Q: I recently paid off my car through Capital One, only to discover that the only way to get my title is to go to the title office and pay a fee to retrieve it. Whatever happened to just getting it in the mail?
W.F., Cleveland
A: This can be frustrating, especially if you don’t realize you don’t have a paper title until you need it, such as if you are selling or trading-in your car.
You can get them in person quickly through a title office (not a BMV office) with only your ID. But you’re right — there’s generally a $16 fee. In Cuyahoga, title office locations include Cleveland, Parma, North Olmsted, Bedford and Mayfield Heights.
Lindsey Bohrer, spokeswoman for the Ohio BMV, said that many lenders now participate in the Electronic Lien Holder program offered by the BMV. It allows lenders to add and release a lien electronically so paper titles aren’t lost in transit.
“In the past, people were not receiving their titles due to lost mail, and sometimes the customers would misplace the title that had the lien holder’s signature to release the lien,” Bohrer said. “Some small banks still hold the actual title but some of the larger banks such as Capital One do not.
“With this new option for lien holders, the customers will not have to worry about their titles being lost, or having to obtain their title right away,” she said. “The title remains active and on file as long as the customer continues to register their vehicle in the state of Ohio.”
You should get a letter of some sort from your lender that the loan is paid in full. But you’ll still need the title someday. You can choose to get it right away or wait until you need it.
To Bohrer’s point, there are cases when a car owner has a paper title and misplaces it or forgets it’s somewhere in the house and then gets a duplicate. When you get a duplicate, the original title becomes inactive and null, even though it looks and smells like a perfectly good car title. If you’re selling a car — or buying a car — and want to make sure you have the right title in your hands, then you can check whether the title is good here, and search for the title number on the document.
As a side note: Ohio also redesigned its car titles this year, but old titles are still valid. The new titles are 8-1/2 by 11 inches and are blue and green; older titles are 7 by 8 inches and are brown and blue.
Q: You wrote recently about using a bank service called Zelle to transfer money to someone or yourself at another bank in real time. You said it’s a free service. It’s not. As of Aug. 1, Zelle is charging the recipient of funds 2.5%.
I have tenants using Zelle to pay rent. I feel the 2.5% charge is exorbitant. I am going to ask the tenants to use the ACH system, as long as their bank supports it. It takes longer to receive funds, but as far as I know, it’s still free.
R.S., Seven Hills
A: Zelle does not cost money; it is free. As we later learned, you are having your tenants pay their rent by depositing money into your business account. U.S. Bank – not Zelle – charges 2.5% for those transactions.
If you were having your tenants transfer money to your personal account using Zelle, it would be free.
I’d be reluctant to share your bank routing number and account number with tenants or anyone you don’t know well and trust. If people have someone’s routing number and account number, they can use it to commit fraud and theft.
I’d agree that electronic payments serve you better than old-fashioned checks. Maybe you should consider Venmo, which would be free for you. Or they could pay through PayPal, which would be free as long as your tenants indicate the payment isn’t for merchandise and is a “friends and family” transaction.
Or if your tenants don’t have and don’t want a Venmo account and choose to pay you through Zelle instead, then you could tell them THEY have to pay the 2.5% fee. In the end, you’ll need to decide what fits your business situation best.
To reach Teresa Murray, email moneymatters@plaind.com or call or text 216-316-7064. She cannot respond to all queries or comments. Previous columns online: http://cleveland.com/moneymatters. On Facebook: MurrayMoneyMatters. On Twitter: @teresamurray.