Joint tenancy and judicial sale?
Ex and I bought a house (joint tenacy), she moved out and quit paying any mortgage. She agreed to a buyout amount then once I was approved for the refi, she now wants more money. We can’t decide on a amount now. She now is threatening to make me sell by judidcial sale. I thought the only thing she could do was try to partition the house. I thought judicial sales were for forclosures.
-Can a judge force a judiacial sale of the house just because we can’t decide on an amount for buyout?
-What is the judicial sale process? Is it always an auction? What decides the first bidding amount- mortgages amount owed?
Thanks so much for any help on this matter! – Mark B
-No we were not married. This process would probably be easier if we were.
-We arrived upon a buyout amount based on what the house was last listed on the market minus realtor’s fees, closing costs and mortgage amounts. The amount was very close to the equity split equally.
*goz1111- i do believe that she feels the house is worth more than it is. The fair market appraisal recently done came back considerably lower than the amount the house was last listed at.
I already have thousands of dollars in lawyers fees. should i call her bluff and let her do the judicial sale?
oh yeah can i sue her for my lawyers fees since she is the one that went back on our original agreement and caused us to involve lawyers?
This is the problem I will assume she is still on the title and the note? then unfortunately you will need her to sign off, which it seems at this point she is looking to squeeze some extra cash out of the agreement
But in general, if she is on the title she can go into civil court then the court of equity and seek either you to pay her fair market value of the place or force a sell, but this litigation is not cheap and would be costly for all parties
Now when the court is considering her fair market value of her share of the property: the note must come off first, then your payments on the note will also be considered etc
so may your ex have an unrealistic value of her share clouded by emotional hatred toward you? maybe, then it will be up to the courts to figure what her fair share would be
Comment by goz1111 — July 14, 2009 @ 10:40 am