Buying Mobile Homes With Title Problems

Most investors hear “no clear title” and immediately walk away. We did the opposite and I’ll tell you exactly why. After putting a mobile home under contract with a messy ownership situation, I break down how I evaluate title risk in manufactured home investing, when a bill of sale can be acceptable, and when it’s worth doing the extra work to get true clear title so the deal stays financeable and easy to resell.

We get practical about the paperwork, especially for Texas mobile homes. I explain what a bill of sale really is (and what it doesn’t protect you from), what clear title actually means, and how a death in the family can create gaps in the chain of ownership. Then we talk about TDHCA and why simply calling them can save you hours of guessing. They’ll point you to the right inheritance and transfer of ownership forms, fees, and requirements so you can move from “problem deal” to “clean transfer” with a real process.

We also dig into due diligence tools you can use right now, including how to find a home in TDHCA Ownership View using the label number, serial number, address, or owner name, and how to check tax lien status and mortgage lien status. Finally, I share how I use NADA value to estimate what the home is worth with clean paperwork, then negotiate a significant discount when title issues add risk. If you’re buying, selling, wholesaling, or doing seller financing in the mobile home space, this one will sharpen your decision-making fast.

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Transcript

The Deal Most Investors Skip

SPEAKER_00 0:00

So yesterday I put a mobile home under contract that I think a lot of investors probably would have passed on. And here's here's the deal, right? It didn't have clear title, which I would have bought it probably anyway, just on a bill of sale.

Bill Of Sale Versus Clear Title

SPEAKER_00 0:17

So on another note, a bill of sale is just a piece of paper saying that you bought it and the person you bought it from is claiming that there's no liens, encumbrances. They have clear, you know, they they're able to sell it in a nutshell, right? Clear title would mean that, you know, it can trace back clearly all the way up to them. And there's a paperwork trail to prove that. There wasn't for this because, you know, there's death in the family, and there's things that go with that. Um, you know, especially when when somebody passes away, like in Texas, right? I'll speak on Texas. Uh, there's in uh there's a chart that you can look up, and it'll say, like, you know, if I guess a spouse dies and if there's kids involved, you know, a certain percentage goes to the spouse and to the kids and if they have kids and so forth, right? But and with like mobile homes, you could buy them on a bill of sale, and they're not like somebody can't get financing, they won't be able to get a bank loan if they ever wanted to like cash out of them or anything with a bill of sale.

Clearing Inherited Titles Through TDHCA

SPEAKER_00 1:17

However, to clear a title when there's um, you know, unfortunate passing of somebody, you can do uh you can call the TDHCA in Texas, right? And if you don't know what that is, you can Google TDHCA and get their phone number and call them, be like, hey, you know, um, somebody passed away and this is the situation. What all paperwork do I need? And they'll tell you. Like they have like inheritance forms, they have transfers of ownership, they have a fee, you know, and they'll tell you if they require anything past that. Easy as that, right? They'll tell you what you need to get clear title transfers. You transferred title to mobile homes through uh TDHCA, and they have paperwork, designated paperwork that needs to be filled out to do so. Very, very freaking helpful. So when you're looking at mobile homes and you're gonna purchase them, you're gonna wholesale them, whatever. The titles passed like, I don't know what the year is, but let's call it 1990. Um, some somewhere around there. They they're all online, but they're called statement of ownership. So it kind of screws

Finding Records And Checking Liens

SPEAKER_00 2:24

people up. They're like, where's the title of these things? There's not titles anymore. Well, the statement of ownership is the title. So, like, say you find a mobile home, you look it up, TD, you could just Google TDHCA ownership view, right? And you can put in the label number, serial number, address, name of person, which a lot of times there's a lot of the same names. So you're gonna get a lot of results, stuff like that, and and find it, right? And when you do find it, there'll be a place on there it says like tax lien status. You click on that to see if there's any owed taxes, mortgage lien status. It'll tell you if there's like an encumbrance, like a mortgage on there, a mortgage lien. You know, a lot of times there are, even if they're paid off, and you just need a letter saying like, you know, it's paid off. Easy as that. A lot of a lot of people don't know that, but they'll pass on stuff. But I mean, like I said, I buy stuff on bill of sales all the time too. You just gotta know what you're getting in and what you're buying and get the right discount, the right pricing for the structure that you're buying. But like on this deal, you know, buying no title issues, I'm gonna clear the title issues. Um, I'm putting some money down, and the rest is gonna be seller financing. Good deal, newer home, um, win-win, because you know, um, I'm helping on that aspect, and and you know, they're hoping by getting me a good home for my park, right? It's a win-win. Like everybody does well. Didn't uh nobody got over on anybody. It's a good deal. This is just me telling you like if you find a home with with title issues, a mobile home, you got one or two options. One, you can try to clear it, TDHCA, ask them what you need, tell them the situation, right? Or

Pricing Risk With NADA Values

SPEAKER_00 4:12

two, get a bill of sale, you know. And here's another uh little trick is you can look up the NADA value on mobile homes, year model, condition, all that stuff, right? And you can see what you're getting into. So say that somebody doesn't have clear title and you look up the value of that home and it's X amount, but if it's a bill of sale or if it's got title issues, you're gonna want, you know, a pretty significant discount. But you can look it up and see what the value would be without that and go from there, you know, see if the risk is worth the reward for you, if that

Questions And How To Support

SPEAKER_00 4:50

makes sense. Hope this was helpful. Just wanted to, you know, kind of brief over this since it's something we literally did yesterday. And, you know, if you have any questions, put them down below. If you're listening to this, um, you know, if you're watching this on YouTube, leave a comment, subscribe, click the subscribe button, that'd be awesome. If you're listening to it on the Spotify, Apple, any of that, leave us a review. An honest review goes such a long ways. We appreciate it. Again, my name is Travis Wells. This is the Property Profits Podcast. Appreciate the heck out of y'all jumping on. Hope your Friday goes well. If you're listening to this on Friday or whatever day you're listening to this, and um, you know, leave us your honest feedback. Thank you so much. Until next time.