I've never sold a vehicle I owe money on so I don't know how it works.

Daughter wants me to try to sell her 2015 Yamaha Bolt. Obviously, we can't get the title until the loan is paid off and can't pay the loan off until the bike is sold.

In my experience, it usually takes 2-4 weeks to receive the title after the loan is paid off. That means the buyer wouldn't be able to register it for at least that long.

How is this usually dealt with?

Contact the lien holder.

I'm sure they can explain their process. Most vehicles today are sold with money still owed on it.

I've done on the buying side a few times.

If the lien holder is local, I've gone in with the seller, paid the lien holder directly, and left with the vehicle and signed title.

With a non-local lien holder, I've wired the funds directly to the lien holder and once the seller verified the funds were received by the lien holder, I again left with the vehicle and signed title.

I haven't had any trouble registering the vehicles. I'm guessing the buyer could get a temporary plate until the title is cleared.

https://www.maine.gov/sos/bmv/titles/titleapp.html

Lienholder:
If an owner creates a security interest in a vehicle, the owner must complete an application stating name and address of lienholder. The owner must deliver the application to the lienholder with the certificate of title and fee. The lienholder shall immediately deliver the certificate of title, application and fee to the Secretary of State.

A lienholder may assign a security interest to a person other than the owner without affecting the interest of the owner or the validity of the security interest. A person without notice of an assignment is protected in dealing with the lienholder as the holder of the security interest.

Upon satisfaction of a security interest, the lienholder must, within 10 days, execute a release of the security interest on the certificate of title and release the certificate of title or certificate of salvage to the subordinate lienholder (if one is named) or to the owner. The lienholder must notify the Secretary of State when a lien has been satisfied.

For additional information on motor vehicle titles, please contact the Bureau of Motor Vehicles Title Examination and Information Unit at (207) 624-9000, extension 52138 or by email at: titles.bmv@maine.gov

https://www.maine.gov/sos/bmv/registration/index.html

Registrations & Plates
Online Registration Renewal | Online Vanity Plate Search and Order | Online Duplicate Registration |

The links on this page are intended to help you gain information on some common registration processes and highlights new plates and programs.

If you do not find your answers here, please contact us at our main office in Augusta or any one of our thirteen conveniently located motor vehicle branch offices.

Passenger vehicles are registered annually on a staggered basis. Generally, registrations expire one year from the month issued. The payment of municipal excise (property) taxes is a prerequisite for all motor vehicle registrations. Excise taxes must be paid to your town office prior to registration. Many municipal offices also issue registrations. Residents of those municipalities that do not issue registrations must bring the excise tax certificate to a local Bureau of Motor Vehicles office to complete the registration process and obtain the registration plates, stickers, and a completed registration.

HRK has done the research for you... but if I'm the buyer I would obviously prefer a clean title.

quote:

Daughter wants me to try to sell her 2015 Yamaha Bolt. Obviously, we can't get the title until the loan is paid off and can't pay the loan off until the bike is sold.

Of course, you could make her a short term loan and pay it off for her before selling. That way you would be selling with a clean title and you would probably get more for it. I think you limit the number of buyers who would be interested if the title has a lien.

Not many private party buyers will be interested in buying a motorcycle without a clean title. Some dealers will but the price will take a large hit.

When I sold my Travel Trailer that still had bank lien, I met the buyer in the bank. I asked him to make the Cahier Check payable to the bank, for the entire balance. I made prior arrangement with the bank to make sure the title is available on the day we met at the bank. Once they accepted the cashier check, the bank released the title to ME. I then signed it off to the buyer. We also made a notarized deed of sale at the bank, transferring ownership (not really required, but I opted to). We walked out of the bank and shook hands. Should be no different for vehicle sales.

The lienholder will want to be paid off, and will then release its lien so you can transfer the title.

I second the suggestion of contacting the lienholder to get some help about how to expedite the process. A wire from the buyer to the lienholder may be the best way, since they get their money immediately with no chance of claw-back. The buyer should have no problem waiting a few days for the title transfer since he knows he is wiring to a corporate lienholder.

But the lender has dealt with this before, so they will tell you what they want.

Thank you all. HRK particularly for doing for me what I should have done for myself. Frankly, tho, I understood about 1/10th of that.

Now that I know who the lienholder is (a local credit union) I can go right to the source as jhe888 suggested and get the straight skinny.

That's assuming we can generate any interest in the bike at a price that gets Baby Daughter out from under.

The only thing that may further complicate the transaction is if she needs to come up with $$ if the loan exceeds the market value.

quote:

Originally posted by Russ59:
The only thing that may further complicate the transaction is if she needs to come up with $$ if the loan exceeds the market value.

She owes about $600 less than Blue Book retail. The question is whether or not we can sell it for that. Or at all, for that matter. Not a wildly popular bike. (Yamaha Bolt).

Happens all the time. Contact the lien holder and ask them how they prefer to handle it. I've been on both sides of that exchange, but usually it was with local banks where I just went in with the other party and handled it. Last time I purchased a bike from a buddy who had a lien my bank arranged it with the bank that held the original lien.

$600 isn't too upside down and even if you (she) has to eat the difference it's better than owing the full balance on a bike she isn't riding. Depending on where you are you might be able to do better than you expect in a face to face sale with someone looking for smaller but still fairly capable bike. I had a Yamaha (Star) 650 and 1300 and both were pretty much bulletproof. My brother currently has the 650 and sadly the 1300 was not "sliding out from under me on oily wet road" proof...

Could it bring a price anywhere near its payoff amount?

quote:

Originally posted by egregore:
Could it bring a price anywhere near its payoff amount?

Payoff is $4600. Blue Book average retail is $5200. With 3200 miles and absolutely virginal condition, we're starting at $5500.

We shall see, I guess.

I misread the payoff above. I thought she owed more than payoff. I don't know what the market for used bikes is there, but here I'd be confident you could at least break even if you weren't in a hurry to sell. Bolt isn't a high demand bike, but it's a solid mid size bike from a quality manufacturer.