The Expert Podcast

So the first question that very often comes up when talking to clients about getting a vehicle title is: How do I get a title when I don't have the right paperwork? What are the methods that can be used? What are the differences between the methods? So we're going to look into the two most common ways of getting a vehicle title, which are the bonded title and the court order title. In almost every case, the best way to get a title is one of these two methods. So what are the differences? Which one is better, which one takes longer, and which one is cheaper? Both methods are legal, official government methods of getting a title. In fact, you have to pick one of these methods; all the other methods are probably not the correct or appropriate methods for getting a title.

So what is the difference well we're going to talk about first the short answer and then we're going to go into depth so if you want to just find out basically what the um answer to your question is that'll happen pretty quick within a minute or two if you want to get more detailed Deep dive into both of these methods this video will cover that the biggest difference is the bonded title goes through the DMV or the titling Authority in your state some states call it Department of Motor Vehicles some states call it Department of Transportation some states call it the registry a bonded title goes through that government agency at the state level the court order title bypasses the bureaucracy of the DMV and goes over their head to the legal system the county court now before you get concerned about you have to go to a big court case this is not like Law and Order Jack McCoy a big kind of court hearing in a courtroom it's usually done administratively we'll get into that.

So what what is the pros and cons to those well the DMV Department of Motor Vehicles Department of Transportation whatever agency in your state hands out titles because that's who hands out titles is your um Vehicle Authority they have certain rules they're not allowed to give out titles unless you have the old title from the vehicle signed over on the back to you or you go through the bonded title process through their agenty even then there's certain requirements for example in some states like Florida unless the vehicle was last titled in Florida you can't do a bonded title in some states if the vehicle has a lean on it you can't do a bonded title some states don't do bonded titles at all there's a list of about 14 states in the country that don't do bonded titles you can find out a link to that list in the uh website cartitles.com so if your state doesn't do bonded titles then it's off the table in addition the DMV will probably not be able to do a bonded title if you don't meet certain criteria they have certain rules they have to abide by even if they want to break the rules they can't the court order title on the other hand goes through the county court in the county where you reside court has authority over the DMV if the court issues an order to the DM V saying you have to give a title to this person they have to do it so it's kind of like extra Authority that's the biggest difference one goes through the DMV local Vehicle Authority one goes through the court which is a higher authority which one takes longer they both take about the same amount of time the court may take a little longer again there's a lot of variation remember there's 50 different states every State DMV has different turnaround time some states you can get a title in four or five days some states take four or five weeks with the courts there's 3,611 different counties in the country they all have different turnaround times for court cases some a couple weeks some a few weeks some a month so in general a bonded title will take slightly less but only by a matter of a week or two it's not going to take months to do this in most cases which one is harder well the paperwork is about the same and we're going to look at some of this paperwork there's only one difference when it comes to the Department of Motor Vehicles they have what I call color by number forms fill in blank forms here's an example of a DMV form see where it has name blank address blank VIN number blank check off boxes that's how DMV forms are created for court order titles this is how the form starts it's a clean sheet of paper there are no fill-in-the blank forms there's a couple exceptions we'll talk about in Ohio and we'll use those as an example but for court you have to start with a blank sheet of paper and type up all the words yourself see all these words here on this form for request for motor vehicle see all this paragraph of text and all these words these are already pre-done for you with the DMV for a bonded title for a court order title there are no words pre-done you have to make up all the words yourself so it is a little trickier but there's ways you can maybe make that easier when it comes to filing these documents whether it's the court or the DMV we recommend not bringing them in person even if the office is right next door to your house don't walk them in the front door here's why the people who normally work at the clerk window for either the court or the DMV are not the most experienced people they're kind of like the front-end administrative people they may not be familiar with some of this stuff if you mail it in it goes directly to the main office for that agency if you're mailing it to the DMV mailing to their main office headquarters usually in the capital city like in California it's in Sacramento in Pennsylvania it's Harrisburg and so on when you mail to the court it goes right into the back office to the magistrate those people know what they're doing so so don't walk it in the door cuz you may get just turned away no we don't do this and they may not know cuz you don't see a lot of these the other thing to keep in mind is that the court can override what the DMV says it can override leans it can override ownership so they have more power but you have to come up with the words to do that last disadvantage pros and cons between the two when you do a bonded title you will have to purchase a shy bond for that vehicle that shity bond is usually based on the value of the vehicle so if the value is let's say 8,000 you have to buy a bond for usually one and a half times or $122,000 may cost you a couple hundred bucks for that Bond and your title when you get it is going to say bonded on it stamped in Big Red Letters so if you're looking to sell the vehicle or move to a state that doesn't allow bonded titles that could be a disadvantage a court order title is a regular standard title No deviation so let's look at an example of a bonded title now in New Jersey they call it improper evidence of ownership procedure it's basically the same as a bonded title in most States but the reason we're going to look at is because it gives you a good representation of what the process is the only advantage to New Jersey is you don't have to purchase a shity bond they do it without a bond so what do they say about a sh bond this this procedure is a 12-step procedure when it is purchased without an existing title right and that's what most of you are facing you have purchased a vehicle without a title this procedure is only available to New Jersey residents which is normally the case for most of these each case is unique and handled on an individual basis it's possible additional documents may be required to complete the transaction to obtain the evidence of ownership these are all the forms OS 142 ss150 ss45 so these are all the forms you need and we'll look at those here in a minute so that's what they call bonded title it's a little bit different name what does it look like here is the process and they have a package for this improper evidence of ownership procedure step one proof of ownership lean holder information what you have to do is you have to file an application to get a print out of the names of any owners of the vehicle names of any lean holders of the vehicle they call it a d22 form and we'll look at that you have to send them $15 if they don't have a record in their state then you have to run all the adjoining States New York Delaware Pennsylvania Connecticut Maryland if you notice right after step one it says stop here do not continue until you receive the print out back from New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission then you can go to step two this is very common with a bonded title they want to make sure that the last owner has no objection to you doing this so they're going to require you to do a prior owner lookup now this prior owner lookup we're going to scroll down to that page it will come back up don't worry if you notice it has this title lean search request you fill in your name the business name whatever you have the VIN number and if you notice you have to check off a permitted use 1 two 3 4 right and it has words what the use are for use by a government agency for use in conjunction with Motor Vehicle Safety well let's look at another state here is the state of of um Missouri they have a similar form request for motor vehicle records permiss permissible use government agency court if you notice it has the same uses the reason why is because this comes from a federal law called the dppa that all states have to abide by so when you do a request for motor vehicle background information you have to abide by and check off one of these rules no matter what state you're in and New Jersey has the same thing so now once you've submitted that and you get the print out then what what you have to do is you have to do an emergency application for title and the form is called ss150 fully completed and notorized you have to submit it to the um office of titles then you have to put a certified ad in the newspaper it's publishing notice that you're intending to get a title you have to send a copy of that notice to your local police department to make sure it's not stolen you have to file a notice of intent to get a title to the last owner stating your intent to get a title have to send him a certified letter then you have to have your evidence of purchase like a bill of sale or something where you bought the vehicle then you have to get notorized statements from three parties saying they have seen you have the vehicle in your possession they want to make sure you're not trying to get a title for a vehicle you don't have then you have to do a pencil tracing of the VIN number or take a picture of it so they prove prove that the VIN number is correct you have to take pictures of the actual vehicle front back side then you do an application for title pay the fee of $60 and sign an affidavit that you're not using this process for a business it's only for your own personal use and then here's all the forms here's all the forms title search request um here's the Declaration emergency application for title fill in the information how vehicle came into your possession very important remember that we're going to talk about this here in a in a minute um notice of intent to obtain title and they give you all the forms you have to fill them in properly we recommend typing them don't handwriting them because if you do it might get kicked back you file that with the New Jersey DMV if everything checks out they give you a title that's their version of a bonda title Most states are similar they may not have all these same 12 steps you might not have to put an ADD in the paper you might only have to send out certified letters but it's the same idea how does that compare to a court order title well here is an example for a court order title this one happens to be in Ohio Montgomery County Ohio there are four counties in the whole country that have a package of documents for a court order title you go into any other County and you say I want to do a court order title they're not going to know what you're talking about they're going to tell you to leave because they don't call their court cases by the name of what's in the case like we've you've heard us say this before there's no such thing as a dog bite lawsuit case they just consider it a litigation so there's no paperwork for this but we can look to Montgomery County to get an idea what they want what steps do I need to take visit one of the offices and get this package where you have that package complete a form for a vehicle record does that sound familiar same as a bonda title you have to complete that form and send it in mail a certified letter to the vehicle owner does that sound familiar to a bonded title you have to do an inspection in Ohio for the vehicle after these steps are complete bring your petition to the clerk of court you file it and they will take it under advisement what are the words on the paper remember we talked before about having a blank sheet of paper for the court well in Montgomery they tell you what to type on that paper you put in your name your address you put my name is blank I in possession of this vehicle um what are the let's scroll down here um here's the VIN number I hereby petition the county for an order directing the court to issue a certificate of title in support of this petition the court will will find an attached statement of fact saying how the vehicle was acquired does that sound familiar it sounds like something we saw back here on the bonded title asking you to tell them how the vehicle came into your possession and the court order title they say how the vehicle was acquired it's the same thing statement of fact have to have a bill of sale additional property list if you're getting more than one car here's a list of 20 cars you could try to get at the same time you file that with the court there's actually less steps in this court order title process in Ohio than there are for a bonded title in New Jersey again mail it to the court don't bring it in person the court will give you what's called a response date sometimes called a hearing date that's the date that they review all this most of the time if you've filled this out properly and you have a legitimate vehicle that's not not stolen it's not a salvage there's no back taxes everything checks out they give you what's called the Judgment of ownership and that Judgment of ownership then you bring to the Bureau of Motor Vehicles or the DMV to get a title let's go back up here so what do you do if you're not in Montgomery County Ohio what you do is you type up on a blank sheet of paper like this words such as this I hereby petition the blank County Court to give me a title for this vehicle you may have to change a couple of the words but that's what you do now at the end of the day when you have the court order title it's going to be a clean title clear title when you have a bonded title it'll say bonded on it again there's no right or wrong answer which one to pick these are just the differences and if you're doing it in a county where you have to type up your own paperwork like most of them are you'll have to get these words right the good news is on our website court order titles. you will see that wording laid out for you and it'll give you cut and paste where you could do it yourself of course we have a title service where we can do it for you um you can save some money it'll probably take you you know two or three hours to fill out all these forms it'll cost you a few hundred bucks two or three hundred bucks to have us do it take your pick rather be out time or money either way is fine we're glad to help but those are the differences between the two and remember what it said on the beginning of the process the court can do whatever they want the court can tell you that they want more information It also says here as a reference there is never too much information to assist with the decision titles photos events anything you have put with it don't get too deep into the description just put whatever documentation you have the other thing that I will disagree with it says after you completed the forms you must bring them to the clerk of courts legal division again we recommend mailing it don't bring it mailing it those are the differences between the two if you want a more detailed description of your particular scenario you can reach our website cartitles.com you can also arrange for a private one-on-one consultation with a certified title agent to go through your vehicle with you glad to do that but that will give you a brief overview of the difference between the two because again it's important to know don't mess around with any of these out ofate loophole sign over your vehicle to somebody kind of things don't try to do a fake mechanics lean that will get you into trouble these are the two ways that the government officially wants you to get a title if you want one of these for your vehicle if you want a legal title you got to go through the government you can't buy one of these from a company you can't download one from the Internet it's a legal document that only the government issues and they only give it if you have the right paperwork you do a bonded title or you do a court order title.