How To Clear Up A Lien When Trying To Sell Your Home

When someone makes an offer to buy your home, there will be a number of different steps that must be completed before the sale can go through, and one of these will involve title work. An attorney or title agency will research the title and deed of the property, and you may encounter some problems if you discover there are liens on your house. Here are a couple things you should understand about liens on a home.

What Is A Lien?

A lien is a legal right a person has to a property. If you owe a contractor money, for example, the contractor could come after you with a lien. In order to sell your home, you will have to pay the total balance of the lien. When you make this payment, the court will release the lien, and this will free up the title. Without paying for the lien, it will be hard to sell your home.

When a person places a lien on your home, you should receive a notification about this; however, there are times when you might not. In some cases, liens might not even be valid. If you discover liens on your home when you try to sell the house, you will either have to pay them or fight them, because you will not be able to sell the home until the liens are released.

How Do You Fight A Lien?

If the liens on your home are not valid and should not exist, you may need to hire a real estate attorney to help you fight them. This process will take time, though, so you should be aware of this when you begin the process. The first step will be researching what the liens are for, and your lawyer will be able to find this out by looking at the liens. Next, your lawyer will begin disputing the liens, and here are several steps an attorney may take to do this:

1. Find out if the lien expired – Most states have rules that state how long a lien can last before it will expire, and this time frame is typically between 7 to 10 years. If the lien is really old, there is a chance that it has already expired. If this is the case, you can prove you do not owe the lien based on the fact that it should have expired.
2. Dispute the lien with the lienholder – If the lien was fraudulently placed on your property, your attorney will take the right steps to dispute it with the person that filed the lien. This will typically require sending a letter to the person or going to the courthouse to file a request for the release of the lien.
3. Settle with the lienholder – If the lien is not expired and is valid, your attorney might be able to settle the debt with the lienholder. If this occurs, you will probably have to pay for a portion of the debt. In return, the lienholder will release the lien from the property.

The goal is to get a letter that states the lien is released. If you cannot do this, the money you owe for the lien will be deducted out of the proceeds of the sale of the house on closing day.

A lot of steps are needed to sell a home, and there are a variety of different issues you may encounter during this process. If you run into a problem of any kind, you should seek help from an experienced real estate attorney, such as Jack W Hanemann, P.S., so you can close on the sale.