Legal Question in Wills and Trusts in New York
please help greedy aunt and cousins!!!!
my mom and grandmother lived in a house which was my grandparents. the house was signed over to my mother and my uncle in 1972. since then my mom has paid all taxes and the mortgage on the house and lived there my grandmother and uncle have both passed. now my aunt and cousins want to sell the house and get their share my uncle left no will and his name and my moms name are the only ones on the deed. can they force her to sell? also is she entitled to half of all the taxes she paid on the house she has all receipts for taxes and mortgage payments please let me kow if we have a leg to stand on i dont wan to see my mom left with nothing.
Thank You
2 Answers from Attorneys
Re: please help greedy aunt and cousins!!!!
If your Mom and Uncle owned home as "Tenants in Common", his heirs can force a sale through a partition action in court.
Whether or not your Mom entitled to a "credit" for her $$ outlay is up to the Judge, taking into consideration that she had the benefit of living there and 50% of the debt she pd was hers.
Re: please help greedy aunt and cousins!!!!
If your mother never had title she can be forced to sell. While she may be entitled to contribution on bax taxes, your aunt could make a claim for 20 years of rent on her share of interest. What your mother should do, if she doesn't want to sell is to bring an action for constructive trust and reformation of the deed. She will likely need to pay of your aunt for part of her share, but considering her length of time she probably could end up paying less than the half that she may owe otherwise. I just recently finished a trial with a similar situation to yours.
Should you like to discuss this or any other legal matter, you can e-mail me for more information about low cost face-to-face, on-line, or a telephone consultation with a lawyer in our office.
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