Can a car title loan lender make a title loan on a mobile home?
Here’s an interesting Mississippi court case that provides specific insight as to whether a title loan company can provide loans on mobile homes.
Here’s a link to the facts, the view of the Mississippi Banking Department, and the ultimate disposition of this case:
Title Loans on Mobile Homes Link
From the Case:
“Based on the Debtor’s testimony, the Court finds that Laird led her to believe she was entering into a $2,500.00 title loan with Franklin Check Service.
Indeed, Laird admitted at Trial that he initially discussed a $2,500.00 title loan with the Debtor. From his conversation with the Banking Department, Laird knew that Franklin Check Service could lose its title loan license if it granted a title loan on a mobile home, and he also knew that he could not grant the Debtor a title loan himself, so he transformed the title loan transaction to a purported sale to circumvent Mississippi law.
It was reasonable for the Debtor to believe that she was agreeing to a title loan with Franklin Check Service because her conversations with Laird and Delozier took place at its office, Laird was its sole owner, and Delozier was its sole employee.
Also, providing Laird with the Certificate of Title was just as consistent with a title loan as with a sale.[13]
More significantly, the Court does not believe that the Debtor would have agreed to sell her mobile home for $2,500.00 when she had purchased it only five (5) months earlier for $8,700.00 and had made repairs to the interior and had no other place to live.
Indeed, the $2,500.00 purchase price paid by Laird’s Body Shop is less than thirty percent (30%) of the amount the Debtor paid for the mobile home.
In comparison, thirty percent (30%) is within the typical percentage range that a title lender will loan. Taming Title Loans, 101 VA. L. REV. 1753, 1756-57 (2015).”