Houston metro
Avoid foreclosure in Houston
If you are behind on your mortgage, selling before the sale date usually protects both your credit and whatever equity is left. Texas foreclosure runs on a calendar fixed by statute, and it is short. The earlier you call, the more of the calendar is still yours.
Texas foreclosure is fast, and the calendar is written into the statute
For a standard mortgage, Texas uses non-judicial foreclosure through the deed of trust. No lawsuit is filed. The lender's trustee gives notice and sells the property at a public auction, and the whole timeline is set by the Property Code.
For a house you live in, the servicer must first send a written notice of default by certified mail and give you at least 20 days to cure before it can even give notice of the sale. Then the notice of sale has to be given at least 21 days before the sale date, three ways at once: posted at the county courthouse door, filed with the county clerk, and sent to you by certified mail.
The sale itself happens on the first Tuesday of the month, between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. If the first Tuesday falls on January 1 or July 4, the sale moves to the first Wednesday. That is the entire statutory warning. Twenty days, then twenty-one, then a Tuesday. If you have received anything with a sale date on it, that date is the only number that matters. Bring it to the first call.
There is no second chance after the sale
In some states a homeowner can buy the house back for a period after the auction. Texas does not offer that for a home loan. The Texas State Law Library's own guidance is that the right of redemption is available only for specific kinds of foreclosure, such as certain tax liens and property owners' association assessment liens. A deed-of-trust foreclosure on a mortgage is not one of them. When the trustee's sale is done, it is done.
It is worth knowing the contrast, because people confuse the two. If a house is sold for unpaid property taxes rather than for the mortgage, the owner of a residence homestead has until the second anniversary of the purchaser's deed being recorded to redeem it, at a premium of 25 percent in the first year and 50 percent in the second. Other real property gets 180 days. That protection exists for tax sales. It does not exist for the mortgage sale.
Home equity loans and reverse mortgages are the exception
Texas treats a home equity loan differently from a purchase mortgage. The state constitution allows a home equity lien to be foreclosed only by a court order, and the same court-order requirement applies to a home equity line of credit and to a reverse mortgage. The lender has to go to a district court and get an order first, through an expedited procedure the Texas Supreme Court wrote for exactly this purpose.
That court step adds time and it adds a place where you will be served with papers. It does not make the foreclosure go away, and the expedited procedure is designed to be quick. If you are not sure which kind of loan you have, the closing documents from when you took it out will say. Tell us which it is, because it changes how much time you have.
Property taxes are their own foreclosure, running on their own clock
Texas property taxes are due when the bill arrives and become delinquent if not paid before February 1 of the following year. The tax lien is separate from the mortgage, and a taxing unit can pursue it separately. A Houston homeowner who is behind on the mortgage is often behind on taxes too, and it is possible to have both moving at once.
If your lender has been paying the taxes through escrow, they are probably current even if you are not. If you pay them yourself, find out where they stand before you do anything else, because delinquent taxes come off the top of any sale.
Selling is one option. Here are the others
We are not going to pretend selling to us is the only path, because it is not, and for some people it is not the best one. Consider all of these:
- Reinstatement — paying the arrears in a lump sum inside the 20-day cure window, which brings the loan current.
- A repayment plan spreading the past-due amount over future payments.
- Loan modification, changing the terms to a payment you can actually make.
- Forbearance, a temporary pause for a temporary hardship.
- A HUD-approved housing counsellor. This is free and genuinely useful — find one through HUD's own directory at hud.gov, not through anyone who calls or writes to you first.
- Selling on the open market, if you have equity and enough time.
- Selling to a cash buyer, if you have equity but not enough time.
- A short sale, if you owe more than the house is worth.
- A deed in lieu of foreclosure, handing the property back by agreement.
Where a cash sale genuinely helps
It helps in one specific situation: you have equity, and you do not have time. A retail listing takes weeks to market, weeks to go under contract, and a month or more to close with a lender involved. If the sale is the first Tuesday of next month, that path does not finish.
Selling to a cash buyer converts equity you are about to lose at the courthouse steps into money in your pocket, and it stops the foreclosure from completing. A completed foreclosure sits on your credit for years and follows you into every rental application and loan you apply for afterward.
If you have no equity, be honest with yourself about that. A short sale or a deed in lieu may serve you better, and we will say so rather than waste the weeks you have left.
Warnings about foreclosure rescue offers
The notice of sale is filed with the county clerk and posted at the courthouse, which is why the mail and the calls have picked up. Some of what arrives is legitimate. Some is not.
Do not sign over your deed to someone in exchange for a promise to make payments for you. Do not pay an upfront fee to a company promising to stop the foreclosure. Do not agree to rent your house back from a buyer without an attorney reading the documents. Do not sign anything you have not read because someone told you the deadline is tomorrow.
We will not ask you for money at any point. A legitimate cash buyer pays you at closing through a title company, and every term is in writing before you sign.
What to have ready
Your lender's most recent statement, the reinstatement or payoff amount if you have requested one, and every letter about the foreclosure — especially the notice of sale with the date on it. Also useful: whether the loan is a home equity loan or HELOC, whether there is a second lien, and where the property taxes stand.
This is not legal advice. Janam Investments LLC is a real estate investment company, not a law firm and not a licensed brokerage. This page describes how a process generally works so you know what questions to ask. Your situation may differ, and the law changes. Talk to a Missouri or Kansas attorney before making a decision that depends on any of it.
Questions we get asked.
Generally you can sell any time before the trustee's sale is completed. The practical limit is whether a closing can happen before that first Tuesday. With the 21-day notice, the window is often three to four weeks from the day the notice arrives, so call the day you get it rather than waiting to see what happens.
Not for a mortgage foreclosure. Texas does not give a homeowner a redemption period after a deed-of-trust sale. That protection exists for tax sales, where a homestead owner has two years, but not for the mortgage.
No. Missed payments already on your record stay there, but a completed foreclosure is a distinct and much more damaging entry. Selling before the sale avoids adding it.
Sometimes, through a short sale, which needs lender approval and takes longer than the foreclosure calendar usually allows. We will tell you honestly if the numbers do not work rather than tie up your remaining time.
Find out what we would pay.
Send the address and we will come back within 24 hours with a written number and the arithmetic behind it. No fee, and no obligation to take it.
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