It occured to me that a lot of people think they cannot short sale their home due to liens. Did you know that Texas property code protects your primary home from most creditor liens.
Texas property laws protect a defendant's home against liens or acquisition by a plaintiff. This means that a plaintiff cannot be awarded a defendant's primary residence in a civil trial. This rule is established and governed by Title 5, Chapter 41, Subchapter A of the 2005 Texas Property Code. While there are exceptions to this rule, it generally protects a defendant from losing a residence or needing to hand over income earned by the sale of a home.
Read more: Texas Civil Trial Home Property Law
Texas defines a 'homestead' as the main residence of a family or individual. In an urban area, which is an area within an established municipality or serviced by public utilities, a homestead residence is limited to 10 acres. In a rural area a homestead is limited to 200 acres of land for a family or 100 acres of land for an individual. Additional acres in a rural homestead surpassing the maximum amounts allowed are not protected and can be awarded to a plaintiff.
Read more: Texas Civil Trial Home Property Laws
An individual designates a residence as homestead on his tax forms. However, if a defendant has not made such a designation, a court can find the residence to be a homestead during the lawsuit in which a creditor seeks to be awarded the property. In this situation, the defendant would need to prove that the property meets the legal requirements of a homestead.
Read more: Texas Civil Trial Home Property Laws
A homestead property conforming to the code's definition cannot be given to a creditor or have liens attached to it. This rule exists to protect an individual from losing his home. Additionally,
funds earned from the sale of homestead property cannot be accessed by creditors until six months after the sale. This rule exists to permit individuals to reinvest the money into a new homestead. Homestead laws prohibit a court from attaching liens other than approved ones to a homestead. In a civil trial, therefore, a defendant is usually not at risk of losing a private residence. If, however, evidence is provided that a residence is not the primary home, the property can be awarded to the plaintiff.
However, a homestead can have certain types of liens placed against it. These include liens for owed
taxes, construction costs on the home, property division in a divorce proceeding or payments for a reverse mortgage. A lien is an interest in a piece of property. When the property is sold, a lienholder is entitled to the amount of money of his lien. A property may have several different lienholders, and the order of their payment is determined by the date their liens were established.
Read more:
Texas Civil Trial Home Property Laws | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/
The information here is for information purposes only Phillis Nealy and The Texas Group are not attorney's and are not advising or counseling as such. Please consult an attorney for indepth information. This information was used from ehow.com and was used only to share the information to interested parties, Phillis Nealy and The Texas Group did not and does not claim to have written or authored any of the information above.
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