Help with Deed

[helpingmyfather]

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

I am trying to help my father and I needed some advice. The situation is as follows:

My father took out a loan on a mobile home and land with his then girlfriend. She had horrible credit so my father was primary on the loan, she was secondary. They lived in home for about 8 years then they separated. My father allowed her to stay in the home with her minor son. She continued to make payments. My father went to mortgage company to have loan put in her name, they refused because her credit was bad. So my father, left the mortgage in his name. Fast forward 3 years later, ex girlfriend still living in home remarries then passes away. She left land and mobile home to her husband and son. A year after she passes, her husband makes final payment on land and goes to said mortgage company and has the land deed put in his name. Husband then refinances mobile home (how he did this, I don't know because mobile home loan is in my father's name) and stops making mortgage payments on mobile home 1 year after refinancing. Now mobile home is in foreclosure and they are coming after my father to pay mortgage. The husband is currently living in the mobile home but not making the payments. I presented him with a lease agreement since legally, the mobile home is still in my father's name and the ex-girlfriends name. He basically laughed in my face and told me he wasn't paying any rent and that the land belonged to him. The mobile home cannot be removed off the property. My father is now in his late 60's and very ill. I am POA of my father's financial and medical. My questions are as follows:

1) Was this deed illegally deeded to her husband if the loan was never in his name?
2) Does my father have any rights to this land?
3) If I get the mobile home out of foreclosure, can we have him evicted?
4) If the deed was deeded in error, how do we correct this?

Any information would be greatly appreciated.

 

[FlyingRon]

Your father should consult an attorney. Something is definitely wrong here. You are right that there should be no way the loan could have been refinanced without the owner's signature. Further, if it was refinanced, it's not possible the bank is coming after him. Mobile homes are vehicles not real estate. They don't get foreclosed on as much as they get repo'd though people abuse the terms regularly.

 

[justalayman]

I can promise I can't solve then problem as it is confusing but;

In whose name is the deed to the land immediately after your father and girl seperated?

In whose name was the title to the trailer (same time period)

Was the trailer ever legally attached to the land (where the title is retired and it does become a fixture to
The land)?

 

[helpingmyfather]

I can promise I can't solve then problem as it is confusing but;

In whose name is the deed to the land immediately after your father and girl seperated?

In whose name was the title to the trailer (same time period)

Was the trailer ever legally attached to the land (where the title is retired and it does become a fixture to
The land)?

The deed to the land remained in the name of the company he bought it from because money was still owed on the mobile home. (according to tax office) The name on the deed never changed until the husband presented the Will to the company they bought the mobile home from.

the name on the title to the mobile home, according to DMV is still my father and the deceased ex girlfriend.

your last question, I am unsure of the answer because I don't currently have a copy of the original paperwork, but I have requested that from the collections agency that is handling the remainder of the Loan. But I can explain a little more in detail. My father purchased the mobile home and the land at the same time from the same company, this company sells mobile homes and lots together. The mobile home they ordered was placed on the lot, so I'm not sure if it considered "legally attached."

 

[justalayman]

Well that changes things a lot. If the deed was held by the seller, presuming the contract was signed by both your father and his girlfriend, at most your father would have owned would be 50% but if the contract allowed for survivorship rights, it would have all gone to the girlfriend.

If title to the mobile home is still in your fathers name then his estate owns 1/2 the home, unless it to was held jointly with rights of survivorship which would mean girlfriend owned 100% at fathers death.

I would have to check how NC deals with attachment mobile homes but it sounds like they remained separate.

 

[helpingmyfather]

So if his girlfriend died, then the land and the trailer would go to my father..correct?

 

[helpingmyfather]

My father is still alive, its his ex girlfriend that died. Her husband, had the land deeded to him after her death.

 

[LdiJ]

My father is still alive, its his ex girlfriend that died. Her husband, had the land deeded to him after her death.

Your dad really needs to consult an attorney.


Depending on how everything was deeded/titled in the first place either your dad would own the land and trailer due to rights of survivorship, or your dad would own 50% and the husband of his ex would own the 50% that he inherited from his wife.

Something is definitely wrong here, because the husband should not have been able to deed the land in his name and should not have been able to refinance the trailer, and if he was somehow able to refinance the trailer, the bank should not be able to go after your dad.

 

[justalayman]

My father is still alive, its his ex girlfriend that died. Her husband, had the land deeded to him after her death.

My apologies.

As to the land being deeded to anybody from the original seller; Ldij is missing that fact. If the original seller retained title to the land it, to whom it could be deeded would be based on the contract involved. If they were both considered buyers (father and girlfriend), most likely it would go to father and girlfriend in some manner. Whether it be as joint tenants, joint tenants with rights of survivorship (those two may be the same. I have not checked the specific law on jt and jt wros) or as tenants in common. Father needs to consult the purchase contract.

As to ownership to the home; if title was transferred from the seller, again, it will depend on how title is held that will determine what happens.


Due to the complexities and possibilities, yes, father needs a lawyer to review everything. If you can find the answers to the implied questions above I'll be glad to poke at it a bit though.

 

[LdiJ]

My apologies.

As to the land being deeded to anybody from the original seller; Ldij is missing that fact. If the original seller retained title to the land it, to whom it could be deeded would be based on the contract involved. If they were both considered buyers (father and girlfriend), most likely it would go to father and girlfriend in some manner. Whether it be as joint tenants, joint tenants with rights of survivorship (those two may be the same. I have not checked the specific law on jt and jt wros) or as tenants in common. Father needs to consult the purchase contract.

How is that different than what I said? Its still going to boil down to dad either owning 50% of it or all of it.

As to ownership to the home; if title was transferred from the seller, again, it will depend on how title is held that will determine what happens.


Due to the complexities and possibilities, yes, father needs a lawyer to review everything. If you can find the answers to the implied questions above I'll be glad to poke at it a bit though.

I absolutely agree that dad needs an attorney. Something is terribly wrong here.

 

[justalayman]

How is that different than what I said? Its still going to boil down to dad either owning 50% of it or all of it.



.

Not necessarily. We have no idea what the conctract controlling the land says. It could allow myriad situations to be created. I can guess at the most likely but while it could demand some sort of joint ownership, just the same it could direct a transfer to only the girlfriend. I don't know what it says.



One thing that might be he situation the op is misinterpreting is the ownership he sees as remaining with the seller is actually a deed of trust. This is common in many states when financing real property. While the trust is technically the owner, the financing agreeement that created the trust directs the distribution of the asset upon payment of the debt.

 

[helpingmyfather]

Thanks guys for all your responses. The DMV states that the mobile home is registered to my father and the deceased girlfriend. The issue with the contract is that the company is no longer in business so I have reached out to the collections agency to get both copies of the original deed and their refinanced paperwork. I am hoping that the information they provide will be able to provide more clarity as to how he was able to refinance a loan after the girlfriend died in my father's name and on his credit. According to the local tax Department, once the land was paid off the deed stayed in the name of the original company because the trailer still had three years of payments left. But somehow after my father's ex-girlfriend died her husband went and had the land deeded to him. About a year after the land was deeded to her husband the company went out of business. Now collections is trying to get the refinance mortgage payments which are about $8,000 from my father. So I am sure they will have to have some type of documentation proving the amount of the loan so I'm hoping when I get those copies of that paperwork I can take them to an attorney so we can get it all straightened out. In the meantime her husband is living in the mobile home and he has been living there since 2014 and has not been making any payments or paying any kind of rent.
When I approached him with a lease agreement he refused to pay and told me to have the trailer removed off of his property which is basically how this whole thing got started because I was not aware that the property was in his name. From everything that I know and that has been said that property was deeded to him when it should not have been. According to my father who is the primary on the loan for both the property and the trailer, he states that when the original paperwork was filled out that the only beneficiaries of the property were each other. So if he passed away everything would go to her and if she passed away everything would go to him. So with that being said I didnt think her husband should have any claims to that property whatsoever regardless of whether or not he was married to her because she married him 11 years into the 15 year mortgage. The only question is that I was told that if he went to the company with her will, saying that she left the mobile home and the land to him that that may be the reason why they deeded the land to him. I'm not sure if she can leave property to him that technically doesn't belong to her.