Weekend Argus (Saturday Edition)
Regular valuation, planning will help avoid battle over parents’ home
HOW CHILDREN handle the sale of a parent’s home is often key to whether they end up staying a family, or never speaking to each other again.
“Every parent’s worst nightmare is their children fighting over their stuff,” says lawyer Patrick Simasko.
Estate agent Jennifer Okhovat says she suffered through a drama-filled deal a few years ago when two siblings – a woman in her late 60s and her brother in his 70s – inherited their parents’ home.
The house sat empty for five years before the children decided to put it on the market.
One sibling was ready to sell and move on, but the other kept saying “This was our parents’ home”, and would come up with exaggerated prices. Neither child wanted to buy the other’s share, she says.
After months of discussions, the siblings gave Okhovat the go-ahead to list for about R18m.
Okhovat brought them more than a dozen offers, but every time at least one of the siblings found a reason not to sell. Even when the offers were above asking price, all cash and non-contingent, the siblings were never in agreement.
The property was eventually sold a year later by a listing agent with another brokerage after one of the siblings died.
“I think a lot of it was timing,” Okhovat says.
Her advice? Do your best to remove the emotion and really try to focus on the sale it as a business transaction. “Think of it as selling any other type of property you might own.”
Richard Hardie, chief executive of Knight Frank SA, says many siblings fight, and unfortunately it is often money that comes between them after the sale of a property and the division of the amount fetched.
“Families do fall out, especially when a situation is thrust upon them without expecting it.
“If a valuation and planning is included and done every three years or so, that would help.” - Washington Post and Property360