real-estate
paying mortgage on a disputed property, is there relief?
<p>I have a property that I've owned and paid for since 2008.
I have allowed my parents to live there and have paid the mortgage. This January, my parents agreed to pay rent, paid for January and February, then decided they had half ownership of the house and stopped paying rent.
Now I'm stuck paying the entire mortgage, in addition to an apartment where I live and work, while the title is stuck in a legal dispute with a hearing set for more than 3 months out.
Is there anything I can do to get relief of the mortgage payment in the meantime? Maybe something we could file with a judge to force them to move out to sell the place, then continue dispute over how the proceeds are dispersed?</p>

<p>In the U.S. I'm not aware of any companies that will mortgage property without title insurance.  My understanding is that title insurance covers the costs arising from a dispute of title.  So if you or the lender bought title insurance you might get the insurer to deal with the financial and legal consequences of the lack of clean title.</p>

<p>If there is no insurance then that's one of the risks you and the lender bear.  You could negotiate the costs of dealing with it with the lender, or you could "put" the problem to the lender for the cost of whatever damage they may wish to do to your personal credit and any equity you have in the property.</p>

<p>If I understand you correctly, you're saying you own a property your parents reside in, and they pay the mortgage as their rental fee. Correct?
The fact that the (presumably) at will rental agreement has requires their rent be paid directly to the bank in the amount of your mortgage, gives them no more right to ownership then any other renter, whose rent (again, presumably)goes toward the mortgage, since very few homeowners own their properties outright; most people have a mortgage.</p>

<p>Who owns the property is solely decided by whose name is on the mortgage. If they own half of the house, (this would be either a joint tenancy or a tenancy in common). If this is the case, there is a lot more information I would need to convey to you for you to understand your rights and responsibilities. However, if they were never on the deed and they've just begun to think that they <em>should</em> own half because they've been paying, then they have NO claim to your property. If they refuse to continue paying the rent (i.e. the mortgage amount), your only choice is to evict ( being your parents, I'd try to explain and work it out). If you have some tenancy in common or something, likely I said, the analysis changes. Hope I understood what you were asking.</p>
