I am about to foreclose on an Arizona tax lien where I know the owner is deceased.  I've found a few relatives.  I saw an obituary I didn't print and now can't find again, but I know the owner died.  He didn't have services by his request so I am guessing he might have been a hermit or estranged from family.   How can I find if he had a will and then would it not suffice to just contact the executor and serve them the papers?  Or do I need to contact each relative and serve papers on each of them?  That could get costly.  I am doing it all myself, they are low dollar lands in Navajo county.  If I can find the funeral home I'm guessing they could tell me who made arrangements.  Any recommendations how to proceed?  Thanks.

not sure how you can do a transaction with a deceased person?

@Karen D. Schiano : check with the Navajo Superior court to see if anyone opened probate.

@Karen D. Schiano  

Do you realize if you do this yourself you will not be able to get title insurance? That means no financing or selling the property. The best thing to do is hire a private detective. The next best approach is pay a service for information. Google people search and a ton of sites will come up.

Check with your title company to see who will need to sign the deed in order for you to get title insurance.  That's your goal if you want to resale.  You want to do your paperwork right now, in order to set you up for success in the future.

Can't seem to figure how to respond to each.  You don't do a transaction with the deceased person, you have to find the heirs and that's what I am asking.  Ok so I actually have to check if probate opened in the county where he last lived I guess?  Thanks, that would be a different county in Arizona......It is rare to get title insurance out here.....many investors sell these lands by Special Warranty Deed and some with owner financing.  These are raw lands worth very little......But in the case of foreclosing on a tax lien, I will get a judgment deed from a court order.  This goes on all the time out here.  People buy the land many sight unseen, many internet sales, many out of state or even country because the land is so cheap and remarkably beautiful in the painted desert but so remote that only an artist like me wants to keep them all and have retreats for others too but I will sell some, upfront and disclosing....so when they realize or figure out it's not so romantic to them after all, unlike me, they stop paying taxes and let it go and the same lands get recycled over and over...