Legal Question in Real Estate Law in California

Re: Real estate law

Hard to answer your question.

An incompetent person is usually one who is adjudged "incompetent" by a court. Was this so in your case?

Who is they? Who didn't have power of attorney. Just because one is elderly, and can't sign, doesn't mean they are incompetent.

Would need additional facts to answer your case.

And it is "quit" claim, not "quick" claim.

Re: Real estate law

If a person is incompetent to sign an instrument, then the instrument is void from the outset.

If the person is of unsound mind but not entirely without understanding, their deeds and contracts made before a judicial determination of incapacity are voidable by rescission, but not void from the get-go. See Civil Code sections 38 to 41.

Trouble is, the instrument (here, a "quitclaim deed," not "quick claim") probably appears valid on its face, and persons seeing it in the public record will not have reason to know it is void unless and until the matter is taken to court and a judge or jury finds and declares that the deed was void when made, or is voidable through rescission (Civil Code sections 1688 to 1693).

A deed must be notarized in order to be recorded. A deed that is not notarized can be valid between the parties and others with knowledge of it, but an unrecorded deed may be ineffective in other respects.

Where a person's name is signed for him at his direction and in his presence by another, the signature becomes his own. Jansen v. McCahill (1863) 22 Cal.563.

I know this is a lot of legal theory. The bottom line here is that the whole situation raises a lot of questions about possible fraud, undue influence, possible elder abuse, and other wrongdoing. The document, whether "legal" or not, has the capability to cause a lot of harm and confusion about ownership that sooner or later would have to get straightened out in court, and by that time it probably will be too late to get justice for the incompetent person. On the other hand, there is some possibility that the situation is entirely on the up-and-up. There aren't enough facts here, such as whether there were impartial witnesses and/or a notary present when the quitclaim was signed, or whether the supposedly incompetent person had been adjudged incompetent at the time, or the incompetence is just someone's non-professional conclusion.