Quote from torontoman:
They can't easily place a lien so quickly. They need a court order for that. In order to get a court order, they have to sue you. In order to sue you, they have to serve you, at which time YOU have some time to respond to the statement of claim. From the time they serve you to them getting a court order, that would take some time at which time you do have an opportunity to defend.
I doubt that they will take you to main civil action for 20K. That is expensive and time consuming for them. It could be a small claim depending on your state and this might be good news for you in that the cap for small claims is much smaller.
If your state's small claim cap is 10K, the broker might take you here, eventhough you might owe them 20K, because Small Claims Court is much cheaper. If you lose, the case is settled. They can't go after you for the remainder.
I doubt that they can collect their legal fees from you. The thinking here is that if they want to hire lawyers, that is THEIR problem not yours...unless the defendant is totally ridiculous...which that is not the case here. They might collect court costs, which would be minimal.
Having said that, they may not take legal action at all if they believe that you have no money and believe that you will no have any money for the forseeable future.