Posted by dealmaker on March 29, 2005 at 08:25:59:
If you did it all for cash and didn’t mind if your “relatives” had an undivided interest in it you could, but I wouldn’t do that.
You or someone will have to contact each “owner”, which could be difficult, and get them to agree to accept specific lots in exchange for their rights in the entire 200 acres.
Finding all the owners can be real tricky if the rights have passed down through the laws of descent and distribution and it’s a community property state. If it’s always passed down via a will, pretty unlikely with this many heirs, it will be straightforward to determine who the owners are.
Probably have to get the whole thing surveyed, who will pay, and record each individual deed. Big, big problems when undivided interests are passed on. Particularly when it keeps getting passed down to subsequent generations. Divorces and deaths of young parents really complicate these matters.
I own a percentage of 200+ acres. This land has been in the family for over 100 years, and percentages have been passed on to children and divided from family divorces ect. So, now there is around 15 owners, and 14 of them have never seen or even know exactly where it is, as they live hundreds of miles away, and they only own part as a result of a 40 year old divorce. The mineral rights were under a 100 year lease, as the property was producing oil. recently that lease expired, and I was given a percentage that equals about 15 acres, and i would like to put a house out there and make a fishing pond for nice weekends. it has always been an “undivided interest”, which i think means that everyone owns a percentage, not a real piece of land. is there any way to divide this land into certain individually owned acreage?? Thanks.
First, check to see if the 200 acres of land is sub-dividable into enough individual parcels of land that each owner could get their own fee interest in a parcel. Since these would be of varying sizes, you would need to make sure that all of the parcels meet the minimum lot size requirements for that area.
Then, if that all works, then you could file a partition action and attempt to get the court to order a partition in kind rather than a partition by sale.
Basically, it’s a hell of a lot of work to do and probably not worth the effort.
Posted by John Merchant on March 29, 2005 at 10:01:47:
Sounds like you own a piece of “awl patch” ground, and this is quite common…to find yourself owning 1/64 of 1/32 of 1/16, etc. of a piece of ground (frequently just the mineral rights, not even the surface).
And this is the bailewick and specialty area of “land men/women” who make their livings buying, selling, leasing such ground.
So I’d look around and call a land-man or two and pay for their advice about what would be your best direction here.