IGX

Got a topic I would like some input on from you folks.

My parents are both dead and left my brother and I 46 acres of fairly wooded property. About 2 years prior to my mom's death, my brother decided to move to the land and put his caravan out there and eventually a double-wide trailer up on it. Since it was in my mom's name, she relented and let him live out there for free. My mother died and we were left with it and still currently own it jointly. I am in the process of getting it surveyed and property lines drawn up to split it evenly. To be frank, my brother is your typical run of the mill pikey trash and is slightly put out that I would not want to own anything jointly with him. He see's it as "family land", pikey talk for his land since he lives there.

My wife and I are having a son. We are on the fence about selling the property now, since in the next 2 years we plan on moving about 2-3 hrs north of here and rarely coming back. We don't care for the area. We have talked about selling the property, 23 acres of wooded property, some time soon and putting the money away for my son OR using it to help finance the eventual move. I am still on the fence about keeping it and selling at a later date since acreage value tends to be increasing in this area. I mean, its free money that is already invested. All we have to do is pay the tiny bit of property taxes on it. I just don't quite know if it is worth it.

Thoughts on this from some of you folks that have dealt with something similar?

I've had some similar experience with inherited property. Note that I think the majority of my relatives should be in jail, so take this with a grain of salt.

Every day your brother stays on there, his sense of ownership and entitlement increases. If you decide to hold and let it appreciate, do you think he'll quietly agree to sell whenever you decide the time is right? If he's unwilling to sell now or agree to a contracted exit plan and timeline, I'd lawyer up, divide the property cleanly to get clear and independent title to your half, and then sell when the time is right for you.

sub-optimal because the land probably isn't worth as much divided, but better than having your $ tied up in the hopes of your brother becoming an upstanding citizen.

lasalle wrote:I've had some similar experience with inherited property. Note that I think the majority of my relatives should be in jail, so take this with a grain of salt.

Every day your brother stays on there, his sense of ownership and entitlement increases. If you decide to hold and let it appreciate, do you think he'll quietly agree to sell whenever you decide the time is right? If he's unwilling to sell now or agree to a contracted exit plan and timeline, I'd lawyer up, divide the property cleanly to get clear and independent title to your half, and then sell when the time is right for you.

sub-optimal because the land probably isn't worth as much divided, but better than having your $ tied up in the hopes of your brother becoming an upstanding citizen.

The bolded portion of your quote is what I am doing right now. There is no way he will allow me to sell the property out from under him. The only way I can get all 46 acres is if he does some more stupid shit and ends up pushing daisies, which is a possibility. So I am now trying to get it divided up, he is not happy about it but he understands that he really has no choice in the matter...at least none that he is aware of. So dividing the property up is a must. I am aware that 23 won't sell or appreciate as much as 46, but that is the long and short of it.

Have not dealt with anything similar, but I am a lawyer (standard disclosure, I am not [img]your[/img] lawyer; this is not legal advice; if you want legal advice you should consult a lawyer who's licensed to practice in your state).

No matter what you do, this kind of shit -- family disputes over property -- tends to get really messy. You mention that you're having your property surveyed, but you don't mention having a lawyer. If you don't have a lawyer yet, I'd strongly recommend consulting one. I don't mean to sound like I'm shilling for one of my own; there are a lot of situations where I think folks don't actually need lawyers, or can get by with self-help, but this isn't one of thme.

Divide it up now.

My father's generation has a much larger plot of land they've gone round and round about for years. Essentially, one brother lives on it and farms it and "pays rent" which has never increased in all the years they've had it. If it ever falls to me, I will have lawyers knocking on their doors the next morning but am not sure if it's been too long. I talked to somebody about it years ago and they said the screw up was not dividing the land into even pieces the moment they obtained it. No reason why you shouldn't do this, even if you don't sell.

if your brother is getting uppity, 46 acres is a lot of land if you need to bury a body or create a pen for pigs to eat a body.

i am not a lawyer and this should not be intended as legal advice. you should consult a lawyer licensed in your state about keeping pigs on your land.

Good thing everyone told you to split the land since you already said that's what you're doing in your post.

It seems to me, and this is in no way legal or financial advice, that it's dependent on a lot of things, isn't it?

I mean, if your half of the land is worth $1k, it's not going to really be worth selling. If it's worth $100k, it may be a different story. Also, I have a number of friends who work in finance and accounting who are big on "putting on your own oxygen mask first." The idea being that saving for your kids is cool, but being debt free and having less financial worry, as well as the ability to double up on the savings plan for the little one is even cooler.

And congrats on the kid.

Fence off your half and lease it to a pig farmer. Your brother will be begging you to either buy him out or buy you out in 6 months to a year.

The lawyering up thing is, unfortunately, what you need to do.

There is rarely any 'good' things that come out of land fuckery. I've done this twice, once with my brother, and we managed to equitably split the land then sell, and more recently I let a friend "purchase" some property with a land contract, and I am getting nothing but hassle out of this...late payment, not paying the taxes, etc. In the past, my brother and I have had to take possession of land contractors land who had defaulted, and there is a fuck ton of legal shit to attend to when you do this. It took 18 months for us to repossess one property and about 6 for another, and we still had to have the county sheriff there to escort them off, and because we weren't assholes, we allowed them to remove personal property over the following week while supervised, because they didn't think we'd repossess and didn't pack their shit up to leave.

All the stuff I've learned about this, I've learned the hard way. $2000 up front to a lawyer saves $10K+ down the road.

Then again, if the land is junk land, and not worth a thing, see if you can sell it to your brother.

If your land was around here, I'd send you to one of my customers - three lawyers, I don't think it's actually a partnership but they share an office - but two do mainly real estate and the third is a CPA. They do enough real estate transactions that they'd have a good idea what the land is worth, and the CPA would be able to figure out whether it's a smart investment for your situation. You could get the info you need, I bet in one visit. Maybe you can find similar in your area.

Splitting it up is of course the way to go but I think it's easier said than done. Money is easy to divide in two, but real estate isn't. If he wants to be a pain in the ass, or just hold out for more than his fair share, he could hold you up. Maybe you can work something out so your brother sells part of his half with yours, so you get a better price. Just thinking maybe he'd like three acres and the money more than 23 acres. That might give him an incentive to be reasonable.

I have thought about buying a little land as an investment. Looking around in this area, there are a lot of places where development is bound to creep and land values should climb. If it happens in ten years it could be a home run. If it happens after I'm dead and gone, it's a swing and a miss - that happened to a friend of mine, now he's old and needs the money and he's going to have to sell for shitty prices. If something crazy happens with property taxes (like New Jersey) it could go way wrong. If you're in a locale that has a lot of codes and ordinances, it could become a big pain in the ass. But then again if I can go there and showshoe and shoot, maybe put a storage garage there ... you can't do that with a mutual fund.

Dunn, have you had an appraisal done on the property? Is there adequate access to both properties once it's been subdivided? There are many factors to consider when subdividing property some which can be quite troublesome and complicated...lawyer up with a suitable landuse attorney and get it appraised.

Do the local zoning laws allow division?

contrary to what gertrude stein might say, land isn't necessarily land.

is it all pretty much the same soil and mix of trees, or is there variety? if its the latter, you could divide the land in half and one parcel could be worth a $200k and the other worth $50k.

also 40+ acres is big enough that if the timber is mature, it could be worth cutting.

perhaps your surveyor can help you determine the relative value of different portions of the property. you may want to do that at the same time your are hiring a no-nonsense lawyer.

Let your brother live on the land, but make him sign something to the effect that when he dies the deeds go to your heirs.

This way the land will eventually end up where you intend it to, and you do a nice thing for your brother.

Dunn,

This area of the law/regulatory environment are well in my wheel house. PM me on the facialbooks if you want to talk through it and questions for surveyor. I concur with the attorney rec.s but there are a couple elements of planning that might bear talking through

This seems like it could have so many questions tied to it, you almost have to get a lawyer to sort it out.
Who determines the property lines? Did your parents already figure that out ahead of time? Split it North/south, East/West, diagonal, will both plots have road access?
Will local zoning allow splitting?
Are there mineral rights?
Can your brother legally have a double wide on it? What are zoning laws on that? Did he put in a septic tank? Water well?

To me, the first option would be to get the whole 46 acres appraised, and see if your brother wanted to pay for 1/2 of the current market value to buy you out.
If not, then splitting it seems to be the best choice. I'd sell it right away, and not deal with family that would be butt hurt about it all.
You could rent/lease your 26 aces to your brother each year, as a source of income, like if he wants to hunt on it or something.

Good luck however it goes.