What happens to the property when one person on the title passes away?
Question:
A client is on the title of her home along with her 30 year old son.
She is curious what will happen when she passes away? Will her son automatically inherit the property and he will be the sole owner ?
She is wondering should she remove her name from the title now, if he will have to face any complications in case of her death ?
How important it is to have a will?
By the way she has three other children too.
Answer:
From a preliminary perspective, do they hold title together as Tenants-in-common or as Joint Tenants. The usual and common intention with joint tenancy is the right of survivorship. Here, there are many, many questions which could be asked in order to expose all the facts
There certainly needs to be an estate plan.
Depending upon the circumstances, the son may hold his interest as a Joint Tenant subject to a resulting trust in favour of the mother. If that were the case, and she has no Will, then, the property will be divided four ways. So, what does she want? All three, or just him?
She needs to have a “Statement of Intention” documented and filed with her estate planning lawyer as soon as possible.
Her wishes can be easily accommodated and documented, she just needs to take that step.
Brian Madigan LL.B., Broker