LovingFather
Bronze
Reged: 04/08/08
Posts: 27
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My lawyer quoted a possible nightmare scenario. Wondered if anyone has an educated/informed guess on this playing out:
Ex and I are over $1000 apart on SM offers. I can do no better than split the difference and still barely pay bills, but Ex is offering no ground.
Lawyer said a possibility -- she's frequently telling me the worst things that can happen and telling me what my Ex needs -- is that at trial the judge would order the house sold. It is currently not saleable because an addon has not been completed and AZ law would require a 1 year wait to sell it, since I acted as my own prime contractor and am unlicensed. Lawyer says the judge might order sale AND order me to cover the mortgage til it sells. There is NO WAY I can afford that.
Has anyone ever heard of this happening?
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KGrow
Platinum
Reged: 01/27/06
Posts: 3109
Loc: Colorado
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Somebody has to pay the mortgage. Worst case is that somebody would be you. If it goes down that way, I would fight to get credited for the payments you've made with a larger share of the sale proceeds.
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gigi
Platinum
Reged: 11/06/06
Posts: 4836
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Who is paying the mortgage now? Of course it has to be paid till it's sold, but if the stbx is living in the house and you're paying the mortgage, this is often used as a substitute for alimony for that period of time.
Does your ex have a job at all? How long were you married, waht are her prospects for work? Are there kids? Where are the kids living?
The answers to all these questions can affect the issue of your house. If the house is too expensive for the two of you to afford, then it needs to be sold, but someone has to pay for it in the meantime. If it's the house where the kids were raised, then they'll likely be allowed to stay with whoever stays in the house till it's sold. I doubt the law will prevent it from being sold just because you did some unlicensed work on it unless it was a new house and not your primary residence for very long, such that it looks like you were doing a flipping job, in which case you need professional permits & etc. Talk to a different realtor if you've gotten a differnet answer... that rule you're citing seems... odd.
If you're hanging yoru hat on tryign to keep the house rather than sell it in a bad market, by saying that the law says it CAN"T sell, well you might want to find a way to switch your attitude about that because you could easily hurt your chances of getting a good sale by running around talking about things you think are defects in the house (especially if they aren't entirely defects, legally, and your own legal analysis of the situation isn't entirely accurate).
How long you've been married and what her job is will also affect this.
Your lawyer is right to give you the worst case scenario, but if it's scaring you into doing stupid things like not cooperate with selling the house and trying ot get a good price on it, then you need to go back and explain that you are terrified that you won't be able to make ends meet and would she tell you the LIKELY result of your sitaution, not just the worst case scenario!
Now... if your income is huge and you've been married to her for 35 years and have a pack of teens running around in the house and she's been a stay at home mother helping you in your career for the whole marriage. recognize that you may end up paying alimony for life. You may end up paying the mortgage, you will probably also pay child support, and if the house is too big for either of you once the kids are grown, you may be ordered to sell it as soon as possible.
Tell us more about your situation and we'll help you figure out how much doom & gloom you need to worry about.
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LovingFather
Bronze
Reged: 04/08/08
Posts: 27
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Not a flip...our primary residence. I added on. I've worked on this kind of work a lot through my life and hired out the stuff I didn't or shouldn't do. Have a city permit, so it's all legal and well-built...but the state law says you must wait a year after before you can sell it.
Ex is currently living there, but has (finally) seemed to realize that she can never afford it.
Ex hasn't worked outside the home in 9 years. We've been married 13. She has a teaching degree, but is not currently certified in AZ and hasn't taught in over 12 years.
Wife is demanding over half my net income AND offering me the house. Totally financially undoable for me.
Having to carry the house til it sells in THIS market would be a total disaster.
I'd prefer to keep the house and buy her out through an equity loan. Don't know if the judge would go for that. I hope he'll give me that chance to keep the house for my kids and buy out my spouse through an equity loan.
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gigi
Platinum
Reged: 11/06/06
Posts: 4836
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You're going to owe her something, probably up to 6 years worth, but enough to find a way to get her on her feet, and if that takes a year to get certified as a teacher in AZ then that's what it's gong to be.
How odd about the house sale thing. My aunt sold a house there last year and we visited to help her re-do it before the sale, we did some serious work on it, plumbing style, and no one said she couldn't put the recently re=modeled house on the market. Come to think of it, while we were there we looked at a lot of houses and it was CLEAR that they'd had recent serious renovations, that's what flipping is all about and a whole lot of people get ot the point of selling thier own home and do a big re-do to update & make it more marketable.
I can't imagine that the law is exactly as it sounds, the way you're putting it. Could you ask whoever told you this about the chapter, section & verse of what law prevents you from selling it in Arizona? I am DYING to know for my own purposes (ok, my aunt's, but it's the same thing)... who knows I might learn something new.
But what I think is going to happen is I'll look at the law they cite and realize they gave you information that's a little skewed. I mean, they DO have flippers in Arizona and those people do all kinds of renovations up to the day they're putting the thing on the market!
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KGrow
Platinum
Reged: 01/27/06
Posts: 3109
Loc: Colorado
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States have exceptions to their building code that allow homeowners to do work (e.g. Plumbing and Electrical) on their own homes that normally must be done by a licensed professional. I guess it makes sense that there should be a waiting period to work the bugs out on such work.
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gigi
Platinum
Reged: 11/06/06
Posts: 4836
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I suppose it makes sense that a state might want to do that, but I'd like to know if that's true in Arizona because all the DIY flippers we met while we were fixing up my aunt's house probably need to be out of business!
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LovingFather
Bronze
Reged: 04/08/08
Posts: 27
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I'll get the law/regulation number and post it.
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LovingFather
Bronze
Reged: 04/08/08
Posts: 27
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Found it...kinda.
Here's the synopsis on the Registrar of Contractors website: http://www.azroc.gov/Invest/lbi.html
And here is the statues book in PDF: http://www.azroc.gov/Acrobat/Public/Statutes.pdf
See Page 13. ARS 32-1121(A)(5)
We could argue that we had no intention to sell when we started, but the burden would be on us to prove it in court ==> Big $$$$.
Best of luck~!
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gigi
Platinum
Reged: 11/06/06
Posts: 4836
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Not such a big deal, really. The only person who COULD complain would be your potential buyer, who would turn in a complaint to the board of contractors, would say that addition is illegal and you woudl no longer be allowed to perform as a contractor in Arizona. Therefore the buyer wouldn't be allowed to buy and you'd not be allowed to go build someone else's house or engage in house flipping business of your own (I assume this is not your business or you'd get it done properly). If you disclose to the buyer that the work was done by you unlicensed and you got divorced in the meantime, forcing the sale of the house, you'll have done enough. It would not be big bucks by any means to show this, unless of course you've done flips before and they already half suspect that you're working as an unlicensed contractor through this type of business.
Or your other choice is to get a permit and license to finish the new structure and do it up right.
But being totally unable to sell a house under any circumstances is not really an issue.
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