Home>Levelset Community>Legal Help>I put a mechanics lien on a property and it has since sold and I didn’t get my payment. Why didn’t I get paid and what can I do?
I put a mechanics lien on a property and it has since sold and I didn’t get my payment. Why didn’t I get paid and what can I do?
I paid zlien to put a mechanics lien on a property and his has since sold and I didn’t get my payment. Why didn’t I get paid and how can zlien help me rectify this issue
1 reply
Aug 28, 2018
Mechanics liens encumber the property, by giving the lien claimant an interest in the property itself. In order to do so, the lien must be recorded in the property records where the property is located. The filed lien is then able to be found in title searches, or other inquiries into the property, and this usually results in claimants being paid upon a sale or refinance of the property.
Most purchasers do not want to purchase property subject to a lien, because usually the lien interest would have priority over their own, and the new owners may be able to be required to pay or the property could still be foreclosed upon to satisfy the debt.
There are a few reasons why a property could be sold with a mechanics lien filed against it. The lien could have not come up in the title search (the title insurance company messed up); the purchaser could have paid with cash and just not had a title search done (not a good idea by the purchaser); there could be some contractual agreement between the old and new property owners that if the lien was ever enforced the old property owner would defend and indemnify the new one (unlikely); or the lien could have been "bonded off" which would remove the lien from the property and instead exchange the security to a bond or cash deposit.