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Hi everyone, I am new to this forum and in need of some help. Here is my situation. My grandfathers father left 40 acres of land to all of his sons. There was a total of 6 of them which have all passed away. On the deed it has all 6 of the brothers names on it. 2 of the brothers have signed there part of the land over to my grandfather which has been recorded at the court house. 2 of them verbally gave it to my grandfather but nothing was ever recorded and 1 wanted to keep his part. So with all of them being passed away, that leaves their children holding their shares of the land. Some of them do not want to sign it over, and some of them have agreed to sign their part over to us. My problem is I want to build a house on the land but cant because we do not have a clear deed with just our names on it. I have thought that maybe we could just take our part of the land and make a deed for it and then make a deed for the other peoples part. But then I don't even know what my part would be, because it doesn't have specific portion of the land laid out for each person everyone just has interest in the land. My fears are that if I build a house in one spot someone will say "I want that spot". What can I do to get the borders and boundaries clearly laid out. I currently own 3/6 of the land, couldn't I pick what I wanted? Also my grandfather has been paying taxes on the whole 40 acres for over 40 years, could this give me a leg up somehow? Thanks in advance.
Talk to a real estate attorney. You would most likely need to force a partition action. From what you describe all of you hold title to a big parcel jointly. There is no "his piece, my piece, her piece" that you have claim to, just an ownership portion interest in the whole parcel. You do not own 3/6 of the land ie if it is 50 acres you own 25. You own 3/6 of the interest in 50 acres.
You absolutely must hire an attorney. DO NOT BUILD. More than likely the deed has language to the effect that the land is held in "undivided" shares. What that means is if you "improve the land" by building, then you have improved ALL the shares and will not get back what you invest. In otherwords, the land is now worth $x (total value) divided by all heirs = y. If you build for $z, then the land is now worth $(x+z) - and each portion is now $(x+z)/y as the improvements are also divided by all heirs. Even more of a problem is that since the property is in undivided shares, so is the house!
Have you offered to buy out the other relatives? or are you expecting them to just give you their portion of the land/value?
Additionally, if your grandfather has been paying the entire taxes for many years, he can seek to have the others claiming ownership to reimburse him by filing a lien against their portion of the land (remember it's an undivided portion), assuming your grandfather is still alive and intends to deed you the property. If your grandfather is deceased, then you need to work with the estate administrator.
good luck.
Last edited by NY Annie; 01-13-2012 at 11:07 AM..
Reason: tax issue added
I have talked to a lawyer and he said i could see if anyone would sign a quick claim deed. so that is what I am going to try to do. I was just wondering if there was other options I could go about doing. My grandfather has passed away, but my grandmother is still living. Which he left his share to her and she has left it to me. I am pretty sure I can get a few of them to sign a quick claim deed, but there are a few that will not. What I would really like to do, if possible, is make a deed up for the land that has been signed over to me and then make a deed up for the remaining land. I'm not sure if this is even possible. I guess its just a wish.
I have talked to a lawyer and he said i could see if anyone would sign a quick claim deed. so that is what I am going to try to do. I was just wondering if there was other options I could go about doing.
The options (like in a divorce) are to present the Court with a deal where everyone involved
has signed and sealed all wrapped up in nice ribbon and bows ... or have him order it sold.
They learned a LONG time ago to not do the King Solomon thing.
Good luck getting everyone in the family to sign off.
Heck, just making the list of which descendents have what right to what % is tough enough.
You cannot make up a deed to part of the property b/c legally it is one unit. You each have shares in it, like owning stock in a company. If you own stock in Chevron, you can't go pick out "your" well.
You are going to either get everyone to agree to sell their shares or force a sale of the property and hope you can buy it. You also need to consult the zoning board for where it is located. There may be minimum requirements of dividing it that you don't know about.
It is a common occurrence for plots of land to be broken/divided/shared and nothing ever recorded. Especially true where people have a distrust of the government and/or taxing.
Quite common in SC for land given to and/or bought by former slaves.
Often referred to Heir Property.
While quite common, it will take an attorney to sort it all out.
Could this possibly fall under the adverse possession law? ( not sure I worded that right ) I ask because her granddad is the only one to have paid the taxes. Maybe op has a case of abandonment from the others.?? Good luck op.
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