It is important for Alabama citizens to understand escheat. In English common law, during feudal times, if a person was to die without a will, any property the person owned reverted to the King.  During this time, the King owned all of the land and granted land to lords who in turn granted the land to tenants as fiefdoms. Escheat meant that the land would revert to the King for a year and a day.

Today, if a person who owns real estate dies escheat it means the transfer of title to the land reverts to the state.  Generally, this situation only occurs if a person dies with no living heirs. 

For example, Henry owns 40 acres of land.  Henry was diligent and made a will that would have the land divided equally among his grandchildren.  Because he had a written will, the land would transfer to them.  But what if Henry did not make a will and had no living relatives?

In this case, the property he owned would revert to the state.  In most instances, escheat property is transferred to the state rather than the federal government.  The best way to avoid this situation is to make sure a person has a will to say how they want their property distributed when they die.

In most jurisdictions in the nation, unclaimed property can escheat to the state or local government.  A common example is an unclaimed bank account where the owner of the account is unable to be located.  Even though the unclaimed bank account would be escheated to the government, this action is revocable.  In other words if the original account holder came forward at a later date, he or she might be able to reclaim their money. 

It is important for every property owner to make a will, to prevent his or her real estate from escheating to the state. That is especially true if the property owner has no living relatives.

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This entry was posted on Monday, June 16th, 2008 at 6:10 am and is filed under Real Estate Laws, Real Estate Laws. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.