Sister won’t sell house

Malthusian

TripleH wrote: »

Does your sister own another property or does she rent?
You can only go by what your mother's will states, tell your sister that.
In the worst case could she live there but sign you over a first charge on the property of 50%?

I overcomplicated my last answer. They're joint beneficiaries so that's not the worst case, that's the status quo. She can already live there and the OP already gets 50% of any sale. The OP can do whatever they like, including let the sister live there and pay half her bills if they want. There is of course no reason they should.

YoungBlueEyes wrote: »

I would be very carefully about promising to give away, or eat into, your 50%. As has been suggested I would perhaps consider after the dust has settled, but certainly not before. Bear in mind too that people who are appeased by giving them money once will always come back for a second bite of the cherry.

I speak from experience. When our father died our 2 half sisters came out of the woodwork demanding all sorts and using every tactic in the book to get what they wanted. I stood firm and kept what dad wanted me to have. My sister gave in to them and they’ve been drip feeding money from her ever since. I’d say they’ll only stop when she has nothing left to give.

I agree entirely the OP needs to be very careful. However they are in a slightly different position to you. I infer from your post that your half-sisters weren't executors and maybe not even beneficiaries. The OP's sister is an executor which gives her leverage. As I understand it your half-sisters had no leverage other than emotional blackmail.

Assuming they weren't executors, you could tell your half-sisters to get stuffed and they couldn't do anything meaningful to interfere with the process; the OP's sister can however legally make it difficult to sell the property and cost the OP a significant amount in court fees and wasted energy to remove the deadlock.

If the OP gives up part of their share in exchange for an assurance that the sister does not interfere with the process, and then after the estate is distributed, the sister asks for more of their share, so what. The estate has been distributed, now they can tell the sister to get stuffed with no problem. The sister no longer has anything the OP wants (an assurance not to use their executorship to be a nuisance).

*edit* I did hesitate before making the suggestion because if someone says "There's no way they should offer anything, legally they're entitled to 50%", I cannot disagree.

However money is not a game where if the OP gets less than 50/50 they've lost. If what the OP wants is a swift end to the process plus whatever share they decide to offer, and they get those things, they win.

YoungBlueEyes

True Malthusian, it’s a slightly different scenario.

All four of father’s daughters were beneficiaries, my sister and I were executrices. They didn’t have the position to really do anything except emotional.

Would it be possible for OP to get something written up that says “I’ll give you 10% but there’s to be no messing about with selling the house”?

Malthusian

YoungBlueEyes wrote: »

Would it be possible for OP to get something written up that says “I’ll give you 10% but there’s to be no messing about with selling the house”?

The OP doesn't need anything in writing. If the sister messes about they simply go back to distributing the estate as per the Will, 50/50.

It's actually the sister that would need something in writing because the OP could wait until the house was sold and everything was sitting in cash waiting to be distributed, then renege and insist on the estate being distributed 50/50. As the sister is getting something for free and doesn't have any legal grounds to stop the process, my opinion is that she would just have to take her chances if the OP was feeling generous enough to consider the suggestion.

I suppose in theory she could ask for a binding agreement in exchange for renouncing her executorship, but it would need legal advice and that is the kind of hassle the OP is trying to avoid.