Judgment liens in Virginia

What to file, and where

One act creates the lien, and it is a filing, not the rendering of the judgment.

Recording on the judgment lien docket of the clerk's office of the county or city where the land sits is what makes a Virginia money judgment a lien on the defendant's real estate, from the time of that recording. Va. Code 8.01-458¹ says so for any judgment rendered in the Commonwealth by a state or federal court, and for a confession of judgment too. Until that recording, the land is untouched.

Office and reach are both local. The clerk who matters is the one for the county or independent city where the land is, not where the court sat or where the debtor lives. A judgment recorded in one clerk's office does nothing to land in the next county over.

What it reaches

This lien is not limited to land the debtor owned on the day it was recorded.

Under Va. Code 8.01-458, the lien attaches to all the real estate the defendant owns or is entitled to, and to real estate the defendant later becomes possessed of or entitled to. Land the debtor buys afterward comes under the same lien. How long it runs on each parcel is a separate question, taken up below.

How long it lasts, and renewing it

Virginia runs two clocks, and which one applies turns on a single date: July 1, 2021. The lien can be extended. But only by recording, and only before it runs.

For a judgment dated on or after July 1, 2021, no execution may issue and no action may be brought after 10 years from the date of the judgment or its domestication, unless the period is extended. Va. Code 8.01-251² states that for judgments in favor of the Commonwealth and for judgments from another state or country alike. For a judgment dated, extended, or renewed before July 1, 2021, the figure is 20 years from the judgment or its domestication, or 20 years from the extension or renewal, whichever is later. Same section, different clock. And once the right to issue execution is barred, no suit may be brought to enforce the lien, including a lien in favor of the Commonwealth.

Conveyed land carries its own shorter deadline. Where the debtor has conveyed land to a grantee for value, no suit to enforce the lien against that land may be brought unless it comes within 5 years from the due recordation of the deed to the grantee, and unless a notice of lis pendens is recorded under section 8.01-268 before that 5 years expires. Both the suit and the lis pendens, inside the five years. Va. Code 8.01-251 does not let one stand in for the other.

Extension is an act, not a wish. Recording a certificate in the form of subsection G, before the period runs, in the clerk's office where the judgment is recorded and executed by the creditor, assignee, or their attorney or authorized agent, extends the right to enforce for 10 years from the date of recordation. Both names get indexed by the clerk, with a reference to the book and page of the original lien. One further extension is allowed: a second certificate, recorded before the first 10-year extension expires, buys another 10 years from the date that second certificate is recorded. Va. Code 8.01-251 stops there. See how long a judgment lien lasts for how other states handle the same clock.

Land in another county

The lien on a parcel runs from the recording in that parcel's own clerk's office.

A Virginia judgment lien on a given piece of land runs from the time the judgment is recorded on the judgment lien docket in the clerk's office of the county or independent city where that land is situated. Va. Code 8.01-458 ties the lien to that local recording, parcel by parcel.

One edge case is written into the statute. If land already subject to a docketed judgment is later annexed to or merged with an adjoining city, the judgment is deemed docketed in that city's clerk's office. A moved boundary does not cost the creditor the lien.

Homestead here, in one paragraph

A Virginia householder may hold a set amount of value exempt from creditor process, and the dollar figures carry a date.

Under Va. Code 34-4³, a householder may hold exempt from creditor process arising out of a debt real and personal property the householder selects, including money and debts due, up to $5,000 in value, or $10,000 if the householder is 65 or older. On a showing that the householder supports dependents, add up to $500 in value for each dependent. These figures are in addition to other property the statute exempts elsewhere.

On top of that general exemption, Va. Code 34-4 exempts real or personal property used as the principal residence of the householder or the householder's dependents, up to $50,000 in value. Under Va. Code 34-13⁴, that residence portion, or any unused part of it, may be used only for that property and its proceeds, and for no other property. It does not float over to a car or a bank balance.

Those dollar figures are the ones written in the statute. Va. Code 34-4 adjusts each monetary limit on April 1, 2027, then at every three-year interval after, to track the Consumer Price Index for all urban consumers for the most recent three-year period ending before the preceding January 1, rounded to the nearest $25. So the numbers above are current until the first adjustment and no longer. For the fifty-state view, see homestead protection, state by state.

Where the records live

One book holds it, the judgment lien docket, kept by the clerk of the county or city where the land sits.

Everything on this page turns on one record in one place. A lien exists from the moment the judgment is recorded on the judgment lien docket of the clerk's office of the county or independent city where the land is situated, as Va. Code 8.01-458 provides. To know whether a Virginia parcel carries a lien, that is the docket to read, in that locality. For how the same filing act varies elsewhere, see how a judgment becomes a lien, state by state.