Art. 2335.Superior Mortgage Or Privilege

Liens and mortgages on the same property rank against each other, and that ranking decides who gets paid first and what survives a sale. A superior mortgage or privilege is one that outranks the seizing creditor's claim; because it sits ahead in line, it does not get paid off from the sale proceeds and disappear the way a lower-ranked, or inferior, encumbrance does when the property changes hands. Instead, it survives the sale and continues to burden the property in the purchaser's hands.

Article 2335 requires the sheriff to say so out loud before the sale proceeds: the property is being sold for cash, subject to whatever superior security interest, mortgage, lien, or privilege already sits on it. That announcement puts every bidder on notice, before a single bid is placed, that the winning bid buys a property still carrying that senior debt, not a clean title free of every encumbrance.

This announcement works alongside the rest of the chapter's disclosure machinery. Article 2334 requires the mortgage certificate to be read or provided so bidders can see what is recorded against the property, and Article 2336.1 gives the sheriff and the seizing creditor a way to pin down exactly how much is owed on a superior encumbrance before the sale. Together, these provisions let a bidder judge what a winning bid will cost once the superior debt that survives the sale is factored in.