How to fill out West Virginia DMV-85-A

One page of questions the Division asks before it will write a private person's name into the lienholder slot of a certificate - the slot banks occupy. It is the seller-financer's form: sell your car on payments and this sheet records what the deal actually is, in both parties' hands - the amount of the lien, the date of sale, the payment amount and the number of payments - each certifying by signature. The titles page sets the condition around it: any title listing an individual rather than a financial institution as a lienholder must include a physical copy of the signed loan agreement or contract.

Written against DMV-85-A (Rev 11/2022), issued under W. Va. Code 17A-4A-1. Write the numbers from the contract, not from memory of the conversation. The lien amount here is what the Division records and what any later dispute is measured against - and if the deal changes midway, a repriced handshake with an unamended record leaves the certificate carrying a debt neither of you can prove was paid.

Two documents, and they are not the same thing. Take the blank DMV-85-A from the webapps.transportation.wv.gov copy so you get the revision that is current today, then print our DMV-85-A guide and keep it beside you while you fill theirs in.

Step 1 · the form itself Blank DMV-85-A — Individual Lienholder's Fact Sheet PDF at webapps.transportation.wv.gov · new tab Step 2 · how to fill it in Our filled-in DMV-85-A guide PDF · print and keep beside you

Filled in

What a completed one looks like

This is the actual DMV-85-A, rendered from the PDF the West Virginia Division of Motor Vehicles publishes and completed end to end: letterhead, every field, and the blocks at the foot.

Amber — you write it
Grey — not yours to fill
Numbered — explained below

The West Virginia DMV-85-A individual lienholder's fact sheet filled in: a three thousand dollar lien on the 2014 Ford Escape, twelve payments of two hundred and sixty dollars, and the blocks of borrower Dorsey L. Maxwell and private lienholder Wardell F. Maxwell of Clarksburg completed above their signature lines. — The private loan behind this section's voluntary lien, in the Division's own summary shape. Both parties sign the same figures; the signed loan contract is photocopied and stapled behind it.

Field by field

Every line, in the order you meet it

1
The buyer fills this in
Vehicle information
Title number, make, model year and VIN from the certificate the lien will ride on.
Watch out: Four boxes, so there is no excuse for a slip - each one is on the face of the certificate in front of you.
2
The buyer fills this in
The lien in numbers
Amount, date of sale, payment amount and number of payments, exactly as the signed contract states them.
Watch out: Date of sale here anchors the lien to the transaction - it should agree with the certificate's assignment and the tax paperwork, not the day you got round to the form.
3
The buyer fills this in
Borrower's block
Name in last-first-middle order, resident street address, and the borrower's signature.
Watch out: You are certifying the debt exists on these terms. If the contract says something subtler - a balloon, deferred start - the contract copy carries it; the sheet still wants the plain figures.
4
The lienholder fills this in
Lienholder's block
The private lender's name, resident street address and signature, with the lender code left to the Division.
Watch out: Signing makes you findable at that address for the life of the lien. Move house and the borrower's payoff day gets harder - keep the record current.

At a glance

What goes where

On the form	What to put in it
A) Vehicle information	Title number, manufacturer make, model year and the VIN number - four identifiers, no more, because the sheet is about the debt rather than the machine.
B) Lien information	The deal in numbers: amount of lien, date of sale, payment amount and number of payments. Then the borrower's name in last-first-middle order, their resident street address, and the signature of borrower.
C) Lienholder's information	The private lender's name and resident street address in the same shape, the signature of lienholder, and a lender code box that an individual typically leaves for the Division.

What gets this one rejected

•No signed loan agreement attached. The fact sheet summarises the contract; it does not replace it, and the Division's rule wants the physical copy of the signed paper.
•Numbers that do not multiply. A payment amount and a number of payments that do not reach the lien amount plus whatever interest the contract states is a sheet contradicting its own attachment.
•Only one signature. Borrower and lienholder each certify - the sheet is the two of you agreeing on the same figures, which is its entire value.
•A post office box for either address. Both address lines say resident street address, because a private lien is enforced against people who can be found.
•Treating it as the lien itself. Nothing is recorded until it rides with the title work - the buyer's application on a financed sale, or the DMV-84-A afterwards.

Rules that decide whether it is accepted

•Why the state asks. A bank lien is checkable against a licensed institution; a private lien is only as real as its paper trail. This sheet plus the contract is the trail.
•The seller-financer's tax detail. A gifted car with a lien on it is taxed on the recorded lien amount - the lien figure on this sheet is a tax input, not bookkeeping.
•Payments finish, then release. When the last payment clears, you as lienholder sign the release - your own title work warned you the certificate would sit with you until then, and the borrower will need your signature to clear it.

Every line here was read off DMV-85-A (Rev 11/2022) itself — the PDF is here — and off the West Virginia Division of Motor Vehicles pages. This is plain-language help with a form, not legal advice, and where our wording and the agency's differ, theirs governs.

Back to all West Virginia seller paperwork, or what selling a car in West Virginia involves.

How to fill out West Virginia DMV-85-A

What a completed one looks like

Every line, in the order you meet it

Vehicle information

The lien in numbers

Borrower's block

Lienholder's block

What goes where

What gets this one rejected

Rules that decide whether it is accepted

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