Lee County solar lien search

Where do you search for a solar lien in Lee County?

In the Lee County official records, which the Clerk of the Circuit Court and Comptroller keeps as county recorder. A solar lien is usually a UCC fixture filing, and Florida sends fixture filings to the clerk of the circuit court rather than to the state registry. A clean search at the state registry does not clear a home in Fort Myers, Cape Coral, Estero or Bonita Springs.

The statute draws the line itself.Florida Statute 679.5011sends a financing statement to the office of the clerk of the circuit court when the collateral is goods that are or are to become fixtures and the statement is filed as a fixture filing, and sends every other case to the Florida Secured Transaction Registry, the state index at floridaucc.com. So the registry is the wrong window for panels bolted to a Lee County roof, and theclerk's official records searchis the right one. The version of this rule for every state is onwhere to search for a solar lien.

How do you search the Lee County records?

Open the clerk's official records search, accept the disclaimer, and choose the name search. Type your name last name first, the way the search's own help text writes it, as Smith, John. Leave the date range wide, or start it at the month you signed the solar paperwork, then read the document type on each result for a UCC, a financing statement or a fixture filing.

Two habits save time. The clerk's own disclaimer tells you to search every spelling variation of a name, so try it with a middle initial and then without, because an index matches what somebody typed. And if the house is in two names, search both. A filing made against one spouse will not surface under the other.

What do the R, I and V flags mean on a result?

They tell you whether the clerk has checked the indexing yet. Scanned images appear as soon as a document reaches the recording office, and those provisional records carry an R or an I. A V means the record has been verified. A provisional record can still be changed, reindexed or deleted without notice, so a fixture filing you find flagged R today may sit under a different name next week. That is the gap between a document existing and the index being settled, and it is worth knowing before you treat one afternoon's search as final.

What is the Property Fraud Alert, and should you use it?

It is a free service from the clerk, and for this job it is the useful one. You register a personal or business name, or a parcel number, and the clerk emails you within 24 hours when a recorded document in Lee County matches it. Register the parcel number as well as your name. The clerk'sregistration pagesays a parcel registration fires whenever that parcel number appears on a recorded document, whatever names are on it, which is how you catch something filed against a company, a trust or a previous owner. Court documents sit outside the service, so it will not tell you about a lawsuit.

What do you do if you find a solar filing?

Open the image and read who filed it and what it covers. Viewing and printing from the search costs nothing, and a paper copy from the clerk is $1.00 per page. If the filing secures a solar loan you have paid off, ask the lender for a UCC-3 termination and have it recorded. If it protects a lease or power purchase agreement that is still running, ask the provider in writing what they need for a sale or a refinance, and ask now, because their reply is the slow part.

The reason it matters at a closing is the buyer's lender.Fannie Mae's Selling Guiderequires a UCC search on a home with solar and requires a filing that ranks ahead of the mortgage to be subordinated before the loan closes. The closing-table version of this is atselling a house with solar.

Does every kind of solar leave a filing?

No. Loans nearly always do, leases and power purchase agreements often do, and cash purchases and subscriptions leave nothing on the record. The breakdown is ondo solar panels put a lien on your house. We sell subscriptions, the no-filing kind, so read it knowing that.

Looking at solar for a Lee County home?

Run your bill through the estimator. It takes about a minute and a real person follows up with figures for your roof. Read the Florida page first: it covers who insures the panels when a hurricane comes and who this is a bad fit for.