What stays with the house when you buy a home in Flower Mound?

In Texas, the contract decides, not custom. Paragraph 2 of the TREC One to Four Family Residential Contract (TREC 20-19, mandatory since July 1, 2026) conveys the land, every fixture and improvement attached to it (including mounts and brackets for televisions and speakers, ceiling fans, garage door openers, and permanently installed generators), and a named list of accessories (curtains and rods, blinds, door and mailbox keys, pool equipment, and the controls and apps that run the house). Anything the seller wants to keep must be written into Paragraph 2D, Exclusions, before signing. Anything that is not attached, like a refrigerator, a washer, or the TV itself, only conveys if it is listed on a Non-Realty Items Addendum. Smart devices come with a written hand-off requirement at possession under Paragraph 10B.

Most closing-week arguments in Denton County are not about price. They are about a mounted television, a set of curtains, a Ring doorbell that still pings the old owner's phone, or the refrigerator everyone assumed was included. Here is how the Texas contract actually settles each one, and how to make sure your deal never gets there.

The three buckets in Paragraph 2, and what lands in each

The TREC resale contract sorts everything on the lot into three categories. If you can name the bucket, you already know the answer.

Bucket one: Improvements (Paragraph 2B). This is "the house, garage and all other fixtures and improvements attached to the above-described real property." The form then lists examples of permanently installed and built-in items that convey: all equipment and appliances, valances, screens, shutters, awnings, wall-to-wall carpeting, mirrors, ceiling fans, attic fans, mail boxes, television antennas, mounts and brackets for televisions and speakers, heating and air-conditioning units, security and fire detection equipment, wiring, plumbing and lighting fixtures, chandeliers, water softener system, kitchen equipment, garage door openers, cleaning equipment, shrubbery, landscaping, outdoor cooking equipment, and, new in the 2026 revision, generators.

The test for this bucket is attachment. If it is bolted, wired, plumbed, or planted, it stays unless it is excluded.

Bucket two: Accessories (Paragraph 2C). These do not have to be attached at all. The form conveys them by name: window air conditioning units, the stove, fireplace screens, curtains and rods, blinds, window shades, draperies and rods, door keys, mailbox keys, an above ground pool, swimming pool equipment and maintenance accessories, artificial fireplace logs, security systems that are not fixtures, and controls for garage doors, entry gates, and other improvements and accessories.

That word "controls" carries more weight than it looks. The form defines it to include the seller's transferable rights to the software and applications used to access and control improvements or accessories, and the hardware used solely to control them. Your garage door app, the gate keypad, the pool automation hub: all of it is an accessory that conveys.

Bucket three: everything else. If an item is neither attached nor on the accessories list, it is personal property. The refrigerator, the washer and dryer, the television hanging on the conveyed bracket, the patio furniture, the trampoline, the wine fridge that plugs into a wall outlet. None of it conveys by default. It only conveys if you put it in writing.

Where the gray zone actually is

The hard cases are the ones where "permanently installed and built-in" is a judgment call. Texas courts have used the same three-factor test since the Texas Supreme Court set it out in Logan v. Mullis, 686 S.W.2d 605 (Tex. 1985): the mode and sufficiency of annexation, the adaptation of the article to the use of the realty, and the intention of the party who attached it. The court called intention "preeminent," with the first two factors serving as evidence of it.

That is why a contract dispute over a chandelier or a mounted mirror is expensive to win and cheap to prevent. The judge is going to ask what the parties intended. The contract is where you say so.

A few Flower Mound examples I see every year:

• The mounted TV. The bracket is a fixture and conveys. The television is personal property and does not. If the seller takes the TV, the buyer gets a bracket on the wall and four lag bolts in the studs, which is exactly what the form says they get.
• Curtains, rods, and blinds. All accessories, all convey, whether they are custom or came from a big-box store. Sellers who had drapery made to measure routinely assume it goes with them. Under 2C, it does not, unless it is excluded.
• Built-in refrigerators and under-counter wine units. A panel-ready, built-in refrigerator that is part of the cabinetry run is an improvement. A freestanding refrigerator in the same kitchen is personal property. Same room, opposite answers.
• Outdoor kitchens and grills. Permanently installed outdoor cooking equipment conveys. The rolling grill on the patio does not.
• Playsets, basketball goals, and sheds. Cemented in or anchored to a slab leans fixture. Sitting on the lawn leans personal property. These are the items most worth naming one way or the other.
• Shelving, mirrors, and decorative hardware. Attached mirrors are on the 2B list. A leaning floor mirror is not. Floating shelves screwed into studs convey; the books on them do not.

Exclusions and the Non-Realty Items Addendum: the two lines that prevent the fight

Everything above is the default. The contract gives both sides a way to change it, and the whole game is using those lines before you sign, not during the option period and never at the walk-through.

Paragraph 2D, Exclusions. If a seller wants to keep something that would otherwise convey, it goes here, by description: "the dining room chandelier," "the drapery and rods in the primary bedroom," "the mounted television bracket in the living room." The form says excluded items "must be removed prior to delivery of possession." That is a seller obligation with a deadline. Note what the form does not say: it does not spell out who repairs the hole where the chandelier was or the anchor holes behind the bracket. Paragraph 10A separately requires the seller to deliver the property in its present or required condition, ordinary wear and tear excepted, so a fresh drywall gap is a negotiation. Smart sellers remove excluded items before photos and before showings. The buyer never sees them, never wants them, and never argues about the patch.

The Non-Realty Items Addendum (TREC No. OP-M, Texas REALTORS form 1924). This is how personal property comes with the house. Paragraph A has the seller convey the listed items "for an additional sum of $___ and other good and valuable consideration," and it asks you to specify each item carefully, with description, model numbers, serial numbers, and location. Paragraph B has the seller warrant they own the items free and clear. Paragraph C makes clear the seller does not warrant the condition or future performance of what is conveyed.

Three practical points on the addendum, because this is where I see buyers leave value on the table:

1. Write the model and serial number. "Refrigerator" is an invitation to a swap. "Sub-Zero BI-36U, serial number ending 4471, kitchen" is a contract term. The form asks for it for a reason.
2. The dollar figure matters to your lender. Most buyers put $0 or a nominal amount in the blank, and most lenders are fine with that. A meaningful dollar figure attached to personal property can be treated as outside the appraised value of the real estate, which can affect your loan-to-value. Ask your lender before you negotiate a $15,000 furniture package into the addendum.
3. The warranty is on ownership, not condition. If the conveyed washer is leased or financed, Paragraph B is the seller's problem. If it dies in month two, Paragraph C says that is yours.

In Flower Mound, where a lot of the resale inventory in Bridlewood, Wellington, and the Lakeside area carries built-in appliances, media rooms with multiple mounts, and motorized shades, the Non-Realty Items Addendum and the Exclusions line do more work than any other page in the file. I walk through both with every buyer and every seller before the first offer, room by room.

The Ring doorbell problem, and what Paragraph 10B now requires

The item that produces the most friction after closing in 2026 is not a chandelier. It is a video doorbell, a smart thermostat, a Wi-Fi garage opener, or a security camera that still lives on the seller's account.

Start with the contract. The Ring doorbell is wired to the house, so the hardware is an improvement under 2B. Its account, its app, and its stored footage are a different matter, and the form addresses them directly in Paragraph 10B, Smart Devices. A Smart Device is defined as "a device that connects to the internet to enable remote use, monitoring, and management of" the property, any item on a Non-Realty Items Addendum, or any item in a fixture lease assigned to the buyer.

At delivery of possession, the seller must do two things under 10B:

1. Deliver to the buyer written information containing all access codes, usernames, passwords, and applications the buyer will need to access, operate, manage, and control the Smart Devices.
2. Terminate and remove all access and connections to the improvements and accessories from any of the seller's personal devices, including phones and computers.

That second obligation is the one sellers miss. Changing a Wi-Fi password is not enough. A doorbell, a thermostat, or a lock that stays enrolled on the seller's account keeps working for the seller, and the manufacturer will not let the buyer claim it.

What a Flower Mound seller should do the week before closing

• Doorbells and cameras. Ring's own process is a Transfer Ownership request inside the app (Settings, Location Details, Transfer Ownership), which can send the device to the buyer's email or simply release it from your account. A factory reset by itself does not release ownership on Ring hardware, which is why buyers find a "device already registered" error after they move in. Download any footage you want to keep first, and cancel the subscription separately, since transferring the device does not cancel the plan.
• Thermostats, locks, garage openers, irrigation controllers, and pool automation. Each has a remove-from-account or factory-reset step. Do it after your last night in the house, not before, and write the model and the reset method on the 10B information sheet.
• Hubs and voice assistants. If a hub conveys (it is hardware used solely to control improvements, so under 2C it usually does), deregister it. If it is going with you, exclude it in 2D and expect to leave the devices it controlled in a state the buyer can re-pair.
• Gate and garage codes. Change nothing the day of closing; deliver the codes in writing and let the buyer change them.

What a Flower Mound buyer should ask for

Ask for the 10B written hand-off at the final walk-through, not at the closing table. Walk the house with the seller's list in hand, open each app on your own phone, and confirm you can see the doorbell, control the thermostat, and open the garage. If something is still tied to the seller, you have found it while the seller is still motivated to fix it, which is the whole point of walking through before you sign. The live guide to what happens at the final walk-through in Flower Mound covers your rights at that stage, and what actually happens on closing day covers the hours after.

When something is missing at the walk-through

It happens. The drapes are gone, the hub is in a box in the seller's car, or the refrigerator on the addendum has been replaced with a different one. Here is the order of operations.

Check the paper first. Pull up Paragraph 2D and any Non-Realty Items Addendum. If the item is excluded, the seller was right to take it. If it is on the accessories list, on the 2B list, or on the addendum, the seller owes it.

Document before you negotiate. Photograph the empty bracket, the bare rod brackets, the model plate on the substitute appliance. Send it to your agent in writing the same day.

Know your leverage, and its limits. Before funding, the fix is usually a written agreement at the closing table: the item is returned before possession, or the seller credits a stated amount on the settlement statement, or the item is delivered within a set number of days with a holdback. Your agent and the title company handle this routinely. After funding, the contract still binds the seller to what it says, but your remedy is a demand letter and, if that fails, a claim, which is slow and rarely worth it for a set of curtains. The time to catch it is the walk-through. If the dispute is large enough to threaten the closing itself, the rules on what happens if a seller backs out in Flower Mound explain what each side is actually exposed to.

Use the option period for anything you are unsure about. If a showing left you wondering whether the media-room projector, the sauna, or the generator transfer switch stays, ask in writing during the option period, and get the answer into an amendment or an addendum. Silence is how these items end up in a moving truck.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does the refrigerator stay with the house in Texas?

Not by default. A freestanding refrigerator is personal property and is not on the TREC contract's accessories list, so it only conveys if the seller agrees to it on a Non-Realty Items Addendum (TREC OP-M). A built-in, panel-ready refrigerator that is part of the cabinetry is an improvement under Paragraph 2B and conveys unless the seller excludes it in Paragraph 2D.

Do mounted TVs convey in a Texas home sale?

The mount and bracket convey; the television does not. Paragraph 2B of the TREC One to Four Family Residential Contract lists "mounts and brackets for televisions and speakers" as improvements, while the TV itself is personal property. If you want the TV, put it on a Non-Realty Items Addendum with the model and serial number.

Do curtains and blinds stay when you sell a house in Texas?

Yes. Curtains and rods, blinds, window shades, and draperies and rods are all named accessories in Paragraph 2C of the TREC contract and convey to the buyer whether or not they are custom. A seller who wants to keep them must list them in Paragraph 2D, Exclusions, before the contract is signed and remove them before delivering possession.

What does a seller have to do with a Ring doorbell or smart thermostat at closing in Texas?

Paragraph 10B of the TREC contract requires the seller, at delivery of possession, to give the buyer written access codes, usernames, passwords, and the applications needed to run every Smart Device, and to remove all access to the home's improvements and accessories from the seller's own phones and computers. For Ring hardware that means completing a Transfer Ownership request in the app, since a factory reset alone does not release the device.

Who fixes the holes when a seller removes an excluded chandelier or TV bracket?

The TREC contract does not assign that repair in Paragraph 2D, which only requires excluded items to be removed before possession. Paragraph 10A requires the seller to deliver the property in its present or required condition, ordinary wear and tear excepted, so a fresh hole is a negotiating point. The cleanest practice is for the seller to remove and patch before photos and showings so the buyer never sees the item.

Get the fixtures and the paperwork settled before the first offer

What stays with the house in Flower Mound is a contract question with a clean answer: attached items and the named accessories convey, personal property does not, and the Exclusions line and the Non-Realty Items Addendum change the default. The smart-device hand-off under Paragraph 10B is now part of the same checklist. Every one of these is cheap to settle before signing and expensive to argue about at the walk-through.

If you're thinking through a move like this, whether you are listing a home full of built-ins or writing an offer on one, schedule a free Move-Up Strategy Call ... thirty minutes, no pitch, just a clear-headed look at where you are and what your best next move looks like.

This article is general information, not legal advice. Contract terms are negotiated deal by deal, so verify your specific situation with your agent, your title company, and where appropriate a licensed Texas attorney.

About Brian White

Brian White helps families in Northwest DFW make their move-up cleanly, selling and buying in one synchronized step. He built BlueFuse Group on a simple standard: other-first service, proactive at every turn, faith and excellence in equal measure. Brian has been married to Tisha for 27 years and is dad to three adult sons. When he's not protecting a family's equity or untangling a tight closing timeline, you'll find him chasing a round of golf or at Valley Creek Church.

Schedule a Move-Up Strategy Call ... no pitch, just a clear-headed look at your next move.