Skip Tracing (finding a death certificate)

[Teren Cooley]

I've got kind of a strange situation, but maybe someone out there will have some experience.  I'm looking to purchase a property at the moment.  The owner on deed is deceased and all the information I have on them is their first and last name, both of which are very common names.  The reason I think I can buy it is because the only child of that person, who lived on the property, but never properly took ownership, willed it to his friend and caretaker after his death.  The friend is who I'm in negotiations with.  They have all the relevant information and documentation on the person who lived there, but zero info about the parent.  I've spoken to a real estate attorney about this and its a fairly cut and dry process, but the one thing holding me up is that I need to produce a death certificate on the original deed holder.  There are literally no family members to contact and the Dept. of vital records needs at last a year of death.  I've gone to the Library of Virginia and spent hours searching obituaries and databases and still can't find anything.  I feel like since I have a lot of the information on the son, there should be some way to connect the dots back to the parent, but I'm out of ideas on how to get there.  I've also spoken to a private investigator and they weren't much help either.  The next thing I may try is one of the online people finder sites, but a lot of them seem unreliable.  Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!