I sold my house to my parents. Shortly after in an unrelated circumstance, I routinely checked my credit and I discovered that NYS Tax put a judgement against me. Years later, my parents went to refinance the house and discovered that there was a judgement that the title company did not pick up on and it was attached to the house. It seems that the judgement that was put against me must have come either the day before or the same day that my parents closed on my house and the title company must have missed it. I have not been able to determine from anyone if the title company is responsible for this. I would think that the attachment to the house is the title company's responsibility and therefore, they should take care of it. The judgement is for $10,000 and my lawyer said he contacted the title company which contacted NYS and said that NYS would settle for $3,000. Is it the title company's responsibility to pay this? If so, how should I proceed to have this enforced?

Was the $10,000 a legitatmate debt owed to another? If so, you, the debtor would have had knowledge wouldn't you? The title company has insurance to cover errors but this may not be an error at all. Sounds like this could be two ships passing in the night.

Its not the job of the title company to pay off any liens it didn't find, only to pay the expenses incurred because it didn't find them. So the title company seems to be doing its job by getting a settlement from NYS.

Now I'm wondering how you were unaware that you owed NYS $10K in back taxes?

I closed my auto repair shop and I worked with a NY Tax agent to pay the witholding taxes that I owed, which I did. Then I sold the house. Somehow, there were more taxes due than they originally told me about and I had no knowledge of it. I have been complaining about it with them forever now, and they won't give me a straight answer. All I can tell you is that this honestly happened.

OK, So you have a choice. Accept the settlement or fight the judgement. In either case your parents may not be able to refinance until you clear this up.

There is still something not right here. If you owed more taxes than you thought NY would have done their darnest to get a hold of you. Getting a judgement does happen in secret.

Ok, the title company only does the title work, and are not responsible for any debt or lien ( it is a lien) on the property not showing up at the time filed with the county.

If your parents bought title insurance, it will take care of it, ( by paying the full 10,000 most likely) but it will then just sue you to get paid back, they don't lose htier money if they don't have to, since all they do is promice to pay for a clear title.

This would be what the parents bought when they got the house from you.

Next of course depending on the type of deed you signed over, if it was a warranty deed, your parents lawsuit could be against you, under the terms of the warranty deed.

Chuck, thanks for the straight answer. Bellinger, you don't have to believe me if you don't want to. It's fine with me and I also appreciate your help. The whole story is that I originally owed NYS withholding tax people $10,000. My accountant and I negotiated with a representative and got the tax reduced to $6,000. I paid the tax and got a receipt. You would think that if there was any more tax owed, she would have seen it in the computer. Well, she didn't tell me about any other tax owed and I assumed that it was all paid. Then I came to find out that NYS did put a judgement against me without my knowledge for $10,000. I called the representative that I was dealing with and told her that I thought we agreed to settle it for $6,000 and I even have a paid receipt. She said that this other tax that I owed was with the corporation. The one I paid was personal. I'm not a tax expert but this is what they told me. And there are also two different reference numbers on each of the taxes. One for the $6,000 one I paid and a different one for the $10,000 one. Nobody at NYS can explain to me what is going on or how this happened. So there you have the entire story. Now instead of trying to tell me that I am lying, maybe someone who believes me can actually help me. Thanks.

Vinman, I'm not saying you are telling a lie by any means. It just seems we're missing some info. Do you know how they took you to court for the judgement without your knowledge? In Illinois that can't happen , consequently my question. Sorry to upset you while you are in such a state.

No problem Ballenger. In NY, they legally can't put a judgement against you without your knowledge, but it sometimes does happen. They way some of these creditors do it is they send the paperwork into the court and purposely do not send you your copy. Then you don't know about the court date and you do not show up, and they win the judgement. It happened to my wife twice. They falsely state on their paperwork that someone served you. In my wife's case, they put down that a neighbor named Bill was questioned. We don't even have a neighbor named bill. In the case of NYS, I'm not sure how it happened. My repair shop was a corporation and the name was my name. Vinny Smith's Repair. I wish I knew how this could have happened, but I don't. All I can think is that during the negations, my accountant got the NYS lady very upset. She finally gave into $6,000. Maybe she was so irritated by his tatics that she somehow went and did this to me in the computer somehow. I really don't know. I don't have the money for a tax lawyer to fight it and I'm not going to pay something I don't feel I owe but I was thinking that if it is true that it is reduced to $3,000 then maybe someday I could try and scrape up the money and pay it. When I first found out about this which was about 7 years ago, I called the lady at NYS and she said it wasn't her department. Then I went down there to Hauppauge with the paperwork, and nobody would give me a straight answer. All they said is that I owe it and there is nothing they can do for me.

The problem I have is that this was NYS not a bill collector. I can believe that a bill collector would go through some shady practices to get a default judgement, but not the state. The state has resources to find you that a normal bill collector wouldn't.

But that's moot. You now have to resolve the judgement to clear the lien.