I've found a property, which is now distressed, in my farm area. A skip trace showed the owner died 25 years ago. Limited info is all I have from my research to this point.

Does anyone have a good idea in how to located the likely heirs?

Can you squat on it and take it over in your state?

Check ancerstory . c o m or family tree now.

Someone has to be paying the taxes.

The heirs have been paying taxes,yes.

I have their out of state address.

Multiple searches show the deceased unique and old name as the owner.

I bought one like that at tax sale a little while back. Owner had passed away 15 or 20 years ago. Family had been paying taxes but decided to not pay any more so it went for tax sale

They would have been paying the taxes or it would have sold it by now. However they may be tired of paying the taxes so stay with it.

Geez people. You are aggressively trying to take something that is not yours.

My friend is in a home where his parents passed away, he is aware of the state law which counts the years until the home becomes his. It is a long period but it is a law on the books. If a similar law is present in MO then I would venture a guess they are close or already the new legal owners - so-to-speak.

Easy, Smoke.... he's trying to BUY it, not TAKE it. My guess is this is vacant land, no house. #22 is a builder/developer.

That's happened a few times for us. X dies, A, B, C, D, E, F, G and/or H inherit the house, the will never gets probated, so the house stays in the original X's name. I remember when we had a group of (six? eight?) heirs, we had to do an affadavit of heirship to make sure that there weren't any other unknown heirs running around, and then each of the heirs signed a deed.

Usually, I've found it with lower-income, less-educated people, perhaps? The sort of people who either don't know how to take the steps to change things legally, or the sort of people who live close enough to the edge that they don't feel they have money to spare to pay an attorney to take the steps for them. They have the property; they pay the taxes; it's all good, right?

Family tree now is going to be your best friend here. It's going to list relatives and friends. Hit them all with letters and phone calls. Often there are associated phone numbers listed as well. Not all are current, but it's a start.

SMOKE, I guarantee the problem with this property is that there were more than one heir at the time of the owners death 25 years ago. NOW the heirs have expanded and can not agree on moving forward. They can not agree on asking price. They can not agree on selling the property. They can not agree on repairs because they don't want other heirs to make money of their repairs. They do NOT talk to each other.

However the one person paying the taxes may be getting money from others however they will get tired of paying the taxes and the property may get sold. OR the person that is paying taxes may get sick and not pay the taxes there are multiple reasons. HOWEVER at this point there is more than one person that has an interest in this property and they can not agree on resolving the issues. Then more are added to the chain of ownership. This is an age old problem and its a way to take property legally or via hardship. YEP aggressively is an option for #22 of MO. Buying each heir out one at a time then he may have to go to court to move the others to get the property sold. The property is distressed, is the key, the out of state owners and in the in state owners can not agree on zip. So #22 of MO may move them to sell each share. Welcome to one of the oldest methods to buying real estate; Distress buying: divorce of owners, death of owners, and the list goes on...

The other factor #22 of MO most likely will need to do IF all heirs are not found is do a quiet title action to clear the property of any heirs that are not known.

#22 of MO once you buy several shares of the property then you may want the best real estate attorney to help resolve the lose ends of clear title ownership.

The other thing that may happen is when you do contact each of the heirs there may one that will call you and sing like a bird about the family dynamics. This will help you to find the remaining heirs.

Tom, your idea that the heirs have expanded does not make sense -- unless you mean that one or more of the heirs at the time of the owner's death have themselves passed away, so that the share belonging to the now-deceased heir has in turn passed to his own heirs. In a 25 year period, that is not an unlikely scenario.

My wife owns property that is still in her father's name. We have had no reason to complete the transfer. Kind of an asset-protection strategy.

Mike45 of NV, yes heirs can expand. Lets say there are two hiers to the property. Now those two heirs have children. Now its expanding of course if the original two heirs one dies. Trust me you may have never had it occur. But it can happen and when there is more than one heir to a property they can not agree on anything. So yes heirs and chain of owners can increase over 25 years. ABSOLUTELY

Deanna of Tx made an excellent point about how heirs can expand ownership of a property and issues involving heirs!!!

#22,

My first guess is a paperwork error downtown. Title errors happen all the time.

Or

The heirs never bothered to update the title.

Neighbors often have first hand info!

@Nicole, how interesting. That must be one of those things that varies by region.

So, for example, suppose my Grandparents die, and leave behind a beach house on Galveston Island. But none of their three kids live near Galveston, or need a house in Galveston. So they can write it into the will saying, "Please sell the house in Galveston, and divide the portions equally between the three of you," and the Executor sells it on the open market, and they divide it up. There might be a squabble about A wanting to sell it for $150,000 and B wanting to hold out for $160,000. Or maybe C wants to keep the house in Galveston, and buys out A's share for $x and B's share for $y. But those are just details.

But suppose my Grandparents die, and either don't have a will, or they don't want to leave one person the beach house on the Island without doing something equally favorable for the other two. So they say, "I leave the beach house to A, B, and C equally." A, B, and C are my Grandparents' heirs as soon as my Grandparents die. So A, B, and C each inherit a 1/3 interest in the beach house. And so it sits there--- because no provision was made to allow it to be sold, and no one can go over anyone else's head to (turn it into a rental) (turn it into A, B, or C's primary residence) (sell it) (do anything else permanent) without A, B, and C's unanimous agreement.

In that situation, usually one person-- A-- tends to be the Responsible Heir. They're the ones who arrange for it to be kept mowed and the taxes kept paid. But eventually, they get tired, and they want to sell. Maybe B is on their side, and agrees--- B lives in South Carolina and doesn't need a house in Galveston. But C disagrees, because "my father built that with his own hands" and "that's where I spent my favorite summers of my childhood" and "that's where I want to retire in 20 years", but not lifting a finger to contribute to the upkeep and maintenance in the meantime. That one's the Sticky Heir. But there's nothing A and B can do, except exert peer pressure. The property is locked up, because the executor wasn't willed the power to override their personal preference.

There's two properties like that across the alley from me on the next street over. I happened to be at the Appraisal District, when one of the Heirs came by to wrangle his taxes. And he explained the whole story to the Appraisal District employee, and I recognized the address.

His grandfather had passed away and left two houses to his two kids, a 50% share in each. For anyone else on the planet, it would be a no-brainer to give House A to Kid A, and House B to Kid B. But for whatever reason, he didn't. A didn't want to sell. B died in 2015, and left his shares to his three kids, C, D, and E, one of whom lives in New Mexico. So A still has her 50% share; and C, D, and E are each juggling a 16.6% share; and when A dies, her 50% will get split between her surviving children; and the only way either of those two houses will ever reach 100% again is if someone drops the ball and fails to pay taxes enough for it to get sold on the steps.

MIKE45 of NV and Nicole of PA, both of you maybe in an excellent situation and real estate flows smoothly. HOWEVER TRUST ME. There are MORE headaches created by wills then you can imagine its not so cut and dry as you may think. Especially when a will has more than one heir to the process. OR kids/heirs expect to get more money from the house then its worth. Family dynamics plays a MAJOR role in real estate.

Deanna of TX has the prefect text book reasons of WHY 25 year deceased owner there can be problems with selling the property that #22 of MO is in the process of possible purchase.

Best of Success #22 of MO!!!

To force a partition action is akin to a hostile take over.

I hope someone does onto you as you do onto them. (Of coarse not, I'm just kidding. I would never want what is yours taken from you. You live in a free country and you should not lose your dreams and assets simply because someone files papers while you were not looking).