Buying a Property Possibly Subject to Extrajudicial Settlement of Estate

Hi,

Good afternoon! I'm buying a property but the title owner is already deceased. The wife, mentioned in the title as the wife, is selling it to me assuming she has full ownership of his husband's estate. Is the wife right to assume such when the family code seems to suggest otherwise? If not, is extrajudidical settlement of estate with her children required prior to them selling the property?

Your advice on this matter will be highly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Best regards,
Tope

Assuming the subject property is conjugal in nature, 1/2 of it goes to the wife and the other half is inherited by their children and the wife as she is also an heir. So, the children and the wife are co-owners of the entire property which means that they should be the signatories in case it will be sold to another person. Either you let them settle the property extrajudicially first before you buy it or you can also go for extrajudicial setllement of estate with absolute sale so that the title would be released directly to you under your name.

karl704 wrote:Assuming the subject property is conjugal in nature, 1/2 of it goes to the wife and the other half is inherited by their children and the wife as she is also an heir. So, the children and the wife are co-owners of the entire property which means that they should be the signatories in case it will be sold to another person. Either you let them settle the property extrajudicially first before you buy it or you can also go for extrajudicial setllement of estate with absolute sale so that the title would be released directly to you under your name.

Thank you so much Sir for your response! Just one more question though, can the extrajudicial settlement be executed in a manner where all rights to the property of the children/co-heirs will be fully transferred to the wife (their mother) so that I only get to deal with her during the selling process? I'm concerned that if the extrajudicial settlement is through pro indiviso sharing among the heirs, the process might just take even longer with the need to get the approval/signature of all the co-heirs every step of the way since they are all parties to the sale agreement.

Yes, the children are free to do that. Either the children would sell or waive (donate) their shares to their mother, which would entail payment of additional taxes for them to the BIR (Capital Gains tax if sale and Donors tax if waived/donated). So the heirs can execute either extrajudicial settlement of estate with sale OR extrajudicial settlement with waiver/donation, transferring the entire property to the mother. Then you can now purchase the property only from the mother. But please note that you will have to wait for a certain period before you will be able to buy it, and then you yourself will undergo the same procedure as they had undergone. If you want it to be simpler and faster, you can just let them sign an extrajudicial settlement of estate with sale to you.

The children might not opt to transfer their shares to their mother because of the added taxes which they would be required to pay.

karl704 wrote:Yes, the children are free to do that. Either the children would sell or waive (donate) their shares to their mother, which would entail payment of additional taxes for them to the BIR (Capital Gains tax if sale and Donors tax if waived/donated). So the heirs can execute either extrajudicial settlement of estate with sale OR extrajudicial settlement with waiver/donation, transferring the entire property to the mother. Then you can now purchase the property only from the mother. But please note that you will have to wait for a certain period before you will be able to buy it, and then you yourself will undergo the same procedure as they had undergone. If you want it to be simpler and faster, you can just let them sign an extrajudicial settlement of estate with sale to you.

The children might not opt to transfer their shares to their mother because of the added taxes which they would be required to pay.

Wow! Just exactly what I needed! This helps a lot. Thank you very much Sir! Will do as advised.