All Forum Posts by: Michael Roetzel

Hi, sorry this has been awhile but thought I'd post an update - might be helpful to someone else.

The seller thankfully had her own attorney, so I didn't need to contact one myself. The seller's attorney worked with the title company for a little bit, and then the title company accepted the trust and the seller's right to sell. No probate was needed. And I now own the property. 

We were set to close on a single family residence this Friday, when yesterday my realtor and I received word from the title company that the house would have to go through probate. But I'm not sure why. From what I gather there's a trust, and I'm dealing with the trustee. A big part of the reason one has a trust is to avoid probate, right? And here's why I've turned to you all:

1. I talked with the representative at the title company, and she was fixated on the fact that I wasn't dealing with one of the children of the deceased, and "therefore" it had to go through probate. My understanding is that's now how this works. The trustee does not need to be a child of the trustor, it can be anyone.

2. My real estate agent is a great guy, and he's the hardest-working agent in the area, but he's young and still new to this, and has never dealt with this situation before. 

I want this house and I don't want to scare the buyer off. We settled on a fair price, and they're not going to be happy about having to spend more time and money going through probate. I'm thinking of calling a lawyer for advice, myself. But it would be helpful to hear from anyone here who's been through this. Is this really necessary?

Russell, I might have said the same thing last week. This isn't my first house, and I've built 14 of them, but this one got by me. I don't climb up on a ladder or go into the attic like the inspector does.

Hi All,

I'm in the process of buying a property. The purchase price is $45,000, and I estimated, with that bid in mind, $6,000 for repairs. The inspection has come back, and my $6,000 estimate was pretty good, that's right about where I am with repairs, EXCEPT for the roof. I thought it was in good shape, inspector estimates it has 1-5 years of life left, and may develop leaks soon. I'm working on getting a roofer out to take a better look, but would you renegotiate the purchase price at this point?