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Cal. RTC § 2189

This is the official text of Cal. RTC § 2189, part of California’s Revenue and Taxation Code — governs state and local taxation, including income and property tax.

Not legal advice. This page reproduces the official text of a government statute for reference only. Laws change, and how a statute applies depends on your specific facts. For advice about your situation, consult a licensed attorney in your state.

Official statutory text

(a) A tax on personal property is a lien on any real property on the secured roll also belonging to the owner of the personal property, if the personal property is located upon that real property on the lien date, and if the fact of the lien is shown on the secured roll opposite the description of the real property. However, if that real property is transferred or conveyed to a bona fide purchaser for value after the lien date, but prior to the date upon which the assessment on the personal property is made, and the purchaser of that property did not own, claim, possess, or control the personal property at any time from the lien date until the date upon which that assessment was made, the taxes on the personal property shall be placed on the unsecured roll and shall not be a lien on the real property.

(b) Any failure or omission to show the fact of a lien as described in subdivision (a) for personal property taxes on the secured roll opposite the description of real property shall not operate to invalidate those personal property taxes, but in that case the tax shall be collected in the same manner as taxes on the unsecured roll. However, if the fact of lien is erroneously entered on the secured roll opposite the description of real property belonging to someone other than the owner of the personal property on the lien date, then the delinquency penalty provided for in Chapter 4 of Part 5 shall not attach until December 10 at 5 p.m. or, if December 10th falls on Saturday, Sunday, or a holiday at 5 p.m. on the next business day.

Status: in_force · Read it on the official government site

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About this page: Statute text is reproduced from official government publishers via the Open US Law dataset (Vaquill AI, snapshot v2026.08, CC BY 4.0). Primary legislative text like this is public domain under the government-edicts doctrine (Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, 2020). We link every section back to its official source so you can verify it independently.