When you buy a house, it’s important to file a homestead declaration on it to protect your home from claims that may try to use your home to settle those debts. This is a simple and relatively inexpensive process. Here’s exactly how you can make sure your home is protected.
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What is a Homestead Declaration?
This is a document that helps protect your home from claims for unpaid medical bills, credit card debts, business/personal loans, bankruptcy, accidents, etc.). This prevents you from having to sell your home to settle those debts.
Keep in mind that if you have a debt owed where your land or home was used as collateral, this will not be protected with your homestead declaration.
Where Do I File Homestead Declaration in Nevada?
You can get all of the information regarding Nevada’s Declaration of Homestead on the Clark County government website.
This includes all of the details, office locations, instructions for filing, and the homestead declaration form.
Will My Homestead Stay If I Refinance?
It should; However, there have been circumstances where it has been removed when the home is refinanced.
You can verify your homestead status by contacting the local county office to make sure your homestead is still in tact.
Are The Homestead Letters I Receive Legit?
When you buy or refinance a home, you’ll notice a large influx of mail coming in from companies saying that they will file the Homestead Declaration form for you for a specific fee.
These companies are legit; However, you do not need to pay someone to do this for you.
You’ll find they are trying to charge you a fee for their service, but you also have to pay an additional fee to file still. It’s recommended to simply ignore those letters and do it yourself.
How to Fill Out a Homestead Declaration Form
When you open the form to fill it out from the Clark County website, make sure you keep the margins empty.
Here’s how to fill out the form from top to bottom (get the full video on how to fill out the form here):
- Complete the parcel number (if you don’t know it, you can find it here.)
- Enter your name and address
- Check which marital status applies to you
- Check off the type of property
- List the name on the title of your property
- Complete how your property is registered to you, the city and the county
- Add the legal description (you can find this on your tax record) and then you can also add “commonly known as” and put the home address as to make sure there is no confusion which property you are referring to.
Make sure you do not sign the document until you visit a notary. You will need to sign it in front of them in order for them to notarize it.
Notarizing
You will need to get this signed in front of a notary. This typically costs about $5 and can typically be done at a local post office or one may even be available at the Clark County Recorder’s office.
Homestead Declaration Fee
Once the document has been notarized, you will need to take it down to the Clark County Recorder’s office and pay the recording fee. You can find all of the recording fees on the Clark County Recorder’s website here.
