Additional Information:
The agreement says that the husband is supposed to make the mortgage and real estate tax payments on time. He lives in the home and was unable to refinance it to get my name off.
Unfortunately, he has not been making mortgage or tax payments on time, which has resulted in a property tax lein that has hit both our credit reports, even though I haven’t lived in the house since 2008. He has also gotten 3 payments behind and recently informed me he lost his job. He has also let the house fall into a state of disrepair.
I want to petition the court to change the order to remove him from the house so that I can get in there, get the repairs done and either live their myself or hopefully bring the cost of the house up so that the mortgage can be paid off.
Is this something I can do?
ATTORNEY ANSWER:
Sorry to hear about your situation. Are you referring to a divorce agreement? If so, do you mean your ex-husband? I will assume the answers to both of my questions above are “yes” with respect to my answers/comments that follow to your question. If you do not act, either the town through a real estate tax lien taking or the lender through a foreclosure will probably take the property. Consequently, to the extent you would like to keep the property, you should petition the respective family court to modify the divorce decree based on your ex-husband’s breach of the agreement to allow you to receive the property. However, if you receive the property, you then will have to pay off the real estate tax lien and pay the mortgage to bring it current to avoid having the property taken from you.
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The attorneys at The Beliveau Law Group provides legal services for estate planning (wills and trusts), Medicaid (planning and applications), probate (estate and trust administration), business law (formation and operation), real estate (residential and commercial), taxation (federal and state), and civil litigation (in connection with these practice areas). The law firm has offices and attorneys in Naples, Florida, Waltham, Massachusetts, and Salem, New Hampshire.
