Michiana is one economic region split by a state line. People live in Edwardsburg and work in Elkhart, live in Buchanan and work in South Bend, own a cottage on a Cass County lake and a house in Granger. Day to day, the border is invisible.
It stops being invisible the moment something goes wrong with a house. Michigan and Indiana handle mortgage foreclosure, property tax delinquency, and closing costs in genuinely different ways — and the most expensive mistakes we see come from homeowners applying the rules of the state they work in to the house they own in the other one.
Here is a plain comparison of what actually changes when you cross the line.
Foreclosure: A Lawsuit in Indiana, an Advertisement in Michigan
This is the single biggest difference, and it runs in a direction that surprises people.
Indiana uses judicial foreclosure. Your lender cannot simply take the house. It has to file a lawsuit in the county where the property sits — St. Joseph County in South Bend, Elkhart County in Goshen, Marshall County in Plymouth — serve you, and obtain a judgment from the court. Indiana law also imposes a waiting period after the complaint is filed before a sheriff's sale can be scheduled. All of that takes time, and all of it is visible: you can look your own case up free at mycase.in.gov.
Michigan usually uses non-judicial foreclosure, known as foreclosure by advertisement. There is no lawsuit and no court judgment. Instead, the lender publishes and posts the notices Michigan law requires, then schedules a sheriff's sale. Because no court is involved, it can move faster than Indiana homeowners expect, and there is no case number to check.
The compensating difference is on the back end. Indiana front-loads the homeowner's time before the sale; Michigan gives you time after it, in the form of a redemption period.
An Elkhart County homeowner who has been through an Indiana foreclosure — or heard about one — expects a summons, a court date, and months of process. If their next house is in Berrien or Cass County, that expectation is simply wrong, and by the time they realize nothing is going to arrive in the mail from a court, the sale may already be advertised.
Redemption Rights: Michigan Gives You Time After the Sale, Indiana Does Not
In Michigan, a sheriff's sale is not the end. State law provides a statutory redemption period after the sale during which the former owner can still redeem — and, importantly, can still sell. For an owner-occupied residential property the period is commonly six months, though it varies: it can be longer for larger parcels or where a smaller share of the original debt has been repaid, and much shorter where a property has been determined abandoned.
During that window you generally remain in possession and retain a real, saleable interest in the property. This is the period in which a great many Michigan homes get sold rather than lost — and it is the period most homeowners do not know they have.
Indiana is the reverse. Once the sheriff's sale happens on an Indiana mortgage foreclosure, that is effectively the end of the road for the homeowner's interest. The time Indiana gives you is the time before the sale — which is why acting early matters so much more on the Indiana side.
| Indiana | Michigan | |
|---|---|---|
| Foreclosure type | Judicial — lawsuit required | Usually non-judicial (by advertisement) |
| Court involvement | Yes — searchable at mycase.in.gov | Typically none |
| Where your time is | Before the sheriff's sale | Also after the sale, via redemption |
| Post-sale redemption | Effectively none | Commonly ~6 months, varies by case |
| Best moment to act | As early as possible | Early — but a post-sale window often exists |
Property Tax Delinquency: Two Very Different Clocks
Falling behind on property taxes is a separate process from a mortgage foreclosure in both states, and the two states diverge sharply.
In Indiana, delinquent parcels are certified to the county's annual tax sale. A buyer at that sale receives a certificate rather than immediate ownership, and the owner has a redemption period afterward in which to pay what is owed and keep the property. There are important exceptions — vacant and abandoned parcels can be treated very differently — but the general shape is: sale first, redemption window after.
In Michigan, the county treasurer administers a multi-year forfeiture then foreclosure calendar. Unpaid taxes lead to forfeiture to the county treasurer, and if they remain unpaid, to a judgment of foreclosure. Here is the part that matters most: once that foreclosure judgment enters, title passes and there is no redemption. The property is gone, and so is the owner's equity in it.
Michigan homeowners routinely mix up the two Michigan timelines — assuming the six-month post-sale redemption that applies to a mortgage foreclosure also applies to a tax foreclosure. It does not. Tax foreclosure has a hard end date with nothing after it. If you are behind on Michigan property taxes, the date the county treasurer gives you outranks everything else in this article.
Transfer Taxes: A Real Michigan Cost With No Indiana Equivalent
Indiana does not impose a real estate transfer tax. Selling a house in South Bend, Goshen, or Plymouth, you will complete a sales disclosure form, but there is no percentage-based state or county tax on the transfer itself.
Michigan does. Both the state and the county levy a real estate transfer tax, and by long-standing custom the seller pays it. On a Berrien or Cass County sale that is a genuine line item — one that scales with price, so it lands hardest on exactly the lakeshore and lake-property sales where owners are already paying a percentage-based commission.
Sellers who have previously sold on the Indiana side often build their expectations around an Indiana closing statement and are unpleasantly surprised at a Michigan one. If you are comparing what you would net from two different options, make sure the Michigan figure includes it.
When you sell to a cash buyer who covers closing costs, this stops being an out-of-pocket item — but it is still worth understanding, because it is part of why the gap between a listed sale and a cash sale is narrower in Michigan than the headline numbers suggest.
What This Means If You Own on One Side and Live on the Other
A few practical rules that hold up well across the properties we buy in both states:
- Find out which state's clock you are on, first. Not which state you work in, bank in, or grew up in — which state the deed is recorded in. Everything else follows from that.
- On the Indiana side, the urgent phase is before the sheriff's sale. Once it happens, options narrow dramatically. Check mycase.in.gov to see exactly where your case stands.
- On the Michigan side, ask two separate questions. One about the mortgage (has a sheriff's sale happened, and when does redemption expire?) and one about the taxes (what does the county treasurer show, and what is the foreclosure judgment date?). They are unrelated timelines and either one can take the house.
- Michigan tax foreclosure deadlines are absolute. There is no post-judgment redemption to fall back on. Treat that date as immovable, because it is.
- Budget the Michigan transfer tax into any net-proceeds comparison. It is a seller cost, and Indiana sellers routinely forget it exists — it bites hardest on higher-value lakeshore property in New Buffalo, St. Joseph, Three Oaks, and Bridgman.
- If you commute across the line, this applies to you. It comes up constantly in Buchanan, Edwardsburg, Niles, and Marcellus — Michigan houses owned by people whose whole life runs through Indiana.
If you own property in Berrien or Cass County and are not sure which timeline you are on, the county treasurer can tell you your tax status in a single phone call, and it costs nothing to ask. That call is worth making today rather than next month.
Frequently Asked Questions
Not sure whether your Berrien or Cass County house is on the Michigan clock or something else? Call us. We will tell you what we see, what your dates look like, and what a cash offer would be — with no obligation either way.
We wrote this as a plain-language overview of how Michigan and Indiana handle these steps, and it is not legal advice. Michigan redemption periods and tax foreclosure dates depend on the property and the case, and a missed one cannot be undone. Check your own dates with the county treasurer, a Michigan-licensed attorney, or the free guides at michiganlegalhelp.org.