Upon death of a seller in a real estate contract, how to get a buyer out of contract

kimsells4u · Jan 30, 2008, 06:35 AM

In the state of Missouri, a seller in the middle of a sales contract died. The closing time is not yet lapsed and all the contingencies on the buyer side is fulfilled. There is will in place and an executor named for the estate already. The son (named executor) can not legally sign for the deceased seller yet. The buyer's do not want to continue with the contract and wait further and possibly go into probate. What is the fastest way to get the buyers out of the contract? Does the contract die with the sellers death? 9the seller obviously can not sign to close and would be in default) At what point does the seller default on this contract in this scenario? Also, there is earnest monies in place. Will the buyer's have to wait until the son can legally sign to release this contract and the earnest monies or how can we get the earnest money back fast without a signature, or does it have to go to arbitration? If it goes to arbitration, at what point in the state of missouri does the third party company have to return the earnest money back to buyer?

s_cianci · Feb 2, 2008, 11:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JudyKayTee

You are still misunderstanding the situation - there is NO third party. The Executor acts on behalf of the Estate, by law - no third party involved.

Actually I really don't misunderstand anymore. I've learned from this thread ; I'm just a little surprised about what I've learned. I just never realized that a deceased person's estate could be compelled to perform on a contract, save for pre-existing liens on any of the estate's property, e.g. satisfying the remaining balance of a mortgage or something similar.

helloitsme2 · Feb 27, 2008, 03:40 PM

I don't know the legal side of things, however, last year I encountered this issue! We were four days from closing and the seller died. He had a will and had assigned his daughter as executer. So, the forms were all changed to read:"Janey Doe, Personal Representative of the Estate of John Doe." The family actually continued with the sale, as planned, but had to hustle to get all of the paperwork filed with the Register of Wills prior to the sale.
FYI: We were warned by our agent that we would have lost our goodfaith deposit if we decided to back out of the sale. The seller had already complied with all of our repair requests.

Hope this story helps!



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