[quote=SK in CV]…My point is, everyone has those non-financial issues, and moving into an inherited house never comes down to just money. There are always other considerations. Which is why it does NOT happen more often than it does…[/quote]

SK, I can’t go into all the particulars, but I am seriously “stuck” here until next summer. I “could” pay off my small mortgage now but it is fully assumable for a small fee and I am in hopes that a (neighbor?) buyer might want to assume it and pay cash for the rest of the PM. It is currently at 3.7%.

If I decide to rent my house out, I may pay it off at that time to simplify things for myself (and the PM who is left to manage it). I’ll have to run all the numbers through my prospective tax return to decide what to do.

Again, I think the micro-areas where one of the heirs tends to keep the family home are the $200K-$350K areas (or were in that price range during the downturn). They are not in upper MC areas like DC (which would cost too much for any one heir to buy out any others). In the working-class areas, there seem to be more estates where at least one of the heirs needs somewhere to live at the time of their (last) parent’s death and finds a way to buy out the rest of the heirs (even if any other heirs have to carry a note for a time). Or one of the heirs took care of their remaining (infirm) parent during the last years of their life because that parent wasn’t in a financial position to move to a board and care facility and so is left the (modest) family home. I do see all of these scenarios all around me … even legally-disabled heirs inheriting their longtime family home. I’ve also seen heirs move an air mattress in (from their home across town) and spend their wknds cleaning up and rehabbing a home for a few months (which they inherited) to ready it for tenants and then lease it out.

This phenomenon IS common all over the state and will continue to be so as long as Props 58/193 remain on the books as written.