Legal Memorandum: Notice of Foreclosure in TX

Issue: What notice of foreclosure is required under 51.002 of the Texas Property Code?

Texas law specifically prescribes the notice a debtor must receive before property is sold by a trustee at a foreclosure sale.  Under section 51.002 of the Texas Property Code, a sale of real property under a power of sale conferred by a deed of trust or other contract lien must follow specified notice provisions.  Tex. Prop. Code § 51.002 (1995).   This provision of the code was previously Vernon’s Ann. Civ. Stat. art. 3810.  See Act of June 21, 1975, 64th Leg., R.S., ch. 723, § 1, 1975 Tex. Gen. Laws 2354, repealed by Act of June 19, 1983, 68th Leg., R.S., ch. 576, § 6, 1983 Tex. Gen. Laws 3729.  Thus, older cases refer to article 3810.    Under  § 51.002, notice of the sale must be given at least twenty-one days before the date of the sale: “(1) by posting at the courthouse door . . . (2) by filing in the office of the county clerk . . . a copy of the notice . . . and (3) by the holder of the debt to which the power of sale is related serving written notice of the sale by certified mail on each debtor who, according to the records of the holder of the debt, is obligated to pay the debt.”  Id. § 51.002(b).  Service of the notice is complete “when the notice is deposited in the United States mail, postage prepaid and addressed to the debtor at the debtor’s last known address as shown by the records of the holder of the debt.”  Id. § 51.002(e).

The lower courts […]