Rental Property Investor · Florida City, FL · Member since 2020 · 11 posts · 4 votes
Today my mom just showed me a house that hasn’t been touched for over a decade. She said she was going to try to get it but the owners passed away. We went to go look at it today and she said it looks just how it did the first time she seen it. My first question was who would I contact that had power to sell the house. The house was still being built but the only thing missing is a pathway for cars. She didn’t know exactly who the owners were so who would I talk to about finding who may be the owners in the first place. I was going to look more into it and see if it’s even worth pursuing. I would also have to look more into the area since I’m not too experienced.
New to Real Estate · Pittsburgh, PA · Member since 2020 · 38 posts · 38 votes
5y
Go to the county's real estate website/recorder of deeds and see who owns the deed. If the deceased is listed as the owner, unless there is a will, the property will have to go through probate, which is a long an arduous process.
As far as I know, if there is a trust, you would need to find the trustee and ask if they are interested in selling their home. Trusts are private and therefore the documents are private, meaning you will not know who the trustee is from public record. The best you can do is contact the title company or the real estate agent who closed the deal. You may even be able to reach out to the seller (who signed the deed) and see if they still have the contact info of the trustee. This may work.
Otherwise, you would have to just keep watching the house and see if anything happens to it. If something does, contact the new managers of that property, whether city took it for taxes, a bank for mortgages, or something else.