Abandoned Property w/ Messy Heirship

[Jeffrey H.]

I have a Texas RV park in a rural area adjacent to a small parcel of land that is abandoned, but has some nice highway frontage. The owner is deceased from many years ago, and there are dozens of heirs from my initial scratch and sniff.  Yes there are taxes in arrears as well.  This property is worth maybe ~$20-30k on the market.

Normally I would just let this thing sit for a few years and go to tax auction (this county is very slow to foreclose), but at the same time don't want some cheeky heir or squatter to move a junkyard onto the property - and at the same time could use the frontage for signage.

I'm considering finding one of the heirs and acquiring their stake in the property so I can at least have some level of control, granted limited, of what happens until it goes to auction.  Nuclear option is a partition sale but really don't want to go that route.

Are there any other things I should consider, ideas to help protect myself?  Thank you!

[Jerel Ehlert]

Track down one heir, get a contingent contract to purchase (based on other heirs/closing).  Once you have an interest, you can open title and figure out who is an heir.  If it is really that messy, most likely you will have to get a determination of heirship from a probate court.  Maybe get an order of sale with the proceeds going into the registry of the court for any unknown/unknowable heirs.  Not exactly a cheap way, but will probably get the job done.