Bill of Sale Title

The Importance of Titles in Vehicle Transactions
So, for a vehicle, you have a title and you have a bill of sale. They’re two different things.

What is a Bill of Sale?

You may only have a bill of sale and want to get a title. So how does that work?
Well, unfortunately, a bill of sale is only a record of a particular event of one person saying, “I’m selling you this car.” It’s not a complete transfer of ownership because the bill sale doesn’t say that the person who’s selling it actually owns the car. It doesn’t say if there’s a lien on the car. There’s no verification on a bill of sale that the seller has the authority to sell the car. Maybe they do, but by itself, the bill of sale doesn’t disclose that because anybody can write a bill of sale.
You can write on a piece of paper, “I, Joe Schmo, sell this car,” and put the rest of it on there. There are blank forms you can download that might look official, maybe even from the DMV. Bill of sale, you fill it out, but there’s no prior verification that the information is correct. The only thing that a DMV or government agency is going to look at that’s a valid ownership verification is the prior title.

The Role of the Title
So, when you buy a car, what you’re supposed to do is have the seller of that car have their name on the front of the title. They flip it over and they sign the back, and they give it to you. That’s a guarantee that that title and card are now yours. If it’s only a bill of sale, who knows if that seller is the owner? Who knows if there’s not a lien? Who knows if maybe there’s another owner, right?

The Risks of Relying Solely on a Bill of Sale
The bill of sale isn’t good enough. The DMV won’t accept it. You shouldn’t either. Why not? Well, what if it was your car? If somebody just had your car and your keys and just filled out a bill of sale, they could sell the car to somebody else. If that was enough, you having your title document somewhere in the safe deposit box in your file cabinet, maybe, you know, somewhere in your house, is what protects your ownership of that car. So if it was good enough just to have a bill sale to flip a car around, then you wouldn’t need titles because it would have no value.

Options for Obtaining a Title with Only a Bill of Sale
Are there ways to transfer a car and get a title with only a bill of sale? There’s a few ways to do it that might have some other requirements. You can look at some of our other videos to find out more about how to get a title if you only have a bill of sale and to construct the rest of the ownership using other means. Maybe Vermont, maybe bonded title, maybe affidavit. You can look at our other videos to do that. But by itself, if you’re buying a car, make sure that if you’re accepting only a bill of sale, that you know the risk and you know you’re going to do some work to get the title in your name.

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