In Virginia when you buy a new mobile home there are two separate transactions and two separate documents evidencing ownership and those ownership documents are recorded by two different government agencies. The mobile home is bought from a manufacturer and because a mobile home is “mobile,” it is personal property, with ownership shown by a title issued by the Department of Motor Vehicles, just like a motor vehicle. The land that you install the mobile home on is real property, with ownership shown by a deed and recorded with the Circuit Court Clerk’s Office of the city/county the land is in. This dual track of ownership creates problems when the original owner of the mobile home decides to sell. What happens when the land the mobile home sits on is owned by the same person who owns the mobile home and the sale encompasses the mobile home and the land?

If the mobile home has not been converted into the real property, meaning it still has a valid DMV title, a buyer cannot get a loan to make the purchase. Lenders require the mobile home be converted into the real property before they will issue a loan for its purchase. This protects the lender through their ability to record a Deed of Trust on the land to secure the loan and, simplifies the transaction as the lender would also need to record a lien with the DMV to secure the portion of the loan for payment of the mobile home if the mobile home was still its own legal asset.

Converting a mobile home into the real property is a three-step process: 1) install the mobile home on a permanent foundation and remove the tires and any other means of transport; 2) surrender the title for the mobile home by filing the DMV form, Affidavit For Manufactured Home Conversion to Real Property and; 3) after receipt of confirmation from DMV that the title has been surrendered, file Circuit Court Form 1560 - Affidavit for Manufactured Home with the Circuit Court Clerk.

After you complete these steps the mobile home and the real property are one and the same. If the owner decides in the future to make the mobile home “mobile” again they will need to do the reverse of the above, file an affidavit with the Circuit Court Clerk severing the mobile home from the real property and then file with the DMV a copy of the affidavit filed with the Court. The DMV will then issue a new certificate of title.

The DMV and the Court have posted both of the forms described in this article online and links to them are pasted below.

https://www.vacourts.gov/forms/circuit/cc1560.pdf

https://www.dmv.virginia.gov/webdoc/pdf/vsa35.pdf

If you have any questions about this article, please contact Todd Knode (tknode@setlifflaw.com) at (804) 377-1277 or Steve Setliff (ssetliff@setlifflaw.com) at (804) 377-1271.