Rights of 10% property owner

[BadLuck08]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Alabama

A year ago my wife's father passed away and the estate which consisted of a house on 16 acres and the possessions in the house were left to my wife and her 3 sisters. All were give a certain percentage of the property with my wife's part being 10%. This was due to her receiving some other property earlier in life.

Two of the sisters live out of state and visit here frequently and use the house when they visit here every other week or so. They are content with just keeping the house up so they will have a place to stay when visiting here.

My wife gets no use of the house or the land. That is by choice, we only live a mile away and have no use of for it.

What I am wondering about is can we in any way make them buy out her 10% or sell the house and property?

 

[anteater]

Partition lawsuit. Everybody loses.

 

[justalayman]

to explain anteater's post a bit:

a suit to partition is where you ask the courts (via a lawsuit) to divide the property. If it can be divided physically in a fair and equitable fashion, the court may actually split the property into sections. If that is not possible or the parties cannot agree to a physical division, the courts will simply auction the property and divide the proceeds as ownership percentage directs. As anteater said; everybody loses. The courts do not have to worry about the parties accepting the price. Additionally, the parties do have to pay for the process.

It would be much better for all parties involved to come to an agreed solution.

 

[tranquility]

But, a 10% owner should lose less than the others so the threat of a lawsuit should motivate them to buy the owner out.

House worth 100K but will auction at 50K.

A 50%
B 40%
C 10%

If partition is granted, A will lose 25K, B 20K and C 5K. Unless there is a true family battle going on, it makes sense for A and B to come up with 10K for the 10% then to lose 45K.

 

[justalayman]

But, a 10% owner should lose less than the others so the threat of a lawsuit should motivate them to buy the owner out.

House worth 100K but will auction at 50K.

A 50%
B 40%
C 10%

If partition is granted, A will lose 25K, B 20K and C 5K. Unless there is a true family battle going on, it makes sense for A and B to come up with 10K for the 10% then to lose 45K.

Putting numbers to it does make it much clearer.

and since, realistically, OP has no use for the property, one can look at it as they are not losing anything but would be gaining $5k. Since they have no use for it, whether they receive $5k or $10k is simply not relevant.

On top of that, OP would be losing the liabilities involved with ownership so they gain even more.

 

[startedone]

But, a 10% owner should lose less than the others so the threat of a lawsuit should motivate them to buy the owner out.

House worth 100K but will auction at 50K.

A 50%
B 40%
C 10%

If partition is granted, A will lose 25K, B 20K and C 5K. Unless there is a true family battle going on, it makes sense for A and B to come up with 10K for the 10% then to lose 45K.

Yes, the minority owner could even ask for MORE hehehehe ... hahahahaha !

 

[anteater]

Fixed costs...

 

[tranquility]

While anteater responded to startedone, I'll expand a bit. The lawyer is going to want money too. Each will have to pay approximately the same amount to an attorney and other expenses (like depositions), so that is a disincentive to lawsuit by the minority party. However, that is only really significant when we talk of percentages and not amounts.

 

[anteater]

While anteater responded to startedone, I'll expand a bit. The lawyer is going to want money too. Each will have to pay approximately the same amount to an attorney and other expenses (like depositions), so that is a disincentive to lawsuit by the minority party. However, that is only really significant when we talk of percentages and not amounts.

I'm practicing at being cryptic.