Minnesota Real Estate Laws Every Seller Should Know
Minnesota forecloses by advertisement rather than through a court, gives a redemption period measured in months, and lets a homestead owner make a one-time trade between the two. Here is what generally applies before you sell, in plain language.
Before Any State Clock Starts: the Federal 120-Day Rule
Every state timeline on this page sits behind a federal one, and it is the single most
useful thing to know if you have missed payments. Under
Regulation
X, 12 CFR 1024.41(f)(1), a mortgage servicer generally
“shall not make the first notice or filing” required for a judicial or
non-judicial foreclosure unless the borrower's mortgage loan obligation is
more than 120 days delinquent.
That is roughly four months of missed payments before the state process is even allowed to
begin. It is why a state sequence that looks alarmingly short on paper is usually longer in
practice than the statute alone suggests.
The exceptions, because they are real. The rule does not apply where the
foreclosure is based on a violation of a due-on-sale clause, or where the servicer is joining the
action of a superior or subordinate lienholder. Small servicers are not exempt from this
particular prohibition. Loan types and servicing arrangements vary, and some loans are outside
Regulation X altogether.
So treat 120 days as the general floor rather than a guarantee, and work from the dates on your
own paperwork. If a notice has arrived and you do not believe you are past that point, that is a
question worth putting to a HUD-approved housing counselor or an attorney before you do anything
else.
Redemption: Six Months, Sometimes Twelve
Minnesota forecloses by advertisement rather than through a court, so there is
no lawsuit to answer and no hearing to attend. What it gives back is time after the sale.
Under Minn. Stat. 580.23 the redemption period is generally six months after
the sale. It extends to twelve months in defined cases, including where the amount
due is less than 66-2/3% of the original principal, where the property exceeds ten acres
subject to date thresholds, for certain agricultural classifications between ten and forty acres,
and for reverse mortgages.
One warning if you have read about another state. The same two-thirds
threshold appears in Michigan and works the other way round there, shortening the period rather
than lengthening it. Here it lengthens the period to twelve months where less
than two-thirds is still owed. Same number, opposite effect, so do not carry an assumption across
from a page about somewhere else.
Which period applies to you depends on figures and classifications you may not have to hand.
Take the date from your own recorded documents rather than from any website,
including this one, and free HUD-approved housing counseling is available before you commit to
anything, including to us.
Official source: Minn. Stat. §580.23, redemption
The Trade You Can Make Once: Postpone the Sale, Shorten What Follows
This is the part of Minnesota law almost nobody publishes, and it is a real decision
rather than a technicality.
Under Minn. Stat. 580.07, where the property qualifies as your homestead and contains
one to four dwelling units, you may postpone the foreclosure sale to
five months after the originally scheduled date, if the original redemption period
was six months. Where the original redemption period was twelve months, the postponement runs to
eleven months.
And here is what it costs. Recording the postponement affidavit
“shall automatically reduce the mortgagor's redemption period under section 580.23 to
five weeks”. It may be used only once per foreclosure.
So it is a trade, not extra time. Roughly five months moves from after
the sale to before it, and what remains afterwards shrinks from six months to five weeks.
| If you are trying to sell | Time before the sale is generally worth far more, because you still own the house and can convey clear title to a buyer |
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| If you are hoping to refinance and stay | The arithmetic may run the other way, and the longer redemption period may be what you need |
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We are not going to tell you which side to take, because it depends on facts about your own
position that we cannot see. Take it to a Minnesota attorney or a housing counselor. What we will
do is tell you honestly whether a sale can realistically close inside whichever window you end up
with.
Official source: Minn. Stat. §580.07, postponement
The Deed Tax, and What We Are Not Telling You
The deed tax. Under Minn. Stat. 287.21, where the consideration exceeds $3,000
the tax is “.0033 of the net consideration”, which is 0.33%.
Where there is no consideration, or consideration excluding the value of any lien remaining at the
time of sale is $3,000 or less, it is a flat $1.65.
Note that measure: it is net consideration, excluding a lien remaining at the
time of sale. It is customarily the seller's here, though the section we read does
not itself assign it between the parties, so it is negotiable and the contract controls. Some
counties add their own charge on top and we have not published those figures because we have not
read them.
What this page deliberately does not tell you. We have not published the number
of weeks of publication required for a Minnesota foreclosure by advertisement, or the service
requirements, because we have not read those sections closely enough to state them and an
approximate deadline is worse than none at all. The dates that govern you are on your own recorded
documents. The same goes for Minnesota's seller disclosure requirements and the alternative
inspection route, which we have not summarized here.
What holds generally is that selling as-is describes who pays for repairs, not what you are
allowed to leave unsaid. Closings run through a title company and no attorney is required, which is
one reason a clean Minnesota file can close toward the shorter end of our range.
Official source: Minn. Stat. §287.21, deed tax
General information, not advice. This section describes Minnesota practice in general terms and was checked against the sources cited in September 2026. Laws, timelines and local procedures change, some Minnesota counties add their own charges, and how any of it applies to your property depends on facts we have not seen. It is not legal, tax or financial advice, and it is no substitute for talking to a Minnesota attorney, accountant or HUD-approved housing counselor about your own situation.
