Virginia closing costs: every line, who pays it, with real numbers

Virginia closing costs land on your Loan Estimate as one big number, and most buyers treat them as one bill. They’re really three kinds of money: taxes the state and county set by law, fees the lender and other companies charge, and choices you make yourself, like your settlement agent and your owner’s title policy. Here is every line, who pays it in Virginia, and the real math on a $350,000 purchase in Chesterfield County, where I work.

Who pays closing costs in Virginia?

The buyer pays most of them. The seller pays the grantor tax and their own costs out of the sale proceeds. And the purchase contract can move almost any line from one side to the other, which is why a seller credit written into the contract can pay your costs, up to your loan program’s limit.

Source: Code of Virginia 58.1-801 to 58.1-814 and the Supreme Court of Virginia circuit court fee schedule (rev. 07/26), read November 2026.

Custom is the default, not the law. The Code doesn’t assign the deed tax to either side; buyers pay it by custom, and the court’s own fee schedule calls it the grantee tax. If your contract says the seller pays a line, the seller pays it.

Virginia recordation tax on the deed and the loan

Virginia taxes two documents when you buy: the deed that puts the house in your name, and the deed of trust that secures your loan. Each one carries a state recordation tax of 25 cents per $100. A city or county can add a local tax equal to one-third of the state tax, and most do, so the combined rate is about 33 cents per $100 on each document. That’s one-third of 1%.

Two details decide the dollar amount:

1. The base. The deed is taxed on the greater of the price or the home’s most recent assessment. The deed of trust is taxed on the loan amount, so a financed VA funding fee or FHA upfront premium is part of the base.
2. The rounding. The tax runs on “every $100 or fraction thereof,” so the base rounds up to the next $100. A $342,050 loan is taxed as $342,100.

For round numbers there’s a shortcut: add the price and the loan, then divide by 300. A $350,000 price and a $332,500 loan make $682,500, and $682,500 divided by 300 is $2,275 in recordation tax. Does that make sense? Two documents, one-third of 1% on each.

Then come the clerk’s fees, which are small and fixed:

Source: Supreme Court of Virginia circuit court fee schedule, rev. 07/26, and Virginia Code 17.1-275, 17.1-279 and 58.1-817, read November 2026.

As of November 2026 the Technology Trust Fund fee is $8. It went up from $5 on July 1, 2026, so an older fee sheet runs a few dollars light. I tell buyers taxes and government fees are the cost of doing business. Nobody negotiates them, so I estimate them to the dollar and save the negotiating for the lines that move.

Grantor tax in Virginia: the seller’s line

The grantor tax belongs to the seller. It’s 50 cents for each $500 of the price or value, or fraction of $500, which works out to 0.1%. Half goes to the state and half to the locality. The seller pays it unless the contract says otherwise, and if the buyer takes over the seller’s existing loan, that balance is left out of the base.

Sellers in Northern Virginia can owe up to two regional deed fees of 10 cents per $100 each, and sellers in Hampton Roads owe one of 6 cents per $100. None of them applies in the Richmond region.

Virginia closing costs, worked out on a $350,000 home near Richmond

Here’s the Virginia part of the bill on a real-size purchase. Say you buy a $350,000 home in Chesterfield County with 5% down, so the loan is $332,500. The assessment is at or below the price, the deed runs 10 pages or fewer, and the deed of trust runs 11 to 30 pages.

Now put that next to my rule of thumb for total closing costs: 2% to 3% of the price, or $7,000 to $10,500 on this house. The state and county take $2,388 of it, roughly a quarter to a third, before a lender or title company charges anything. The Virginia cash to close calculator runs this same math on any price and loan amount.

Refinance recordation tax in Virginia

A refinance gets a lower rate: 18 cents per $100 to the state, plus a local tax of one-third of that (6 cents), for 24 cents combined. It applies when the new deed of trust refinances a loan already secured by a deed of trust that was taxed when it recorded. Since July 1, 2012, it doesn’t matter whether you stay with your current lender or move to a new one. The new deed of trust has to cite the old one’s deed book and page, which your settlement agent handles.

Two cautions. A loan modification isn’t a refinance: it’s taxed only on any amount added to the loan, at the regular rate. And how clerks tax the new money in a cash-out refinance isn’t settled in anything I’ve read, so on a cash-out I get the figure from the settlement agent instead of guessing. Whether a refinance is worth doing at all is a break-even question, and that math lives on when to refinance.

Title insurance: the lender’s policy and the optional owner’s policy

Your lender requires a title search and a lender’s title policy, and you pay for both. That policy protects the lender’s loan. It doesn’t protect you. The owner’s policy is optional, and it covers what you own. My line on it: “You’re not insuring what you’re owed, you’re insuring what you own.”

What does it cover? Title problems that started before you owned the house. The rare kind is an old claim that the land was wrongly transferred generations ago. The common kind is a lien. Say the seller had a $20,000 roof put on and never paid the roofer, and the contractor’s lien posts at the courthouse after the title search already ran. That debt isn’t yours, but the lien sits on your house.

Two Virginia rules are worth knowing here:

• No single state price. Rates have to be “reasonable and adequate,” but insurers and agents set their own and can even negotiate them, and search, exam and closing charges are billed separately. So premiums vary from one title agent to the next (Virginia Code 38.2-4608).
• Your written choice. Before your settlement agent pays anything out, they have to tell you an owner’s policy may be worth considering, including mechanics’ lien coverage if it’s available, explain the coverage in general terms (including that later improvements may not be covered), and get your written statement of whether you want it (Virginia Code 38.2-4616).

You choose the settlement agent

In Virginia the buyer or borrower has the legal right to pick the settlement agent, and a seller can’t require a particular one (Virginia Code 55.1-1006). Every purchase contract for a home of one to four units has to include a “Choice of Settlement Agent” notice in bold type. Around Richmond most closings run through a settlement attorney or a title company, and Virginia doesn’t require an attorney.

What the law requires of whoever you pick:

• Who can do it: a Virginia-licensed attorney, a licensed title insurance company or title agent, a licensed real estate broker, a financial institution, or a registered lay settlement agent.
• Coverage: errors and omissions coverage of at least $250,000, a fidelity bond of at least $100,000 and a surety bond of at least $200,000, plus registration with the right state body.
• Your money: held in a trust account and deposited by the close of the second business day, with records kept for 5 years.
• Closing-day money: the lender’s funds have to reach the settlement agent at or before closing, and the agent pays out within two business days of settlement, generally after the documents record (Virginia Code 55.1-902 and 55.1-903).
• No kickbacks: kickbacks and referral fees for settlement business are prohibited.

One change is coming: starting January 1, 2027, a settlement agent who knows of a land-use special assessment on the property has to tell you in writing before settlement.

Lender and third-party fees: what you can shop for and what you can’t

The loan costs on your Loan Estimate split into three sections. Section A is origination: what the lender and loan officer charge to make the loan, plus any points. Section B is services you cannot shop for, like the appraisal, credit report and flood certification, ordered by the lender. Section C is services you can shop for, mostly title and settlement.

“Services you cannot shop for” sounds hostile, but it only means you don’t pick the vendor. You don’t get to pick the appraiser. The layout exists so you can compare lenders side by side. Around Richmond, appraisals in my files have run about $450 to $600, and a rush appraisal about $750. Processing fees I see across the market run about $500 to $1,500.

When you compare two lenders, compare what they control. My formula: Section A plus Section B, minus lender credits. Section C follows the settlement agent you pick, not the lender. Then check the total closing costs line, Section J, because a lender credit can make the loan with the bigger origination line the cheaper one. Some lenders list application, underwriting or tax service fees; others build their costs into the rate. The totals catch both. How a broker gets paid, and why that changes how the page looks, is on broker vs bank, and the rate-for-credit trade is on points and buydowns.

Prepaids and the escrow deposit

Below the closing costs sit the prepaids: your first year of homeowners insurance, interest from closing day to the end of that month, and the opening deposit for your escrow account. They’re your own bills paid ahead, not fees; how the escrow deposit gets sized is on property taxes and escrow, and how your closing date moves the interest line is in the cash to close guide.

How to pay less at closing

The closing costs have to be paid by someone, and it doesn’t have to be only you. A seller credit written into the contract moves real dollars at the table, while the same dollars off the price change your payment by only a few dollars a month for every $1,000. That’s my rule, concessions over reductions, and the math and program limits are on making an offer. In my read, late 2026 isn’t a bidding-war market, so asking is reasonable.

Three other levers: a lender credit, where a slightly higher rate has the lender pay part of your costs; your closing date, which sets the prepaid interest; and on a refinance, making sure the 18-cent rate gets applied. The owner’s title policy is not a lever. Keep it.

Every line on a Virginia closing has an owner: the state, the county, the lender, a title agent, or you. Once you know which is which, you know which numbers are worth a phone call. I just always want you seeing real numbers before you sign a contract, not at the closing table.