Land Sales and Unidentifiable Mobile Homes — How to Navigate the Hazards

Posted on August 26, 2021, by Jennifer Codding

You have just signed a sweetheart of a contract to sell land with a mobile home on it. Visions of dollar bills dance in your head. Suddenly, you receive a call from the closing agent asking you to provide an original mobile home title. You think to yourself, “what mobile home title?”

In many instances, if you sell a piece of property with a mobile home on it, you will need to provide the closing agent with an original Certificate of Title in order to close. For example, if the property is a mobile home cooperative unit, mobile home condominium unit, or a fee simple lot with a mobile home on it, unless the mobile home title is retired, the mobile home title will need to be transferred with the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles while the real property will need to be transferred with the Clerk of Court.

But what happens if you do not have a Certificate of Title? Worse, what if the DHSMV cannot identify your mobile home so that it can issue a duplicate Certificate of Title?

When all other avenues are exhausted, you will need a Court order to obtain a title to the mobile home. This is done through the filing of a declaratory action pursuant to Fla. Stat. Chap. 86. In declaratory actions, litigants request the Court issue a judgment clarifying and affirming rights, obligations, and responsibilities of one or more parties to the dispute. 

In cases of an unidentified mobile home with a missing title, a property owner will request that the Court enter judgment awarding the title to the property owner, assigning new identifying numbers to the mobile home, and directing the DHSMV to issue a new title to the property owner, upon application and payment of all required fees. The legal process leading up to the entry of a declaratory judgment can be either fairly straightforward or quite complicated, depending on the individual circumstances.

The lawyers at MLG are experienced in obtaining declaratory judgments relative to unidentifiable mobile homes. Contact our office today and speak to a knowledgeable attorney to find out if a declaratory action is right for you.