Complete a Title Search Before Building Your Modular Home

Whenever you purchase land, make sure you complete a title search before building your modular home. If you finance the purchase, your lender will automatically require this. Although it will cost you several hundred dollars to have the title checked, don’t skip this task when you inherit or are gifted land. Having it done early on will protect you from moving forward with other steps that can’t be completed until the title is cleared.

Failing to Complete a Title Search Before Building Your Modular Home

In our first year of selling modular homes, one of my salespeople sold a ranch to a woman who was going to build a home on a lot she was being given by her mother. When her attorney did a title search the day before the closing, he found a title flaw with the property. It turned out that when her mother had inherited the land from her own mother (my customer’s grandmother), the grandmother had actually given the land to both of her children, not just her daughter. So the land was really owned by my customer’s mother and her brother. No one had paid attention to this because the brother had died many years ago, and he didn’t have any children or a will stating what should happen to his share of the land. My customer’s mother falsely assumed she automatically inherited her brother’s share of the property. My customer had to cancel purchasing her modular home when she was told it could take over two years to resolve this matter in court. A couple of years later I noticed in the local paper that she had cleared up the problem. Since she had already bought an existing home, however, she sold the lot.For more information about why you should complete a title search before building your modular home, see Finding and Preparing a Building Lot for a Modular Home in my book The Modular Home.