Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good morning, Welcome to Life Happens. Are you prepared? This
is our weekly radio program where we address the challenges
we all face as we age. We talk about aging
as a lifestyle, the issues that must be confronted, and
the careful planning that's required to avoid crises in the future.
Life Happens will provide you with tools to educate and
prepare yourself for events like retirement, protecting your income and assets,
planning to pay for nursing, home and home care, special needs,
(00:22):
wills and trusts, and planning for an untimely death, as
well as resolving disputes in and out of court. I
am Aaron Connor from Pure O'Connor and Strauss. Good morning,
As I said, everyone, joined by a radio neophyte today,
Adriana Mahalik.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Good morning, Adriana, Good morning Aaron.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
So.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Adriana is a relatively new associate in our office. How
long has it been?
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Three months?
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Three months? Feels like longer? No, just kidding, no, it has,
but so whyt to just give some the listeners a
little of your law school or law career background.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Sure, so, I graduated law school in twenty twenty one
during my third actually my two l and my three
l years of law school. I interned at a firm
in Troy general practice, but there I got some experience
when it came to some estate planning, corporate work, real estate,
(01:21):
and some other litigation matters. I worked there upon graduation,
and then things took a turn for me, meaning I
kind of wanted to focus more in one area, sure,
to just really grow in my profession. I felt that
I wanted some mentorship guidance to grow in a certain area,
so I switched over to real estate law. I did
(01:42):
really enjoy real estate. I worked at a high volume
firm here in the Capital District for about three years,
and then, as luck would have it, I again wanted
to more focus on a different area and learn more.
For me, it was all about professional growth. I think
you need to expand the as you practice.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
In sure, so most people would consider real estate transactional. Right,
So someone comes to you, they're purchasing, they're selling. Usually
those are really I mean, they can be doing other
things maybe, but predominantly that's what you say. Predominantly, especially
from a consumer perspective. Yes, and you know, maybe later
(02:24):
on they'll ask, you know, can you do this? Will
or power of attorney, but general experience with people who
don't do documents like that on a regular basis, it's
not good. I'm sure we say this quite often on
the show. I certainly don't want to do a closing,
I can tell you that. So if we have to
(02:45):
for some reason do a closing in the office, that
we'll be going to Adriana Thansk.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
I'd be very happy too. You know, you could tell
right away when someone was not a real estate attorney.
It's it's very obvious and sometimes difficult to work with,
but like you said, transactional. But at the end of
the day day everyone has the same goal right to
get to the closing, So regardless you make it work.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
Too much math. I didn't really enjoy the math part.
I was always a good math student, but I really
never enjoyed it. I certainly didn't enjoy it when we
were talking about co tangents and as totes and you know, algorithms,
like you know, I didn't know that algorithms were going
to rule the world back then either, But it just
(03:26):
never really did anything for me.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
So the calculator became my best friend.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
So, but real estate math or real estate law does
involve a fair amount of math. So I think probably
you're doing less math now, but you are handling a
state administration cases and trust administration cases and office. So
there is some math, definitely, because we have to figure
out who's getting what. There's also math done when people
(03:55):
take commissions, which they are allowed to do either or
both in the document and under New York state law. Actually,
New York State law is pretty generous when it comes
to in a state commission, five thousand of the first
hundred thousand, four thousand of the next two hundred thousand,
and so on. It's a word problem again. Math, yes,
(04:18):
so there is that, But I mean you had some
exposure to this, you know, some small exposure to this,
and now it's your primary practice area, at least for now.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
I know you have some interest in doing some planning.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
I do some other things.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
So we'll let you learn the end I guess first. Right,
So in our world, learning state administration is particularly instructive
because you see how everything works or you see what
hasn't worked. Definitely, a lot of cases so we try
to keep people out of probate, right, And there's a
(05:01):
lot of confusion about what that means right there, are
people who think that they have a will so that
nothing goes to probate. That is one wrong So sorry
if I hurt your feelings had that thought, but that
you could not be more wrong about that. So when
we're doing a trust administration, hopefully people have given us
(05:22):
the information that we needed to make sure that everything
was tied to the trust. They've gone through the funding process,
and essentially we might be creating downstream trust which we
call beneficiary control trusts, which we probably should come up
with a better name for at some point. Yes, it's
a bloodline trust essentially, and I know a lot of
(05:42):
people like that terminology better. And it's an asset protected trust,
which is a big deal. So if your son or
daughter marries someone who is less than trustworthy or not
good with money, or I don't know, has terrible ideas,
(06:05):
you can protect the money from that purpose. So that
is a big part of what we do in the
office is protect downstream money because if I've learned anything,
the hard part is accumulating the money. When people inherit money,
very few people treat it as if it was money
that they earned themselves. They don't. They're much more willing
(06:27):
to spend inherited money in a lot of cases quickly,
so that can also be restricted if you so choose.
It's important to know. But if you don't do anything,
you have none of these options, and we end up
in what's called an administration, which is the absence of
a will. And we've had to counsel a lot of
(06:48):
people when a spouse and children exist that if there's
no will, everything doesn't go to the wife or my husband,
whoever it may be, which is surprising to most people,
but that's the way it is. And it can be
really messy if there are minor children, because then we
have to get guardians appointed, and you've dealt with some aftermaths.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
Of that, and the result of that is, you know, honestly,
that ends up costing the estate more money anyways, and
you know that's not necessarily their wrongdoing. Maybe they just
hadn't gotten around to that, but in the end, it's
a hurdle that they have to jump.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
Yeah. The only people who bank out in that situation
are lawyers. Yeah, and we know, we know how you
feel about lawyers, so we are we're trying to help you.
In the words of Jerry McGuire, help me help.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
You well to that point, I think we do a
very good job of advising our clients of actually funding
trusts because you know, since starting here, you know, three
months ago or so, I've been talking to some friends
of mine and everyone just thinks, oh, but I have
a trust, so my house is in the trust, Like, well, no,
you actually have to take the steps to title the
(07:57):
house into the name of the trust, or we're going
to be dealing with what Aaron is saying, going through
probate or if you don't have a well through probate,
but the administration side of it. So I think it's
very important to know that just because you have a trust,
you still have to take the steps to actually put.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Things in it that's right, and you know, at a
minimum and update beneficiary designations, right because not usually we
are not titling everything in the name of an irrevocable trust, right,
So if we're protecting assets depending on where you are
in life, how old you are, how healthy you are,
what your goals are. You know, the older you are,
(08:36):
the more we're going to tie into your trust. But
we're always leaving a bank account outside and that you
need to make sure has a beneficiary on it. If
you have a retirement account, you need to make sure
you have multiple layers of beneficiary on it. Unfortunately, we've
had a few cases where retirement accounts have had to
(08:57):
go to probate because they were either they were left
to no one or more typically they were left to
a spouse and no kagingent beneficiaries. And it's just a
nightmare that can easily be avoided.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Easily be avoided. I would say, you know, talking to
anyone like I say, now you know, friends, family, always
at a beneficiary or a joint owner if you know,
that's something you feel comfortable with, but in the end
it makes it easier for your loved ones after you pass.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Yeah, chewint owner can be tricky because if that gives
people right that other person rights to the account.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
At that very moment, they can wipe it out.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
That's right, and it has happened so and even in
a great situation, if you're giving a son or daughter,
you know, a joint account, then when a child, their child,
your grandchild goes to college, they would have to disclose
that as an asset of theirs as well. So that's
going to half count and that's not really ideal generally speaking,
(09:55):
although I mean I think the financially a world is
going to look a little different coming in the future
now with all these limits loans, et cetera. So, but
just something to be aware of, because I do think
a lot of people get tripped up on that.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
So what we're going to talk about today are really
a lot of real estate issues that come up related
to planning, whether that be how people own a property
and how sometimes multiple people own a property can still
end up in probate for just to share, which is
a nightmare, or issues in the States with properties which
(10:35):
there are many and not sometimes easy solutions. We also
probably will I think towards the end talk about vacation
properties and things we want to do with those and
how you can set that up not to be a problem,
because there are a lot of times those properties are
someone's life dream and they want to leave them to
(10:58):
their kids, but they're our competing interests, maybe geoggraphical differences
where one kid can't really use it very easily, or
one kid can't afford.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
One kid ends up paying for all of it, right.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
So those things need to be thought out and how
you do that. So we're going to be coming up
on our first break, but when we come back, we'll
delve into the different ways that people can own a
property deed wise at least first, and see the positives
and negatives, because it's not necessarily one is better than
(11:34):
another for any for all situations. It's not. But we
need to think about those things, and we need to
understand what might happen when we owned property with other
people upon one or another's death. So that's where we're going.
This is Life Happens Radio. I'm Aaron Connor from Pure
O'Connor and Strauss and we will be back right after
(11:54):
this break. Welcome back to Life Happens Radio. Aaron Buro
Connor and Strauss, joined by our I think newest associate
Adriana Mahalk. That will not be true soon, yeah, because
I keep calling them boys. I'm sure that they would
not love that. But young men. Have two young men
(12:18):
that will be starting with us soon that were law
clerks with us. So there they've decided that they like
what we do and want to do it, and so
we will be training them up and they will be
the newest people.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
Thank goodness, it's about time.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
So always always daunting being a young attorney people. Really
it's it's pretty stressful profession, especially when you're right out
of school, because you really have no idea. I mean, well,
and people call you out on it, right, I mean
you've learned a lot of things, but you've learned a
(12:56):
lot of things that you're never going to use as well.
I mean, depending on what area of practice you go in. Right,
you have to take criminal procedure, you have to take evidence. Well,
if you're doing a state planning, those things really don't
matter very much. Hopefully criminal procedure not at all. But
so you know, contracts marginally valuable in what we do,
(13:17):
but mostly, you know, the New York practice marginally valuable.
So they will have some knowledge, but it will be
incumbent on us and them to help them alone. They
will have a lot of resources, which is good. That
is not something that I had where I started. The
firm I started at was more like, here are your
twelve files for today, and you know figured out, Oh,
(13:41):
by the way, there's a court appearance. I wanted them tomorrow.
I'm sure it'll be fine. Thanks, thanks for that. So
we don't do it like that. Yeah, that was pretty old.
That was the old school way though there really wasn't
like a lot of mentorship necessarily not definitely not the
better way to do that.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
I think something too is just learning how to be
an attorney, and I think a lot of that is
client communication, sure as well. So I think i've you know,
had some background or some time to learn that. Yes,
and I'd like to think, you know, clients maybe might
not be going through whether it's this area or another
area of law, every day. They don't know necessarily the
ins and outs of what we're talking.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
About, and they might not be having their best day
because in a lot of our situations, either someone needs
long term care, they're not doing well physically, or they've
passed away, or in my case, we're maybe doing a
guardianship because they lost capacity and people are trying to
take advantage of them. So it's not necessarily that we
see people on their best day. We see a lot
(14:40):
of people doing proactive planning, and that's easier and better, frankly,
much more pleasant conversation. Although we still have to say
what happens when you die? Oh, and what happens if
your kids die? Right? I mean, so that part never
really is great, But you have to know who you're
talking to, commun location obviously very important, and what kind
(15:03):
of mood they might be in, you know, and how
you carry yourself in both how you deliver news, whether
it's good news or bad news, and how you carry
yourself in how you know what you're doing right. And
we don't put young people in a position where to
pretend they know what they're doing right. Someone else will
(15:24):
be there to help them through that, but it's important
that the attorney convey that their knowledge and experience in
the situation because it's comforting to people in.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
Our area too that you do actually care, like you
want to help them get through this difficult time.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
Yes, well, a lot of people can't grieve until after
this is state administration. I mean they're grieving along the way,
but there's no closure or finality why this is open
and the longer it takes, the longer they're going through
that process.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Right.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
So, I mean, we do play therapists a little bit
here and there. It's probably not my best skill, but
we do do it. So I had mentioned though that
there are different types of deeds because we're going to
talk about real estate, right and at least coming to
mind to me there's predominantly two types of holdings that
(16:16):
we see, joint tenants or tenants in common right.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
There's a special quote unquote tendency by entirety, right, which
means you're married, but it's really for all intents and
purposes of joint tenancy right right. So can you give
the listeners some ideas and differences between joint tenants and
tenants in common?
Speaker 2 (16:38):
Sure, I'd be happy to so the joint tenants with
right of survivorship. As Aaron said, it's similar to the
when you're taking title when you're married. That means that
when one of the title holders passes away, the survivor
becomes the automatic owner of the house under you don't
(16:58):
have to go through probate. In that instance, you don't
have to sign another deed, which I think a lot
of people think it's an automatic transfer of ownership.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
Yes, we say by operation of law.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
By operation of law, and then tenants in common differs
on the fact that when let's say the first one
passes away, their shared is not automatically, by operation of law,
transferred to the survivor. Instead, their share follows their estate
plan or goes to their next of ken If they
don't have an estate plan, right, so.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
That may and often cases goes to probate. Yes, right,
So we see this a lot in Sometimes people own
property and get married later. Well, it doesn't automatically convert
to a tendency by the entirety if you owned it
as tenants in common correct, So that can be a
big trip up to people. It's more often than not
(17:49):
we see siblings inherit property and decide to keep it.
And if you're five of you, you're going to own
it as tenants in common usually right. And this is
a conversation often having in planning consults, how do you
own that property? And then people look at me like,
what do you mean now I have a deed? Right? Well,
that's not the end of the answer, it's the beginning
(18:09):
of an answer. But more often than not, if five
people own it, it's tenants in common, and then when
somebody dies it goes to their estate.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
Right. I used to say a closing because typically you
know at the closing table where the seller signed the deed,
we're saying, how do you want to take title? And
I would explain the two you know, joint tenants with
right of survivorship, the other one to use the automatic
owner right with tenants in common. Let's say they're not married,
they don't have children. Does a survivor really want to
own it with the deceased mother in law or their
(18:44):
mother in law.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
So I've seen all that's very possible.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
And when I would say it like that, you know,
people took some time to consider it, and it was always,
for the most part, joint tenants with right of survivorship.
But it depends on each situation, like you were saying.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
Right, and I think a lot of time and this
inherited with inherited, that conversation doesn't happen, right. A lawyer
just prepares a deed, usually as tenants in common, because
that's the default, unless you really and once in a
while it is that these five people are joined tenants,
and then I have to explain, well, that's I call
that a winner take all scenario. Right, whoever survives gets
(19:23):
the whole property. And that's usually not the intent. It
may occasionally be that. I mean, if all five people
didn't have children, or all five people, you know, only
one of them had children that were interested maybe, but
generally speaking, you know, if five of you inherit mom
and Dad's house. You're not going to lead that entire
(19:44):
interest to the survivor of.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
Everybody depending on the situation.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
Right. And by the way, it's a good way to
end up with a lean on a property for several reasons. Yes,
someone doesn't pay property tax, right, and in that case
everybody owns a fifth, they all owe a fifth.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
Right.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
Somebody goes into a nursing home, they could lean their
portion of that property. One wrinkle though, from a medicaid
eligibility standpoint, is that if you own property with people
who refuse to sell it, it's exempt. Okay, So this
is like a it's not one that you want to
plan to rely on because it's not a good plan.
(20:28):
But if you and your brother own a property and
your brother's well and he says, now I'm not selling that,
then no one's going to buy your half interest. It's
not really marketable, so it's exempt. But if you and
your brother are similar ages and then he has a
problem and you have a problem, you have to sell
the property and you're in some financial difficulty. So it's
(20:54):
okay as a stop gap measure, but it's not something
you would proactively plan to you understood.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
So.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
Many many issues come up with these property ownerships. I
mean there's also deeds where people own the building attached
to the land but not the land right. And associations
we've had to transfer, mostly like lake associations. Okay, that's
(21:25):
becomes a little you know, strange. I did encounter a
beach house in New Jersey once where I don't know
which church. I don't know, but I want to say
it was a Protestant church owned all the land in
the town, literally all of it, yep. But there were
plenty of houses there and these people owned the house,
(21:46):
but they didn't own the land that the house was on. Yeah.
I would never really be comfortable with this scenario like
that in my own head. I mean, many years ago,
if local people might remember, there was a place along
the Mohawk and the Old Canal in Half Moon and
where Kraus's restaurant was, where there were a number of
(22:07):
houses there on the river. But those people did not
own the land. They only owned what they had put
on the land. And whoever owned Krauss or the land
at the time decided they were going to build big
apartments there and you needed to get off the land.
And it's not easy to move a house. I think
(22:29):
most of those people lost whatever they had built up
as far as the structure. Yeah, but it is kind
of foreseeable at the same.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Time too, right, I don't know who advised them.
Speaker 1 (22:40):
To exactly right. Better advice would be like and by
the way, no, those whatever they just wanted to build
never got approved. Oh wow, a messy situation, definitely so,
But it's just kind of Sometimes the most instructive things
are that bad decisions that other people have made. Right,
(23:02):
hopefully it's not your bad decisions. Better instructive they can be,
but those are things that you want to think about
before you look into things. That's why we have title reports.
That's why we figure out can this person actually convey
what they say they're conveying in a real estate transaction?
And maybe when we come back after the news, we'll
just talk briefly about that because I think that's important too.
(23:24):
There has been more recently quote deed fraud out there too,
so that's something that probably should just touch on because
I know a number of older people have brought that up.
So we're going to be coming up on the news
after that. We will continue to talk about real estate issues.
Related to estates. This is Life Happens Radio. I'm Aaron
(23:47):
Connor with Pier O'Connor and Strauss, and we'll be back
right after this. Welcome back to Life Happens Radio. Aaron Connor,
piro'connor and Strauss joined by new associate Adron Mahleik, and
we are talking about real estate issues, some problems, some solutions.
(24:09):
Hopefully we can give you some guidance so you don't
make mistakes that we've seen people make, and that can
be titling things incorrectly. It can be not thinking about
who might be receiving a share. Right. So if you
have a will and you leave something five ways and
somebody is then disabled at that time, we have a problem.
(24:32):
We're going to have a lawyer appointed for them, a
guardian at item to make sure that they're getting what
they're supposed to be getting. Or they're in a nursing home,
same treatment, or they're a minor, same treatment. So in
some cases you're leaving something to five kids, but one
of those kids predeceases you, So there are children step
up to take that share. They're miners. We have a problem.
(24:57):
Those are all reasons to use a trust because we
don't encounter guardian that items with a trust. So it's
important really to think about what you're doing, what might happen,
and a little more money upfront saves a lot more
money on the back end. I can say that confidently
after about fifteen years of doing this. So we encourage
(25:19):
you to do some planning, certainly if you want to
hear about how to avoid a nursing home and keep
your assets. We do have a seminar coming up on
August sixth at the East green Bush Library and also
on August thirteenth at the Gilderland Wis MCA. You can
get more information about those at our website that's puro
Law dot com, p I E R R Law dot com,
(25:42):
or you can always call the office five point eight
four five nine twenty one hundred or send an email
to info at puro law dot com. So that commercial
part is over when go back to talking about real estate,
So just from its most basic thing, you have to
(26:03):
make sure that the person you are purchasing from has
title to the property. And so what's generally done.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
To show that, well, typically there's a title searched done,
but even before that, what I saw a lot in
real estate, you know, whether it was the purchaser side
or the seller side was the purchaser would say, oh,
the seller's in a state, so all's fine, we'll get going.
(26:34):
And I said, well, we have to make sure we
get title insurance. Of course, Well why do I need that? Well,
just because someone passes away and they have a will
that named someone as their executor doesn't mean that that
person just automatically has the authority right to act on
me half of the estate or sell it. And I
think that is a big misconception that people do have. Sure,
(26:54):
I said, no, we need to make sure that they
actually went through the probate process. They've been given the
letters testamentary or administration right having the actual ownership or
the authority to actually sell the property. And I know
that's one thing that the title companies usually will require.
They want to see copies of all of those documents,
and via that title search, they'll look through the chain
(27:16):
of title make sure each person's ownership interest from you know,
dating back forty years, they have accurately conveyed their portion
of the property, and that there were no outstanding leans
or judgments hanging on there. Because if you buy a
house right with the leaner judgment, that becomes yours.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
That's right. So there's two I think important things there,
and we'll talk about the second thing first, and that's
leans or judgments. Right. So a lot of times we
see people had a mortgage, they paid off the mortgage,
but the release doesn't get filed yep, right, which can
be a problem. Has to be tracked down a lot
of the time. And in that the banking world, many
of these banks have been bought by other banks, so
(27:53):
sometimes it takes a long time to track that down.
Sometimes it's deemed an ancient mortgage, yes, which is not
really being over forty it's kind of offensive, you know,
forty years old is ancient, but you know that's how
it goes. So that's the terminology, yes, you know. So
(28:16):
it's important that none of those things are out there.
There are tax leans, there can be judgments.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
You know.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
One thing we haven't really touched on is life estate deeds.
And I as a firm, I along with Lou we
decided that we basically never do a life estate deed
because it doesn't really work very well. If you don't
get through or five year look back, you have to
have people sign back property to you, they may not
(28:44):
be around to do so. I had a case where
a woman put the remainder interest in her son. Her
son died and that remainder interest went to his spouse
and she wanted her remainder in back and the spouse said, no,
I'm good. Right, she has no legal obligation to give
(29:06):
it back, So it doesn't it doesn't work well that way.
I've also seen where there's four or five people with
the remainder interests and one gets a judgment it's a problem,
and it just is not it's a bad substitute. It's
kind of it's just it's just not something I'd ever
(29:27):
really be comfortable putting my name on, and unless there
was really really strange circumstances, so it's not a good idea.
Generally speaking, we don't do them. So you were talking
to my goats, you and I'm getting old. We talked
(29:48):
about that's right, leans, yes, right, oh, and we're talking
about ability to convey. Yes, oh, now I know. So
we have had deeds where people have carved out pieces. Right,
So right, so mom and dad have one hundred acres,
(30:09):
Johnny and his wife want to start have their own house.
So they give Johnny and his wife five acres, and
then they give their daughter and her husband five acres. Right,
it gets pretty complicated to figure out whose is what.
And so this has come up recently. A deed was
(30:29):
done that was supposed to convey everything I believe correct,
all right, title and interest, yes, right, but it did not.
So now we're in a state situation and we have
to figure out one what wasn't conveyed. Is there a
(30:51):
description for that piece of property? Yes, separately, Yeah, because
in some cases you might have to have a survey done,
a map done, and a new description created for that.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
I mean, I don't know how antiquated it is. If
someone's going to require updated one from the.
Speaker 1 (31:08):
Stone three feet off the road, you know, I mean
people though right from the tree with I don't know,
but that's really and then the safest thing to do
in those situations is just repeat that, because you can't
get anything wrong if you repeat it.
Speaker 2 (31:24):
No, but sometimes title requires an updated one, which no
one's happy to get a survey, but hey, you want
to know what your property lines are, where your boundary
lines are, and so that's in short as well.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
So and that can happen all the time. I can
tell the story that so the house that my grandparents
owned and that my dad grew up in was built
on a lot that was originally fountains for the house
next door. And that's that's a true story. Fountains fountains. Okay.
(31:54):
So the house next door was a manor house. This
is not in the South, it was. It was ins
Toga County, Okay. But you would walk in and there
was a giant staircase and there was a statue of like,
I don't know, a god or goddess, and the light
bulb was literally coming out of their hand. That was
like the light for the banister.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
So it was, you know, and there was a in
the back there was like a carriage house that I
was always told that during Prohibition was like a you know,
gam like a casino and b Yes. So that house
had a big stone fence, like you know, thick, big
pieces of block. And when they sold off the fountain lot,
(32:37):
I don't know what else to call it, and the
woman who built a house who owned it before my grandparents,
put like a Cape cod style house on it. That
fence covered the front part of her long. Okay, right,
So the fence was no longer the property line for
the for them, right, sure. And so my grandparents bought
that house in nineteen thirty nine and people then in
(33:00):
the late probably early nineties came and said that that
stone fence was on their property. Oh my, And I'm
really wonder what that lawyer was telling those people, because
that fence was well over one hundred years old at
that point.
Speaker 2 (33:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
So that's what's called adverse possession. And without getting overly complicated,
if you have something like that and it's over your
property line conspicuously for a period of time ten years, yes,
then you own that property, right And I don't know,
maybe they didn't care when they put the fence up,
(33:38):
who knows, right, Yeah, but by the time it was
over one hundred years ago, it didn't matter. First of all,
no one was moving the fence.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
No one could move Italy.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
Exactly, and it had been way too long. So I
just don't even know. And it's not a good way
to really introduce yourself to your neighbor. And we're talking
about an encroachment of possibly like one foot by six feet.
Maybe you know what I mean to do? Yeah, it's
not like a big deal.
Speaker 2 (34:06):
No, So.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
You know, getting a survey not a bad idea, but
you may find some things that you're unable to fix,
let's say too. And I mean, if you really want,
you could ad just a.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
Boundary line to reflect that you could, But I.
Speaker 1 (34:22):
Mean, I don't know that most people would go to
that trouble so anyway, So there are all sorts of
wild things that can happen. You know. The deeds that
don't convey everything or that accept a piece out always
make things more complicated and probably do require a title
(34:44):
report and a lot of these instances to be sure
we know who owns what. And lots of times people
come in and they own these little landlocked parcels next
to their parcel. They're not combined. We talk about combining them.
And that's certainly something that we combine things on deeds
(35:04):
a lot because from a medicaid perspective, your residence is
exempt if a well spouse is living in it. So
Dad needs to go to a nursing home. Mom's got
two or three parcels, but they all touch each other. Well,
we'll put them all on one deed because guess what,
now they're all exempt protected right, gotcha. So but like
(35:25):
those are tricks, I'm not sure. You know, most of
the time people have gone to trouble to separate parcels,
they can still do that. The deed just reflects that
there's three separate parcels and if they wanted to sell one,
they still could. But sometimes it's actually beneficial to put
them all on one deed for that medicaid purpose. So
(35:46):
when we're planning, we are also trying to think about
what might happen in the future and what the most
likely scenario is. I mean, nobody really knows, right, we're
just going to do it based on age, health assets,
existence of long term care insurance and whatever else. So
those those things are important. Those are discussions we should
have even you know, when we're doing deed work, like
(36:11):
Adrihanna said, are you going to hold this as tenants
in common or you know, join tenants? That that's important
and a lot of people just have no idea.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
I recently talked with a relative of mine and I
did get her consent to talk about this, but not
give too much confidential confidential information. You know, from a
prior marriage. She had one child her husband from a
prior marriage had two kids together. They had one, so
four kids altogether. In her will, she asked me to
(36:40):
take a look at it. She decided to reference all
the four kids as her children. You know, yeah, that
happens wonderful because you know, step kids typically don't have
any rights. Really is what we say in the will,
But really the only asset was the house, and it said,
you know, to to the four children per sturpies with
that language. We all like saying that if they predecease,
(37:02):
her goes to you know, their next of kin. And
I was thinking about it and one of the two
step children it's not married, no children, So I said, hmm, well,
let me think about this. If she were to predecease
for some reason, her share would go to her mother,
(37:23):
which is my relatives husband's ex wife.
Speaker 1 (37:27):
Oops.
Speaker 2 (37:28):
And I said, you know you were doing the right
thing there, but let's think about that now. Is that
going to happen? Who knows. But it's those little things
that you have to like, well, she have a share
in your house, you want your husband's ex wife. No,
that is not what she wanted. She had no idea
that was a you know, potential event that that could arise.
(37:48):
So granted she is having that document edited, but I
think that was interesting to think about.
Speaker 1 (37:54):
It and something she would have never considered. So I
think it's a good time to take the last break.
This is Life Happens Radio Aaron Connor, Apio, Connor and Strouss,
and we'll be back right after this. Welcome back to
Life Happens Radio. Aaron Connor, Apio, Conor, and Strauss joined
by associate Adriana Mahalek. We have been talking about real
(38:15):
estate issues with planning and estates, and I think probably
one of the biggest ones are vacation homes as we
kind of generically call them. It could be a lake property,
it could be a cabin. It could be I don't know,
a ranch, right, don't running too many ranches, but no,
(38:36):
not for me. You could own an island. I don't know,
that's right. So, you know a lot of people work
their life to make sure that they have a beach house,
you know, a lake house, whatever. It may be, a cabin.
And when I say cabin, we had clients a number
of years ago that were very wealthy people, very and
(38:59):
they had quote three cabins on their property that were
thirty two hundred square feet each. So I was like, yeah,
I don't know if i'd call that a cabin, but
you know what, they called it a cabin, So I
just had to roll with it. But those things can
be complicated assets to leave behind for many reasons. Right. Obviously,
(39:21):
the more people who have an interest in the property,
the more complicated it can be. So you have to
think about a number of things who might use this property, right,
Because if you have three kids and one of them
lives in Utah, they may use the property, but they
(39:43):
may not either, and two kids that are local, right,
it may set up a kind of an unfair dynamic
as far as goes. We also often have issues with funding.
Sometimes property taxes on an upkeep on a place on
a lake can be pretty expensive. Especially let's just say,
(40:06):
like if it's not a year round camp, right, you
have to open it up, you have to shut it down.
All of it has to be done correctly. You may
be employing somebody to do that. You know. There may
be maintenance, just in the form of I don't know,
long cutting if you have a lawn, right, and eventually
some things are going to need to be repaired, replaced,
(40:28):
and you have to kind of think of all that.
So in the best case scenario, people leave aside a
pot of money for that for a period of time. Right,
So I've seen people leave one hundred thousand dollars or
something to fund a property for a period of time,
whatever that may be. Right, some places, the taxes are
less than New York almost everywhere. So for instance, right
(40:52):
I hope to eventually own a piece of property in Delaware,
the property tax on a million dollar house in Delaware
somewhere between fifteen hundred and eighteen hundred dollars. Okay, significantly
different than you, very different. Okay. They do have a
small flip tax on the on the seller, usually.
Speaker 2 (41:13):
As more than the transfer tax.
Speaker 1 (41:16):
Yeah, okay, it's a two percent of the transaction.
Speaker 2 (41:21):
Huh.
Speaker 1 (41:21):
And I think it gets more often split between the
buyer and seller. But that all depends on the market.
Speaker 3 (41:28):
Right.
Speaker 1 (41:28):
If the market's down, the buyer is going to.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
Have to eat that one time fee though, Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1 (41:33):
Right, And if you know it's there, and I mean
even so, if it's a million dollar property, I think
you're talking about fifty thousand dollars, which is not nothing.
I'm not saying any way, shape or form. But if
you're spending a million dollars, it's probably not going to
stop you from spending so and if you're spending five
hundred thousand, then it's it's half that, right, and it's
(41:54):
you know, it's just one of those things. Like when
my parents bought a house in the villages, there was
also a bond that they had to then take on
a portion of because that's how the villages were built
through bonds, and then the builder of the villages passed
the savings or the expense in this case of the
bond onto everybody who bought, which is you know, smart.
Speaker 2 (42:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:17):
So, and most people have paid off their bond well
and ahead of their house if they didn't, if they
got a mortgage.
Speaker 2 (42:25):
Right.
Speaker 1 (42:26):
So there's all sorts of little things in different places
that you need to think about too, you know. And
even here like in Sacondaga, a lot of people buy
places and they want to knock them down. Yeah, and
that is not necessarily as easy as you might think.
The stories I've heard is generally you have to keep
one wall something like that. I don't I'm not going
(42:46):
on record as saying that that's the rule, but there
are rules about what you can do and what you
can do, and you can't necessarily just put up a
giant house on the property that you you've knocked in.
Speaker 2 (42:58):
And I think too, you know a lot of them.
I don't know if people just presume that they automatically
have lake rights or anything like that, but you actually
or dock rights. Do you have deeded lake rights saying
you can cross over this person's property to get down
to the lake.
Speaker 1 (43:11):
Or and let's talk about that for a second. Okay,
how exciting is that? Like if you're the person on
the lake and these people get to traverse your property
like you're having a party and they're just gonna hey,
you having a party?
Speaker 2 (43:22):
And who maintains that right? Like that's always the question.
I feel like I don't love that dive deeper into Yes.
Speaker 1 (43:29):
You need to be cognizant of those things.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
Just can't take someone's word that oh yeah, sure, yeah
you can. You got access to that dock right there.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
Yeah, No, it's very important. And you know, functionally when
people have access across your property to the water is
not great, no, because there's usually that could be at
any time of day or nine, at any time of year,
there's very little restriction, and that's usually done as an easement,
but I don't know, it could be done as probably
a license or other things too. Sure, so lots of
(44:00):
things to think about. Our best strategy for passing on
a vacation home, though, is to put it in an
LLC with an operating agreement. And maybe at the first
generation it isn't so bad. Right, if it's just two kids,
(44:21):
they can probably figure it out. Maybe they can even
be there together at the same time, right, depending on
how get along. Right it's fourth of July weekend, because
those things become important.
Speaker 2 (44:33):
Sure, who gets it that holiday?
Speaker 3 (44:35):
Right?
Speaker 1 (44:35):
But next generation it can be a little trickier, right,
because there might be six hands in the till at
that point, and they might be in many many different
places and again many different affordability levels. So when we
do that, we create an operating agreement that one allows
for a structure of determining who has it when. Right,
(44:56):
there's usually some kind of rotating system about who has
it Fourth of July, Labor Day, Memorial Day, that kind
of thing. There is verbiage about what happens when people
don't pay their share. Usually what happens is it diminishes
their interests by that amount, right, So that can become
(45:18):
kind of a tricky thing because there can be room
for dispute there. Right, I say you owe five thousand,
You say, well, I think it's only three thousand. I
mean in that area, we're not talking about anything that's
worth really disputing in a legal sense. Right, There's definitely
plenty of room for hurt feelings no matter what. So
(45:41):
there are a lot of things that it's not just
as simple of here. Here's the lake house because and
you know, some people want to restrict whether it can
be sold or not too yes, right, yeah, they think
of this as their legacy or their family house in
the family, right, And you know that may or may
not be. And it also depends on what other assets
(46:02):
there are. So if you have this million dollar lakehouse
and your other assets total less than a million dollars,
then more likely than not, one kid is not taking
the lakehouse, yeah, right, unless they have a pool of
other money to pull from, and it might have to
get sold. So it's in and even many people we
(46:26):
see now bought a property, let's say on Sacondaga, for
a number that was very low compared to today and
if you know their child had to buy out of
that property, they probably might not be able to do that.
You may see somebody who paid fifty and it's worth
three fifty, right.
Speaker 2 (46:47):
I mean, something I think to consider as well is
the fact that you know, in New York, when someone
passes the ownership interest immediately vests in the airs. Granted,
it's subject to the administration the estate. But so if
the executor, you know, you think you have the authority
to sell the house, do whatever. Well, when it comes
(47:07):
time when you're at the closing table, those heirs are
going to be required to sign off on those documents
saying that they agree for it to be sold as well.
Speaker 1 (47:15):
Right, And we only have a couple of minutes of left,
but I do think we should briefly touch on when
there is an heir living in the property. Please, in
respects try to avoid that situation because generally speaking, that
person does not want to pay they honestly, they owe
(47:36):
rent to the estate yep, okay, which almost never gets paid.
Speaker 3 (47:41):
Someone needs to be paying taxes exactly, and a lot
of cases that person wants the house, right, But the
only way to do that fairly is to get a
real appraisal and then subtract whatever their share would be
from that, and they have to pay the rest.
Speaker 1 (47:58):
And you know, in some of these he says, there's
a mortgage involved as well, and who's paying the mortgage nobody,
So then we we have a foreclosure issue which can
probably be averted, but you know, probably we have a
lot of stress in these situations and diminishing equity.
Speaker 2 (48:16):
And then you know, are they just they're going to say,
well then a.
Speaker 1 (48:18):
Victim, right, which we know is almost impossible, right, I mean.
Speaker 2 (48:24):
A lot of time and money.
Speaker 1 (48:25):
Yes, it's just not I don't know, it's not a
good time to be a property landlord unfortunately. So no
no political commentary there, just that if you are trying
to get somebody out for nonpayment, it's a very difficult
time to do that. Buckle up, yes, and get your
check book out from all the rent you're not getting paid.
(48:46):
So certainly some things to avoid. So just to recap,
do some planning, right, Know what your deed says. If
you're a tenant in common and you want asset to
go to your estate, okay, you can be a tenant
in common and assign that asset that portion of your
(49:06):
asset to a trust, which can help quite a bit
at least for your planning. Doesn't help the other tenants
in common, but they need to do their own trust.
So come on in, let's do five trusts. If you
are a tenant by tendancy by the entirety, then you're
probably going to be okay, assuming that's what you want,
winner take all or a husband and wife. If you
(49:28):
have other property issues, then we need to have you
come in. We need to talk them out to find
what the best solution is because there's no one solution
for everybody. If you have any questions, we're happy to
meet with you. Five eight four nine hundred Pure O'Connor
and Strauss Aaron Connor. We'll be back next week. Have
a great weekend, everybody,
Good morning, Welcome to Life Happens. Are you prepared? This
is our weekly radio program where we address the challenges
we all face as we age. We talk about aging
as a lifestyle, the issues that must be confronted, and
the careful planning that's required to avoid crises in the future.
Life Happens will provide you with tools to educate and
prepare yourself for events like retirement, protecting your income and assets,
planning to pay for nursing, home and home care, special needs,
(00:22):
wills and trusts, and planning for an untimely death, as
well as resolving disputes in and out of court. I
am Aaron Connor from Pure O'Connor and Strauss. Good morning,
As I said, everyone, joined by a radio neophyte today,
Adriana Mahalik.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Good morning, Adriana, Good morning Aaron.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
So.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Adriana is a relatively new associate in our office. How
long has it been?
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Three months?
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Three months? Feels like longer? No, just kidding, no, it has,
but so whyt to just give some the listeners a
little of your law school or law career background.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Sure, so, I graduated law school in twenty twenty one
during my third actually my two l and my three
l years of law school. I interned at a firm
in Troy general practice, but there I got some experience
when it came to some estate planning, corporate work, real estate,
(01:21):
and some other litigation matters. I worked there upon graduation,
and then things took a turn for me, meaning I
kind of wanted to focus more in one area, sure,
to just really grow in my profession. I felt that
I wanted some mentorship guidance to grow in a certain area,
so I switched over to real estate law. I did
(01:42):
really enjoy real estate. I worked at a high volume
firm here in the Capital District for about three years,
and then, as luck would have it, I again wanted
to more focus on a different area and learn more.
For me, it was all about professional growth. I think
you need to expand the as you practice.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
In sure, so most people would consider real estate transactional. Right,
So someone comes to you, they're purchasing, they're selling. Usually
those are really I mean, they can be doing other
things maybe, but predominantly that's what you say. Predominantly, especially
from a consumer perspective. Yes, and you know, maybe later
(02:24):
on they'll ask, you know, can you do this? Will
or power of attorney, but general experience with people who
don't do documents like that on a regular basis, it's
not good. I'm sure we say this quite often on
the show. I certainly don't want to do a closing,
I can tell you that. So if we have to
(02:45):
for some reason do a closing in the office, that
we'll be going to Adriana Thansk.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
I'd be very happy too. You know, you could tell
right away when someone was not a real estate attorney.
It's it's very obvious and sometimes difficult to work with,
but like you said, transactional. But at the end of
the day day everyone has the same goal right to
get to the closing, So regardless you make it work.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
Too much math. I didn't really enjoy the math part.
I was always a good math student, but I really
never enjoyed it. I certainly didn't enjoy it when we
were talking about co tangents and as totes and you know, algorithms,
like you know, I didn't know that algorithms were going
to rule the world back then either, But it just
(03:26):
never really did anything for me.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
So the calculator became my best friend.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
So, but real estate math or real estate law does
involve a fair amount of math. So I think probably
you're doing less math now, but you are handling a
state administration cases and trust administration cases and office. So
there is some math, definitely, because we have to figure
out who's getting what. There's also math done when people
(03:55):
take commissions, which they are allowed to do either or
both in the document and under New York state law. Actually,
New York State law is pretty generous when it comes
to in a state commission, five thousand of the first
hundred thousand, four thousand of the next two hundred thousand,
and so on. It's a word problem again. Math, yes,
(04:18):
so there is that, But I mean you had some
exposure to this, you know, some small exposure to this,
and now it's your primary practice area, at least for now.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (04:33):
I know you have some interest in doing some planning.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
I do some other things.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
So we'll let you learn the end I guess first. Right,
So in our world, learning state administration is particularly instructive
because you see how everything works or you see what
hasn't worked. Definitely, a lot of cases so we try
to keep people out of probate, right, And there's a
(05:01):
lot of confusion about what that means right there, are
people who think that they have a will so that
nothing goes to probate. That is one wrong So sorry
if I hurt your feelings had that thought, but that
you could not be more wrong about that. So when
we're doing a trust administration, hopefully people have given us
(05:22):
the information that we needed to make sure that everything
was tied to the trust. They've gone through the funding process,
and essentially we might be creating downstream trust which we
call beneficiary control trusts, which we probably should come up
with a better name for at some point. Yes, it's
a bloodline trust essentially, and I know a lot of
(05:42):
people like that terminology better. And it's an asset protected trust,
which is a big deal. So if your son or
daughter marries someone who is less than trustworthy or not
good with money, or I don't know, has terrible ideas,
(06:05):
you can protect the money from that purpose. So that
is a big part of what we do in the
office is protect downstream money because if I've learned anything,
the hard part is accumulating the money. When people inherit money,
very few people treat it as if it was money
that they earned themselves. They don't. They're much more willing
(06:27):
to spend inherited money in a lot of cases quickly,
so that can also be restricted if you so choose.
It's important to know. But if you don't do anything,
you have none of these options, and we end up
in what's called an administration, which is the absence of
a will. And we've had to counsel a lot of
(06:48):
people when a spouse and children exist that if there's
no will, everything doesn't go to the wife or my husband,
whoever it may be, which is surprising to most people,
but that's the way it is. And it can be
really messy if there are minor children, because then we
have to get guardians appointed, and you've dealt with some aftermaths.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
Of that, and the result of that is, you know, honestly,
that ends up costing the estate more money anyways, and
you know that's not necessarily their wrongdoing. Maybe they just
hadn't gotten around to that, but in the end, it's
a hurdle that they have to jump.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
Yeah. The only people who bank out in that situation
are lawyers. Yeah, and we know, we know how you
feel about lawyers, so we are we're trying to help you.
In the words of Jerry McGuire, help me help.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
You well to that point, I think we do a
very good job of advising our clients of actually funding
trusts because you know, since starting here, you know, three
months ago or so, I've been talking to some friends
of mine and everyone just thinks, oh, but I have
a trust, so my house is in the trust, Like, well, no,
you actually have to take the steps to title the
(07:57):
house into the name of the trust, or we're going
to be dealing with what Aaron is saying, going through
probate or if you don't have a well through probate,
but the administration side of it. So I think it's
very important to know that just because you have a trust,
you still have to take the steps to actually put.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Things in it that's right, and you know, at a
minimum and update beneficiary designations, right because not usually we
are not titling everything in the name of an irrevocable trust, right,
So if we're protecting assets depending on where you are
in life, how old you are, how healthy you are,
what your goals are. You know, the older you are,
(08:36):
the more we're going to tie into your trust. But
we're always leaving a bank account outside and that you
need to make sure has a beneficiary on it. If
you have a retirement account, you need to make sure
you have multiple layers of beneficiary on it. Unfortunately, we've
had a few cases where retirement accounts have had to
(08:57):
go to probate because they were either they were left
to no one or more typically they were left to
a spouse and no kagingent beneficiaries. And it's just a
nightmare that can easily be avoided.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Easily be avoided. I would say, you know, talking to
anyone like I say, now you know, friends, family, always
at a beneficiary or a joint owner if you know,
that's something you feel comfortable with, but in the end
it makes it easier for your loved ones after you pass.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Yeah, chewint owner can be tricky because if that gives
people right that other person rights to the account.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
At that very moment, they can wipe it out.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
That's right, and it has happened so and even in
a great situation, if you're giving a son or daughter,
you know, a joint account, then when a child, their child,
your grandchild goes to college, they would have to disclose
that as an asset of theirs as well. So that's
going to half count and that's not really ideal generally speaking,
(09:55):
although I mean I think the financially a world is
going to look a little different coming in the future
now with all these limits loans, et cetera. So, but
just something to be aware of, because I do think
a lot of people get tripped up on that.
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
So what we're going to talk about today are really
a lot of real estate issues that come up related
to planning, whether that be how people own a property
and how sometimes multiple people own a property can still
end up in probate for just to share, which is
a nightmare, or issues in the States with properties which
(10:35):
there are many and not sometimes easy solutions. We also
probably will I think towards the end talk about vacation
properties and things we want to do with those and
how you can set that up not to be a problem,
because there are a lot of times those properties are
someone's life dream and they want to leave them to
(10:58):
their kids, but they're our competing interests, maybe geoggraphical differences
where one kid can't really use it very easily, or
one kid can't afford.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
One kid ends up paying for all of it, right.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
So those things need to be thought out and how
you do that. So we're going to be coming up
on our first break, but when we come back, we'll
delve into the different ways that people can own a
property deed wise at least first, and see the positives
and negatives, because it's not necessarily one is better than
(11:34):
another for any for all situations. It's not. But we
need to think about those things, and we need to
understand what might happen when we owned property with other
people upon one or another's death. So that's where we're going.
This is Life Happens Radio. I'm Aaron Connor from Pure
O'Connor and Strauss and we will be back right after
(11:54):
this break. Welcome back to Life Happens Radio. Aaron Buro
Connor and Strauss, joined by our I think newest associate
Adriana Mahalk. That will not be true soon, yeah, because
I keep calling them boys. I'm sure that they would
not love that. But young men. Have two young men
(12:18):
that will be starting with us soon that were law
clerks with us. So there they've decided that they like
what we do and want to do it, and so
we will be training them up and they will be
the newest people.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
Thank goodness, it's about time.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
So always always daunting being a young attorney people. Really
it's it's pretty stressful profession, especially when you're right out
of school, because you really have no idea. I mean, well,
and people call you out on it, right, I mean
you've learned a lot of things, but you've learned a
(12:56):
lot of things that you're never going to use as well.
I mean, depending on what area of practice you go in. Right,
you have to take criminal procedure, you have to take evidence. Well,
if you're doing a state planning, those things really don't
matter very much. Hopefully criminal procedure not at all. But
so you know, contracts marginally valuable in what we do,
(13:17):
but mostly, you know, the New York practice marginally valuable.
So they will have some knowledge, but it will be
incumbent on us and them to help them alone. They
will have a lot of resources, which is good. That
is not something that I had where I started. The
firm I started at was more like, here are your
twelve files for today, and you know figured out, Oh,
(13:41):
by the way, there's a court appearance. I wanted them tomorrow.
I'm sure it'll be fine. Thanks, thanks for that. So
we don't do it like that. Yeah, that was pretty old.
That was the old school way though there really wasn't
like a lot of mentorship necessarily not definitely not the
better way to do that.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
I think something too is just learning how to be
an attorney, and I think a lot of that is
client communication, sure as well. So I think i've you know,
had some background or some time to learn that. Yes,
and I'd like to think, you know, clients maybe might
not be going through whether it's this area or another
area of law, every day. They don't know necessarily the
ins and outs of what we're talking.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
About, and they might not be having their best day
because in a lot of our situations, either someone needs
long term care, they're not doing well physically, or they've
passed away, or in my case, we're maybe doing a
guardianship because they lost capacity and people are trying to
take advantage of them. So it's not necessarily that we
see people on their best day. We see a lot
(14:40):
of people doing proactive planning, and that's easier and better, frankly,
much more pleasant conversation. Although we still have to say
what happens when you die? Oh, and what happens if
your kids die? Right? I mean, so that part never
really is great, But you have to know who you're
talking to, commun location obviously very important, and what kind
(15:03):
of mood they might be in, you know, and how
you carry yourself in both how you deliver news, whether
it's good news or bad news, and how you carry
yourself in how you know what you're doing right. And
we don't put young people in a position where to
pretend they know what they're doing right. Someone else will
(15:24):
be there to help them through that, but it's important
that the attorney convey that their knowledge and experience in
the situation because it's comforting to people in.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
Our area too that you do actually care, like you
want to help them get through this difficult time.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
Yes, well, a lot of people can't grieve until after
this is state administration. I mean they're grieving along the way,
but there's no closure or finality why this is open
and the longer it takes, the longer they're going through
that process.
Speaker 2 (15:54):
Right.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
So, I mean, we do play therapists a little bit
here and there. It's probably not my best skill, but
we do do it. So I had mentioned though that
there are different types of deeds because we're going to
talk about real estate, right and at least coming to
mind to me there's predominantly two types of holdings that
(16:16):
we see, joint tenants or tenants in common right.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
There's a special quote unquote tendency by entirety, right, which
means you're married, but it's really for all intents and
purposes of joint tenancy right right. So can you give
the listeners some ideas and differences between joint tenants and
tenants in common?
Speaker 2 (16:38):
Sure, I'd be happy to so the joint tenants with
right of survivorship. As Aaron said, it's similar to the
when you're taking title when you're married. That means that
when one of the title holders passes away, the survivor
becomes the automatic owner of the house under you don't
(16:58):
have to go through probate. In that instance, you don't
have to sign another deed, which I think a lot
of people think it's an automatic transfer of ownership.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
Yes, we say by operation of law.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
By operation of law, and then tenants in common differs
on the fact that when let's say the first one
passes away, their shared is not automatically, by operation of law,
transferred to the survivor. Instead, their share follows their estate
plan or goes to their next of ken If they
don't have an estate plan, right, so.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
That may and often cases goes to probate. Yes, right,
So we see this a lot in Sometimes people own
property and get married later. Well, it doesn't automatically convert
to a tendency by the entirety if you owned it
as tenants in common correct, So that can be a
big trip up to people. It's more often than not
(17:49):
we see siblings inherit property and decide to keep it.
And if you're five of you, you're going to own
it as tenants in common usually right. And this is
a conversation often having in planning consults, how do you
own that property? And then people look at me like,
what do you mean now I have a deed? Right? Well,
that's not the end of the answer, it's the beginning
(18:09):
of an answer. But more often than not, if five
people own it, it's tenants in common, and then when
somebody dies it goes to their estate.
Speaker 2 (18:22):
Right. I used to say a closing because typically you
know at the closing table where the seller signed the deed,
we're saying, how do you want to take title? And
I would explain the two you know, joint tenants with
right of survivorship, the other one to use the automatic
owner right with tenants in common. Let's say they're not married,
they don't have children. Does a survivor really want to
own it with the deceased mother in law or their
(18:44):
mother in law.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
So I've seen all that's very possible.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
And when I would say it like that, you know,
people took some time to consider it, and it was always,
for the most part, joint tenants with right of survivorship.
But it depends on each situation, like you were saying.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
Right, and I think a lot of time and this
inherited with inherited, that conversation doesn't happen, right. A lawyer
just prepares a deed, usually as tenants in common, because
that's the default, unless you really and once in a
while it is that these five people are joined tenants,
and then I have to explain, well, that's I call
that a winner take all scenario. Right, whoever survives gets
(19:23):
the whole property. And that's usually not the intent. It
may occasionally be that. I mean, if all five people
didn't have children, or all five people, you know, only
one of them had children that were interested maybe, but
generally speaking, you know, if five of you inherit mom
and Dad's house. You're not going to lead that entire
(19:44):
interest to the survivor of.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
Everybody depending on the situation.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
Right. And by the way, it's a good way to
end up with a lean on a property for several reasons. Yes,
someone doesn't pay property tax, right, and in that case
everybody owns a fifth, they all owe a fifth.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
Right.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
Somebody goes into a nursing home, they could lean their
portion of that property. One wrinkle though, from a medicaid
eligibility standpoint, is that if you own property with people
who refuse to sell it, it's exempt. Okay, So this
is like a it's not one that you want to
plan to rely on because it's not a good plan.
(20:28):
But if you and your brother own a property and
your brother's well and he says, now I'm not selling that,
then no one's going to buy your half interest. It's
not really marketable, so it's exempt. But if you and
your brother are similar ages and then he has a
problem and you have a problem, you have to sell
the property and you're in some financial difficulty. So it's
(20:54):
okay as a stop gap measure, but it's not something
you would proactively plan to you understood.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
So.
Speaker 1 (21:04):
Many many issues come up with these property ownerships. I
mean there's also deeds where people own the building attached
to the land but not the land right. And associations
we've had to transfer, mostly like lake associations. Okay, that's
(21:25):
becomes a little you know, strange. I did encounter a
beach house in New Jersey once where I don't know
which church. I don't know, but I want to say
it was a Protestant church owned all the land in
the town, literally all of it, yep. But there were
plenty of houses there and these people owned the house,
(21:46):
but they didn't own the land that the house was on. Yeah.
I would never really be comfortable with this scenario like
that in my own head. I mean, many years ago,
if local people might remember, there was a place along
the Mohawk and the Old Canal in Half Moon and
where Kraus's restaurant was, where there were a number of
(22:07):
houses there on the river. But those people did not
own the land. They only owned what they had put
on the land. And whoever owned Krauss or the land
at the time decided they were going to build big
apartments there and you needed to get off the land.
And it's not easy to move a house. I think
(22:29):
most of those people lost whatever they had built up
as far as the structure. Yeah, but it is kind
of foreseeable at the same.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Time too, right, I don't know who advised them.
Speaker 1 (22:40):
To exactly right. Better advice would be like and by
the way, no, those whatever they just wanted to build
never got approved. Oh wow, a messy situation, definitely so,
But it's just kind of Sometimes the most instructive things
are that bad decisions that other people have made. Right,
(23:02):
hopefully it's not your bad decisions. Better instructive they can be,
but those are things that you want to think about
before you look into things. That's why we have title reports.
That's why we figure out can this person actually convey
what they say they're conveying in a real estate transaction?
And maybe when we come back after the news, we'll
just talk briefly about that because I think that's important too.
(23:24):
There has been more recently quote deed fraud out there too,
so that's something that probably should just touch on because
I know a number of older people have brought that up.
So we're going to be coming up on the news
after that. We will continue to talk about real estate issues.
Related to estates. This is Life Happens Radio. I'm Aaron
(23:47):
Connor with Pier O'Connor and Strauss, and we'll be back
right after this. Welcome back to Life Happens Radio. Aaron Connor,
piro'connor and Strauss joined by new associate Adron Mahleik, and
we are talking about real estate issues, some problems, some solutions.
(24:09):
Hopefully we can give you some guidance so you don't
make mistakes that we've seen people make, and that can
be titling things incorrectly. It can be not thinking about
who might be receiving a share. Right. So if you
have a will and you leave something five ways and
somebody is then disabled at that time, we have a problem.
(24:32):
We're going to have a lawyer appointed for them, a
guardian at item to make sure that they're getting what
they're supposed to be getting. Or they're in a nursing home,
same treatment, or they're a minor, same treatment. So in
some cases you're leaving something to five kids, but one
of those kids predeceases you, So there are children step
up to take that share. They're miners. We have a problem.
(24:57):
Those are all reasons to use a trust because we
don't encounter guardian that items with a trust. So it's
important really to think about what you're doing, what might happen,
and a little more money upfront saves a lot more
money on the back end. I can say that confidently
after about fifteen years of doing this. So we encourage
(25:19):
you to do some planning, certainly if you want to
hear about how to avoid a nursing home and keep
your assets. We do have a seminar coming up on
August sixth at the East green Bush Library and also
on August thirteenth at the Gilderland Wis MCA. You can
get more information about those at our website that's puro
Law dot com, p I E R R Law dot com,
(25:42):
or you can always call the office five point eight
four five nine twenty one hundred or send an email
to info at puro law dot com. So that commercial
part is over when go back to talking about real estate,
So just from its most basic thing, you have to
(26:03):
make sure that the person you are purchasing from has
title to the property. And so what's generally done.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
To show that, well, typically there's a title searched done,
but even before that, what I saw a lot in
real estate, you know, whether it was the purchaser side
or the seller side was the purchaser would say, oh,
the seller's in a state, so all's fine, we'll get going.
(26:34):
And I said, well, we have to make sure we
get title insurance. Of course, Well why do I need that? Well,
just because someone passes away and they have a will
that named someone as their executor doesn't mean that that
person just automatically has the authority right to act on
me half of the estate or sell it. And I
think that is a big misconception that people do have. Sure,
(26:54):
I said, no, we need to make sure that they
actually went through the probate process. They've been given the
letters testamentary or administration right having the actual ownership or
the authority to actually sell the property. And I know
that's one thing that the title companies usually will require.
They want to see copies of all of those documents,
and via that title search, they'll look through the chain
(27:16):
of title make sure each person's ownership interest from you know,
dating back forty years, they have accurately conveyed their portion
of the property, and that there were no outstanding leans
or judgments hanging on there. Because if you buy a
house right with the leaner judgment, that becomes yours.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
That's right. So there's two I think important things there,
and we'll talk about the second thing first, and that's
leans or judgments. Right. So a lot of times we
see people had a mortgage, they paid off the mortgage,
but the release doesn't get filed yep, right, which can
be a problem. Has to be tracked down a lot
of the time. And in that the banking world, many
of these banks have been bought by other banks, so
(27:53):
sometimes it takes a long time to track that down.
Sometimes it's deemed an ancient mortgage, yes, which is not
really being over forty it's kind of offensive, you know,
forty years old is ancient, but you know that's how
it goes. So that's the terminology, yes, you know. So
(28:16):
it's important that none of those things are out there.
There are tax leans, there can be judgments.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
You know.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
One thing we haven't really touched on is life estate deeds.
And I as a firm, I along with Lou we
decided that we basically never do a life estate deed
because it doesn't really work very well. If you don't
get through or five year look back, you have to
have people sign back property to you, they may not
(28:44):
be around to do so. I had a case where
a woman put the remainder interest in her son. Her
son died and that remainder interest went to his spouse
and she wanted her remainder in back and the spouse said, no,
I'm good. Right, she has no legal obligation to give
(29:06):
it back, So it doesn't it doesn't work well that way.
I've also seen where there's four or five people with
the remainder interests and one gets a judgment it's a problem,
and it just is not it's a bad substitute. It's
kind of it's just it's just not something I'd ever
(29:27):
really be comfortable putting my name on, and unless there
was really really strange circumstances, so it's not a good idea.
Generally speaking, we don't do them. So you were talking
to my goats, you and I'm getting old. We talked
(29:48):
about that's right, leans, yes, right, oh, and we're talking
about ability to convey. Yes, oh, now I know. So
we have had deeds where people have carved out pieces. Right,
So right, so mom and dad have one hundred acres,
(30:09):
Johnny and his wife want to start have their own house.
So they give Johnny and his wife five acres, and
then they give their daughter and her husband five acres. Right,
it gets pretty complicated to figure out whose is what.
And so this has come up recently. A deed was
(30:29):
done that was supposed to convey everything I believe correct,
all right, title and interest, yes, right, but it did not.
So now we're in a state situation and we have
to figure out one what wasn't conveyed. Is there a
(30:51):
description for that piece of property? Yes, separately, Yeah, because
in some cases you might have to have a survey done,
a map done, and a new description created for that.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
I mean, I don't know how antiquated it is. If
someone's going to require updated one from the.
Speaker 1 (31:08):
Stone three feet off the road, you know, I mean
people though right from the tree with I don't know,
but that's really and then the safest thing to do
in those situations is just repeat that, because you can't
get anything wrong if you repeat it.
Speaker 2 (31:24):
No, but sometimes title requires an updated one, which no
one's happy to get a survey, but hey, you want
to know what your property lines are, where your boundary
lines are, and so that's in short as well.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
So and that can happen all the time. I can
tell the story that so the house that my grandparents
owned and that my dad grew up in was built
on a lot that was originally fountains for the house
next door. And that's that's a true story. Fountains fountains. Okay.
(31:54):
So the house next door was a manor house. This
is not in the South, it was. It was ins
Toga County, Okay. But you would walk in and there
was a giant staircase and there was a statue of like,
I don't know, a god or goddess, and the light
bulb was literally coming out of their hand. That was
like the light for the banister.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
So it was, you know, and there was a in
the back there was like a carriage house that I
was always told that during Prohibition was like a you know,
gam like a casino and b Yes. So that house
had a big stone fence, like you know, thick, big
pieces of block. And when they sold off the fountain lot,
(32:37):
I don't know what else to call it, and the
woman who built a house who owned it before my grandparents,
put like a Cape cod style house on it. That
fence covered the front part of her long. Okay, right,
So the fence was no longer the property line for
the for them, right, sure. And so my grandparents bought
that house in nineteen thirty nine and people then in
(33:00):
the late probably early nineties came and said that that
stone fence was on their property. Oh my, And I'm
really wonder what that lawyer was telling those people, because
that fence was well over one hundred years old at
that point.
Speaker 2 (33:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (33:16):
So that's what's called adverse possession. And without getting overly complicated,
if you have something like that and it's over your
property line conspicuously for a period of time ten years, yes,
then you own that property, right And I don't know,
maybe they didn't care when they put the fence up,
(33:38):
who knows, right, Yeah, but by the time it was
over one hundred years ago, it didn't matter. First of all,
no one was moving the fence.
Speaker 2 (33:46):
No one could move Italy.
Speaker 1 (33:47):
Exactly, and it had been way too long. So I
just don't even know. And it's not a good way
to really introduce yourself to your neighbor. And we're talking
about an encroachment of possibly like one foot by six feet.
Maybe you know what I mean to do? Yeah, it's
not like a big deal.
Speaker 2 (34:06):
No, So.
Speaker 1 (34:09):
You know, getting a survey not a bad idea, but
you may find some things that you're unable to fix,
let's say too. And I mean, if you really want,
you could ad just a.
Speaker 2 (34:19):
Boundary line to reflect that you could, But I.
Speaker 1 (34:22):
Mean, I don't know that most people would go to
that trouble so anyway, So there are all sorts of
wild things that can happen. You know. The deeds that
don't convey everything or that accept a piece out always
make things more complicated and probably do require a title
(34:44):
report and a lot of these instances to be sure
we know who owns what. And lots of times people
come in and they own these little landlocked parcels next
to their parcel. They're not combined. We talk about combining them.
And that's certainly something that we combine things on deeds
(35:04):
a lot because from a medicaid perspective, your residence is
exempt if a well spouse is living in it. So
Dad needs to go to a nursing home. Mom's got
two or three parcels, but they all touch each other. Well,
we'll put them all on one deed because guess what,
now they're all exempt protected right, gotcha. So but like
(35:25):
those are tricks, I'm not sure. You know, most of
the time people have gone to trouble to separate parcels,
they can still do that. The deed just reflects that
there's three separate parcels and if they wanted to sell one,
they still could. But sometimes it's actually beneficial to put
them all on one deed for that medicaid purpose. So
(35:46):
when we're planning, we are also trying to think about
what might happen in the future and what the most
likely scenario is. I mean, nobody really knows, right, we're
just going to do it based on age, health assets,
existence of long term care insurance and whatever else. So
those those things are important. Those are discussions we should
have even you know, when we're doing deed work, like
(36:11):
Adrihanna said, are you going to hold this as tenants
in common or you know, join tenants? That that's important
and a lot of people just have no idea.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
I recently talked with a relative of mine and I
did get her consent to talk about this, but not
give too much confidential confidential information. You know, from a
prior marriage. She had one child her husband from a
prior marriage had two kids together. They had one, so
four kids altogether. In her will, she asked me to
(36:40):
take a look at it. She decided to reference all
the four kids as her children. You know, yeah, that
happens wonderful because you know, step kids typically don't have
any rights. Really is what we say in the will,
But really the only asset was the house, and it said,
you know, to to the four children per sturpies with
that language. We all like saying that if they predecease,
(37:02):
her goes to you know, their next of kin. And
I was thinking about it and one of the two
step children it's not married, no children, So I said, hmm, well,
let me think about this. If she were to predecease
for some reason, her share would go to her mother,
(37:23):
which is my relatives husband's ex wife.
Speaker 1 (37:27):
Oops.
Speaker 2 (37:28):
And I said, you know you were doing the right
thing there, but let's think about that now. Is that
going to happen? Who knows. But it's those little things
that you have to like, well, she have a share
in your house, you want your husband's ex wife. No,
that is not what she wanted. She had no idea
that was a you know, potential event that that could arise.
(37:48):
So granted she is having that document edited, but I
think that was interesting to think about.
Speaker 1 (37:54):
It and something she would have never considered. So I
think it's a good time to take the last break.
This is Life Happens Radio Aaron Connor, Apio, Connor and Strouss,
and we'll be back right after this. Welcome back to
Life Happens Radio. Aaron Connor, Apio, Conor, and Strauss joined
by associate Adriana Mahalek. We have been talking about real
(38:15):
estate issues with planning and estates, and I think probably
one of the biggest ones are vacation homes as we
kind of generically call them. It could be a lake property,
it could be a cabin. It could be I don't know,
a ranch, right, don't running too many ranches, but no,
(38:36):
not for me. You could own an island. I don't know,
that's right. So, you know a lot of people work
their life to make sure that they have a beach house,
you know, a lake house, whatever. It may be, a cabin.
And when I say cabin, we had clients a number
of years ago that were very wealthy people, very and
(38:59):
they had quote three cabins on their property that were
thirty two hundred square feet each. So I was like, yeah,
I don't know if i'd call that a cabin, but
you know what, they called it a cabin, So I
just had to roll with it. But those things can
be complicated assets to leave behind for many reasons. Right. Obviously,
(39:21):
the more people who have an interest in the property,
the more complicated it can be. So you have to
think about a number of things who might use this property, right,
Because if you have three kids and one of them
lives in Utah, they may use the property, but they
(39:43):
may not either, and two kids that are local, right,
it may set up a kind of an unfair dynamic
as far as goes. We also often have issues with funding.
Sometimes property taxes on an upkeep on a place on
a lake can be pretty expensive. Especially let's just say,
(40:06):
like if it's not a year round camp, right, you
have to open it up, you have to shut it down.
All of it has to be done correctly. You may
be employing somebody to do that. You know. There may
be maintenance, just in the form of I don't know,
long cutting if you have a lawn, right, and eventually
some things are going to need to be repaired, replaced,
(40:28):
and you have to kind of think of all that.
So in the best case scenario, people leave aside a
pot of money for that for a period of time. Right,
So I've seen people leave one hundred thousand dollars or
something to fund a property for a period of time,
whatever that may be. Right, some places, the taxes are
less than New York almost everywhere. So for instance, right
(40:52):
I hope to eventually own a piece of property in Delaware,
the property tax on a million dollar house in Delaware
somewhere between fifteen hundred and eighteen hundred dollars. Okay, significantly
different than you, very different. Okay. They do have a
small flip tax on the on the seller, usually.
Speaker 2 (41:13):
As more than the transfer tax.
Speaker 1 (41:16):
Yeah, okay, it's a two percent of the transaction.
Speaker 2 (41:21):
Huh.
Speaker 1 (41:21):
And I think it gets more often split between the
buyer and seller. But that all depends on the market.
Speaker 3 (41:28):
Right.
Speaker 1 (41:28):
If the market's down, the buyer is going to.
Speaker 2 (41:30):
Have to eat that one time fee though, Yes, exactly.
Speaker 1 (41:33):
Right, And if you know it's there, and I mean
even so, if it's a million dollar property, I think
you're talking about fifty thousand dollars, which is not nothing.
I'm not saying any way, shape or form. But if
you're spending a million dollars, it's probably not going to
stop you from spending so and if you're spending five
hundred thousand, then it's it's half that, right, and it's
(41:54):
you know, it's just one of those things. Like when
my parents bought a house in the villages, there was
also a bond that they had to then take on
a portion of because that's how the villages were built
through bonds, and then the builder of the villages passed
the savings or the expense in this case of the
bond onto everybody who bought, which is you know, smart.
Speaker 2 (42:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:17):
So, and most people have paid off their bond well
and ahead of their house if they didn't, if they
got a mortgage.
Speaker 2 (42:25):
Right.
Speaker 1 (42:26):
So there's all sorts of little things in different places
that you need to think about too, you know. And
even here like in Sacondaga, a lot of people buy
places and they want to knock them down. Yeah, and
that is not necessarily as easy as you might think.
The stories I've heard is generally you have to keep
one wall something like that. I don't I'm not going
(42:46):
on record as saying that that's the rule, but there
are rules about what you can do and what you
can do, and you can't necessarily just put up a
giant house on the property that you you've knocked in.
Speaker 2 (42:58):
And I think too, you know a lot of them.
I don't know if people just presume that they automatically
have lake rights or anything like that, but you actually
or dock rights. Do you have deeded lake rights saying
you can cross over this person's property to get down
to the lake.
Speaker 1 (43:11):
Or and let's talk about that for a second. Okay,
how exciting is that? Like if you're the person on
the lake and these people get to traverse your property
like you're having a party and they're just gonna hey,
you having a party?
Speaker 2 (43:22):
And who maintains that right? Like that's always the question.
I feel like I don't love that dive deeper into Yes.
Speaker 1 (43:29):
You need to be cognizant of those things.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
Just can't take someone's word that oh yeah, sure, yeah
you can. You got access to that dock right there.
Speaker 1 (43:36):
Yeah, No, it's very important. And you know, functionally when
people have access across your property to the water is
not great, no, because there's usually that could be at
any time of day or nine, at any time of year,
there's very little restriction, and that's usually done as an easement,
but I don't know, it could be done as probably
a license or other things too. Sure, so lots of
(44:00):
things to think about. Our best strategy for passing on
a vacation home, though, is to put it in an
LLC with an operating agreement. And maybe at the first
generation it isn't so bad. Right, if it's just two kids,
(44:21):
they can probably figure it out. Maybe they can even
be there together at the same time, right, depending on
how get along. Right it's fourth of July weekend, because
those things become important.
Speaker 2 (44:33):
Sure, who gets it that holiday?
Speaker 3 (44:35):
Right?
Speaker 1 (44:35):
But next generation it can be a little trickier, right,
because there might be six hands in the till at
that point, and they might be in many many different
places and again many different affordability levels. So when we
do that, we create an operating agreement that one allows
for a structure of determining who has it when. Right,
(44:56):
there's usually some kind of rotating system about who has
it Fourth of July, Labor Day, Memorial Day, that kind
of thing. There is verbiage about what happens when people
don't pay their share. Usually what happens is it diminishes
their interests by that amount, right, So that can become
(45:18):
kind of a tricky thing because there can be room
for dispute there. Right, I say you owe five thousand,
You say, well, I think it's only three thousand. I
mean in that area, we're not talking about anything that's
worth really disputing in a legal sense. Right, There's definitely
plenty of room for hurt feelings no matter what. So
(45:41):
there are a lot of things that it's not just
as simple of here. Here's the lake house because and
you know, some people want to restrict whether it can
be sold or not too yes, right, yeah, they think
of this as their legacy or their family house in
the family, right, And you know that may or may
not be. And it also depends on what other assets
(46:02):
there are. So if you have this million dollar lakehouse
and your other assets total less than a million dollars,
then more likely than not, one kid is not taking
the lakehouse, yeah, right, unless they have a pool of
other money to pull from, and it might have to
get sold. So it's in and even many people we
(46:26):
see now bought a property, let's say on Sacondaga, for
a number that was very low compared to today and
if you know their child had to buy out of
that property, they probably might not be able to do that.
You may see somebody who paid fifty and it's worth
three fifty, right.
Speaker 2 (46:47):
I mean, something I think to consider as well is
the fact that you know, in New York, when someone
passes the ownership interest immediately vests in the airs. Granted,
it's subject to the administration the estate. But so if
the executor, you know, you think you have the authority
to sell the house, do whatever. Well, when it comes
(47:07):
time when you're at the closing table, those heirs are
going to be required to sign off on those documents
saying that they agree for it to be sold as well.
Speaker 1 (47:15):
Right, And we only have a couple of minutes of left,
but I do think we should briefly touch on when
there is an heir living in the property. Please, in
respects try to avoid that situation because generally speaking, that
person does not want to pay they honestly, they owe
(47:36):
rent to the estate yep, okay, which almost never gets paid.
Speaker 3 (47:41):
Someone needs to be paying taxes exactly, and a lot
of cases that person wants the house, right, But the
only way to do that fairly is to get a
real appraisal and then subtract whatever their share would be
from that, and they have to pay the rest.
Speaker 1 (47:58):
And you know, in some of these he says, there's
a mortgage involved as well, and who's paying the mortgage nobody,
So then we we have a foreclosure issue which can
probably be averted, but you know, probably we have a
lot of stress in these situations and diminishing equity.
Speaker 2 (48:16):
And then you know, are they just they're going to say,
well then a.
Speaker 1 (48:18):
Victim, right, which we know is almost impossible, right, I mean.
Speaker 2 (48:24):
A lot of time and money.
Speaker 1 (48:25):
Yes, it's just not I don't know, it's not a
good time to be a property landlord unfortunately. So no
no political commentary there, just that if you are trying
to get somebody out for nonpayment, it's a very difficult
time to do that. Buckle up, yes, and get your
check book out from all the rent you're not getting paid.
(48:46):
So certainly some things to avoid. So just to recap,
do some planning, right, Know what your deed says. If
you're a tenant in common and you want asset to
go to your estate, okay, you can be a tenant
in common and assign that asset that portion of your
(49:06):
asset to a trust, which can help quite a bit
at least for your planning. Doesn't help the other tenants
in common, but they need to do their own trust.
So come on in, let's do five trusts. If you
are a tenant by tendancy by the entirety, then you're
probably going to be okay, assuming that's what you want,
winner take all or a husband and wife. If you
(49:28):
have other property issues, then we need to have you
come in. We need to talk them out to find
what the best solution is because there's no one solution
for everybody. If you have any questions, we're happy to
meet with you. Five eight four nine hundred Pure O'Connor
and Strauss Aaron Connor. We'll be back next week. Have
a great weekend, everybody,
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