1st Probate Deal

[Robert Burns]

I was on vacation this weekend and was talking to someone who's wife is involved in a probate settlement of some property. He said they need to sell the house quickly and the attorney is asking $130K and the house is probably worth $180K. Since this is my 1st probate deal, what are the action steps I should take?

[Jerry Puckett]

Have your contact put you in touch with the personal representative (PR) of the estate. That's the person with the power to decide. Once you've established contact, work it like any other deal. Do your due dilligence on the property (which you could be doing in the mean time), then make your offer. If 130k is a good deal, you may not have to negotiate. When you come to acceptable price, get it under contract and proceed to closing. There is nothing special that needs to be done just because the house is in probate, and the PR doesn't have to wait until the house clears probate to sell.

What makes "probate deals" another animal is 1) finding the PR,(and here it appears you have an in) and 2) the fact that often times the real property must be sold and quickly to pay off the taxes, then 3) most of the time the heirs have no interest in owning the property and the proceeds they get from the sale are "found" money.

All of those things combined tend to make for good deals without a lot of competiton.