How have courts dealt with the enforcement mechanism of a special lien on a property?

We thus deal mainly in this appeal not with the right to compensation or the attorney fee award as such. Rather, we deal with the enforcement mechanism of that right. In effect, by providing for a direct offset against purchase price, the trial court converted what would be, at best, the basis for a judgment lien against all the sellers' property into a pre-existing special lien with super-priority over all other liens on this particular property. (See Isaac v. City of Los Angeles (1998) 66 Cal.App.4th 586, 77 Cal.Rptr.2d 752 [municipality could not validly give its liens for unpaid utility bills priority over all other liens, including tax liens].)