Judgment Liens and Lis Pendens on a Virginia Home Sale: What Each Does, How Long a Lien Lasts and How It Is Cleared at Closing

Published October 23, 2026

A judgment lien and a lis pendens can both turn up on a Virginia home sale, and they are not the same thing. A judgment lien is a creditor’s claim on real estate after a court has ruled that money is owed. A lis pendens is a recorded notice that a lawsuit about the property is still pending, with no ruling yet.

This guide reads the Code of Virginia sections that set those rules, as they appeared on the Virginia Legislative Information System on October 21, 2026, and walks through what a seller in the city of Richmond, Henrico County or Chesterfield County should expect when one shows up in a title search. It is general information, not legal advice. A Virginia real estate attorney should read your actual docket entries.

The two claims side by side

Source: Code of Virginia sections linked in the table, read at law.lis.virginia.gov on October 21, 2026.

A judgment lien attaches to land in the county or city where it is docketed

Under § 8.01-458, every money judgment from a state or federal court, or by confession of judgment, is a lien on all the real estate the defendant “is or becomes possessed or entitled” to. It starts from the time the judgment is recorded on the judgment lien docket of the clerk’s office where the land sits.

Two details matter to a seller. First, the words “or becomes” mean a docketed judgment can reach a house the debtor buys later, not only one owned on the day of the judgment. Second, the lien is local. A judgment recorded only in another county has not been recorded where your house is, though a creditor can record it in a new locality. If you are selling a home near the lines between the city, Henrico and Chesterfield, the locality that matters is the one named on your deed.

The statute makes the judgment a lien. It does not say the owner cannot sell. In practice the lien is dealt with at closing, which is why a title company lists a docketed judgment as an item to resolve. Our guide to reading a title commitment shows where those items appear.

How long a judgment lien lasts

§ 8.01-251 limits how long a creditor can enforce a judgment. For judgments dated on or after July 1, 2021, no execution can issue and no action can be brought after 10 years from the judgment date. For judgments dated before that, the period is 20 years. A creditor can extend by recording a certificate before the period ends, which adds 10 years from the date of recording, and can record one further extension before that ten-year extension expires.

For a seller, the practical point is that a judgment can look old and still be live. A creditor who recorded an extension certificate has kept it alive. Whether a given judgment is still enforceable is a records question for the clerk and a legal question for an attorney, not something to guess from the date on the docket.

A lis pendens is a warning about a lawsuit, not a verdict

§ 8.01-268 says a lis pendens does not bind a later bona fide purchaser who had no actual notice until a memorandum is admitted to record in the circuit court clerk’s office for the county or city where the property is. The memorandum states the title of the case, its general object, the court, the amount claimed, a description of the property and the name of the person whose estate is meant to be affected. That is the information a buyer’s title examiner will read.

Subsection B limits when one can be filed at all. The lawsuit has to seek one of four things: to establish the filer’s interest in the real property described, to sell the property to enforce a delinquent-tax lien or a docketed judgment lien, to partition the property, or to enforce a zoning ordinance. The Code history line on that section shows the General Assembly amended it in 2025, so older articles that describe it more broadly may be out of date.

The practical effect on a sale is different from a judgment lien. There may be nothing to pay yet, because the case is not decided. Buyers and their lenders usually will not want to take title with an unresolved claim against the property recorded, so the case or the filing has to be resolved first. How that happens depends on the lawsuit, which is a job for your attorney.

What happens to a judgment lien at closing

The steps below describe the usual order. The statute sections cited in steps 4 and 5 are the legal backbone; the earlier steps are how closings typically run.

1. Search. The title company searches the land records for the locality and lists any docketed judgment against the seller as a requirement.
2. Identify the creditor and the amount. You or your attorney get a written payoff from the creditor or its lawyer, the same way you get a payoff letter from a mortgage lender. Our post on the mortgage payoff letter and per diem interest explains why that number moves by the day.
3. Pay. The payoff is commonly paid from the seller’s proceeds at the closing table, or earlier by the seller.
4. Satisfaction. Under § 8.01-454, the creditor must enter the satisfaction on the docket within 30 days after payment is made.
5. If the creditor does not release. Under § 8.01-455, the debtor can ask the court to mark the judgment satisfied on proof of payment, after ten days’ notice to the creditor.

If the payoff is larger than what the sale leaves you after your mortgage and costs, the gap has to come from somewhere else before closing. Ask for the lien figures at the start of the listing, not in the last week of a contract. Other liens work on different clocks; the 90-day window for a mechanic’s lien is one example, and the deed, plat and chain of title you can pull yourself show what else has been recorded against the property.

What a buyer should know about a missed lien

This is the reason buyers and lenders insist on clearing a docketed judgment at closing. Subsection C of § 8.01-251 says a suit to enforce a judgment lien against land the debtor has already conveyed to a buyer for value must be brought within five years of the recording of the deed, and a lis pendens has to be recorded within that five-year period. In plain terms, the statute contemplates a creditor pursuing the land after the sale. No buyer wants to be on the receiving end of that, and no seller wants a closing delayed or a buyer’s attorney asking why a lien was left open.

What this guide does not cover

We did not read or cite the rules on federal tax liens, bankruptcy, homestead exemptions, HOA assessments, child support liens or how a lien ranks against a mortgage. Each has its own statute and timeline. If your title search shows one of those, the sections above do not answer your question. Bring those to a Virginia real estate attorney. To see what nearby homes have sold for in the meantime, browse our recently sold homes.

Questions to put to your title company before you list

• Does any judgment appear against my name, or a name close to mine, in the locality where the house is?
• If one appears, whose is it, and how do you confirm it is not someone else’s with a similar name?
• Is there a lis pendens of record, and what case does it refer to?
• How will a payoff be obtained, and will it be paid from proceeds at closing?
• For a judgment I already paid, can you see a recorded satisfaction?