Michigan bill would start the redemption clock at recording, not at the sale
Michigan bill would start the redemption clock at recording, not at the sale
2026-09-12 · Michigan · Legislation · Pending — not yet law
What happened. A bill that would penalise slow recording of a foreclosure deed passed the Michigan House on 24 June 2026 by 105 votes to 2 and has been in the Senate Committee on Local Government since 1 July. House Bill 5046, sponsored by Rep. Amos O'Neal (D-94) with sixteen co-sponsors from both parties, amends MCL 600.3232 and 600.3240 of the Revised Judicature Act.1
It is not law.
The gap it fills
MCL 600.3232 already requires that the sheriff's deed be deposited with the register of deeds “within 20 days after such sale.” It states no consequence for missing that. In practice the deadline is advisory.
HB 5046 adds a new subsection (5):
- (a) If the deed is recorded within 20 days, the redemption period runs from the date of sale, and interest on the bid accrues from the date of sale.
- (b) If the deed is not recorded within 20 days, the sale is not invalid — but the redemption period begins on the date the deed is recorded, and interest accrues only from that date.
Why an association is on the wrong side of this
Michigan condominium associations foreclose their assessment liens by advertisement under the same chapter, by force of MCL 559.208. So the association, or more usually its collections firm, is the party holding the deed.
Under HB 5046, a firm that records late hands the delinquent co-owner a longer redemption window and forfeits the interest that would have accrued in the interval. Neither consequence falls on the person who caused it.
What the bill leaves alone, and one thing to stop misreporting
The redemption schedule in MCL 600.3240 carries forward unchanged as passed by the House: six months for commercial or industrial property and multifamily of more than four units; one month where less than two-thirds of the original indebtedness remains; 30 days for property abandoned under section 3241a; one year for certain agricultural property; and the existing $250 cap on a redemption-computation designee's fee.
And a correction worth making, because it circulates: MCL 600.3240(4) already permits a foreclosure purchaser to add “condominium assessments, homeowner association assessments, community association assessments” to the redemption amount. That language was added by 2019 PA 130. HB 5046 carries it forward untouched. It is not new, and a board told otherwise is being sold a change that happened seven years ago.
The practical checklist for an association's collections file
- Ask your collections counsel what their recording turnaround actually is, measured from sale date, over the last twelve months. Most firms have never been asked because nothing turned on it.
- Put the 20-day recording deadline into the engagement terms now rather than after the bill passes. It costs nothing while the deadline is advisory and protects the association if it stops being.
- Budget the redemption period from recording, not from sale, in any project that assumes possession by a date certain.
The companion bills, and where the whole set sits
HB 5046 travelled with House Bill 5045 (Rep. Brian BeGole, R-71), which makes the parallel change to the State Housing Development Authority Act at MCL 125.1448g and 125.1448i, and which passed the House the same day by the same 105–2 margin. Both went to Senate committees on 1 July and neither has moved in ten weeks.
Separately, House Bills 5152 and 5153 — Reps. Brad Paquette (R-37) and Joey Andrews (D-38), tie-barred to each other — would change how surplus proceeds from foreclosure auctions are distributed. Both passed the House 102–3 on 1 July 2026 and went to Senate Housing and Human Services on 2 July. That set matters to associations for a different reason: surplus-proceeds rules determine what a junior association lienholder recovers after a senior sale.
What to watch next
The Senate returns 22 September 2026. Four foreclosure bills that cleared the House with margins above 100 votes are sitting in two Senate committees with no hearings posted. If they are going to move this session, the window is October and November; everything not enacted dies at the end of December.
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