Whenever real property is being jointly owned by two people and over, any person can ask the court to divide the acreage or sell the property. Since it's improbable to split a house in half, the court can appoint a trustee to sell the home for the owners interest and allot the proceeds accordingly.
A sale in lieu of partition commonly occurs when the owners can't get a buy-out agreement between or among themselves. Mainly because they cannot make an agreement on the value of the home. It is also appropriate when the co-owner cannot be found.
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I am mired in a situation that may result in a sale in lieu of partition, when my father retitled the house in equal shares between my brother, sister, and I before his death. One of those parties has continued to change its mind about the sale's details - going from not wanting to sell to wanting to sell immediately, asking for a listing agreement and then refusing to sign it, choosing a real estate agent and then wanting a new one - and it's driving the other sibling and myself crazy. All the time, the (small) estate has been saddled with the mortgage and overhead costs and I, being the only owner living nearby, have had to take care of the property and keep an eye on it. That sibling sued the other and myself for a sale in lieu, which was abandoned when we supposedly had an agreement that the problem sibling put forth, only for their refusing to sign after the fact. Is there any other way to make a sale happen besides sale in lieu? Or a way to control the sale; perhaps arrange for the originally agreed-upon real estate agent to handle the sale at market value, rather than risking a great loss through an auction by a third party?
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