk prepares copies, and the sheriff of the county where the debtor lives must serve a copy on the debtor at least 20 days before the hearing.⁴ If the debtor lives in a different county, separate copies are issued for each county involved.

What a Revived Judgment Looks Like

Once revived, the judgment is enforceable again, but the lien attaches only from the date of revival, not retroactively to the original judgment date.⁵ Property the debtor transferred or encumbered while the judgment was dormant is not caught by the revived lien. For lien priority purposes, the creditor is starting over.

Interest Keeps Running the Whole Time

The seven-year clock controls enforceability, not the balance owed. Georgia judgments accrue interest at the federal prime rate on the day the judgment was entered, plus 3 percent.⁶ With the prime rate at 6.75% in early 2026, a judgment entered then carries interest at 9.75% per year.⁷ On a $20,000 judgment, that is roughly $1,950 a year. Interest is collectible as part of the judgment whether or not the court’s order specifically mentions it.

One exception matters. If the judgment is based on a written contract that sets its own interest rate, the contract rate applies instead of the statutory formula. That is common with promissory notes and business loan agreements.

Out-of-State Judgments Once They’re Domesticated Here

A judgment from another state does not run against Georgia property or wages until the creditor domesticates it. That means filing an authenticated copy of the foreign judgment with a Georgia superior court clerk, together with an affidavit listing the last known address of both the debtor and the creditor.⁸ The clerk mails notice to the debtor and records the mailing on the docket.

Once filed, the foreign judgment is treated like a Georgia judgment for enforcement, which means the same seven-year dormancy rules and the same revival window apply from that point forward.

Checking Whether a Judgment Against You Is Still Enforceable

Because the seven-year clock only resets when the creditor puts something on the general execution docket, the docket itself is the place to look. Pull the record in the county where the judgment was entered and see whether a fi.fa. was recorded and whether any officer entries or written notices followed within each seven-year window. If more than seven years passed without a qualifying entry, and more than three additional years passed without a revival action, the judgment can no longer be enforced.¹ A creditor who claims otherwise but has no GED entries to show for it has no case to make.

Two cautions when doing that math. Any time the debtor lived outside Georgia may not count toward the seven years, because absence from the state tolls the period.² And even a judgment that is unenforceable in court can still be paid voluntarily and can still turn up in background checks; dormancy strips the creditor’s leverage, not the debt’s existence on paper.