Estate Administration

Jurisdiction

Sale of Property Not Completely Owned by Decedent

Walker v. Walker, 152 S.W.3d 220 (Tex. App.—Dallas 2005, no pet.).

 

Mother died with a valid will leaving her interest in a home equally to her two daughters (Pattie and Barbara), each of whom had already inherited a one-quarter interest from Father who had previously died intestate. Pattie served as the independent executor but took many actions allegedly in breach of her fiduciary duties such as living in the house without paying rent or compensating the estate for her use of the house. Barbara was successful in having Pattie removed as the independent executor and securing the appointment of a third party as a dependent executor (Executor). Executor obtained court permission to sell the house. Pattie appealed raising a variety of jurisdictional issues including an assertion that the trial court lacked jurisdiction to order the sale of the house.

The appellate court affirmed. Pattie claimed that Executor had no authority to sell the house and that the trial court lacked jurisdiction to issue an order to sell the house because only one-half of the house was in Mother’s estate. The court examined the Probate Code along with case law and found nothing to support Pattie’s claim that all joint owners must join in a request for a partition for the court to have jurisdiction to issue an order of sale. The court explained that the probate court’s jurisdiction extended to the one-half interest Mother did not own under Probate Code § 5A(b) because the partition action was incident to Mother’s estate.

Moral: The probate court may issue an order to sell estate property even if an interest in that property is owned by someone other than the decedent.



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