Parents selling land.

[Snowy79]

I'm in the process of trying to advise a good friend how to protect her land in the future and it may throw up a few pointers to help out others marrying into such a possibility.

She currently has a family home built on agricultural land. The land is tax declared only but in the name of the grand parents who have both passed away. An aunt has kept up the tax payments on the land. The grand parents had 8 siblings and off those only 2 live on the land. Her father and an uncle

I'm aware under titled land each sibling is entitled to 1/8th of the land but does this still stand for tax declared land?

The next issue is I've advised her to apply for a title, have the land surveyed and divided up into equal lots per sibling. All bar one the uncle said she can have the their share of the land. The land is a good 20 mins walk from the nearest road so she said there's no fears of losing of but I told her to look 10 to 15 years into the future.

She has said the other siblings will sign letters giving her the land as they have no interest in it as there's next to no value in the land. What happens if in the future those siblings die and their siblings challenge this letter? Is it legally binding or can a court over rule it under the Civil Code or such legal framework that protects siblings?

I've advised her to get a title first of all in each siblings name so at the least the land is titled and protected for the family. Then I've advised her to get the siblings to amend page 3 of the title to sign their rights away as the title is a legal document. How does this sound?

This should get the grey matter working today.

[Jack Peterson]

1 minute ago, Snowy79 said:

This should get the grey matter working today.

 Definitely a job for a Lawyer, we here just do not know enough about the Inheritance laws which it seems may involve more than just the 8, as you say there is a furtherance to that where other children are concerned and may well throw a spanner in the Works.

As to the Tax, well I guess the BIR will help you 

[Snowy79]

I pretty much told her she needs to ensure it's worth the trouble in the first place as the good old back of a fag packet rules are OK now but as property and business owners are finding out on Boracay and El Nido further down the line you can get burnt.

[Jack Peterson]

One thing here that does come to mind. If the BIR or other land related people, Registras and the Title Office do not not know they have passed away, there will be a Big problem, Before anything can be sold,  willed  or any other form of Distribution of land, there will be Capital Gains and Death Duty to be paid, all too many times I have heard and read about failure to notify the Government Agencies of the Death that will/can open a big can of Worms So my friend, has the passing of the Parents been Reported?

[Dave Hounddriver]

43 minutes ago, Snowy79 said:

I'm aware under titled land each sibling is entitled to 1/8th of the land but does this still stand for tax declared land?

In my experience from 7 years ago it did indeed, not just siblings will come out of the woodwork, but children of siblings too.  It was such a nightmare that our lawyer told me and me "then gf" to just lease the land for 25 years from the one individual who was left with care and control of the land.  Then all the other claimants cannot come and exercise their claim unless they are willing to pay back what was paid to lease the land.  That scares them all off.

43 minutes ago, Snowy79 said:

What happens if in the future those siblings die and their siblings challenge this letter? Is it legally binding or can a court over rule it under the Civil Code or such legal framework that protects siblings?

If the one who signs the letter dies within a certain time frame (if memory serves it is 5 years) then their heirs can come and claim that the letter is worthless and they want their rights.

The way to avoid this is to have one person "own" the land and another person to have a huge "mortgage" on that land.  Thus any heir who come to claim will have to pay the mortgage before they can claim their rights.  Again, a lawyer sewed this up for me.

As this is Philippines, there is always a legal work around for any heirs who want it bad enough and have enough money to hire a bright lawyer but what I have suggested works 99% of the time and the 1% of the time it does not work is when you spend a huge amount of money improving the land or building on it to make it worth the claimant's time, effort, and money to take a run at it.

Such is my opinion based on having done it and having had legal advice to do it and having years of non-intervention by other claimants.  Your mileage will vary.

EDIT:  PS, if your friend plans on farming or collecting coconuts or timber from this agricultural land then do not expect good results.  All the jilted claimants and their relatives will be sneaking in at night to steal the crop because if they cannot get it legally they will get it illegally.  Especially if it is not a guarded and walled plot.  Again, based on experience.  I suggested putting out guard dogs and my  "then gf" said:  "You don't know filipinos, they will kill and eat the dogs."

Edited March 9, 2018 by Dave Hounddriver

[Snowy79]

I've also just read up that Duterte only a couple of days ago has pushed to put a freeze on the re-designation of Agricultural land to Residential land for up to 2 years.

[Dave Hounddriver]

6 minutes ago, Snowy79 said:

Duterte only a couple of days ago has pushed to put a freeze on the re-designation of Agricultural land to Residential land for up to 2 years.

There is an important distinction here.  There are 3 factors that come into play.  Of course that means a person cannot buy agricultural land and subdivide it or put a bunch of houses on it, but many agricultural plots are permitted to have one residential house for the owner to live in.  Not all allow that.  The tax dec lot that I wrote of in a previous post will only allow non-permanent structures, so a native can build a nipa hut or a bamboo house with no problem whatsoever but if anyone tried to put up a concrete block house the DENR would be all over them.

[Jack Peterson]

7 minutes ago, Snowy79 said:

I've also just read up that Duterte only a couple of days ago has pushed to put a freeze on the re-designation of Agricultural land to Residential land for up to 2 years.

 My SIL works for DAR (Department of Agriculture Reform and has done for over 20 years, she tells us that the previous President also did this, it was to stop their own Land from being Developed But we can still get the waiver for areas under 1 hectare, We have a waiver on our lot of 500 sq mtrs, it really does depend on what is already growing on any land as to whether a waiver can be issued and the surrounding Area in general as to who has done what 

[Dave Hounddriver]

6 minutes ago, Jack Peterson said:

My SIL works for DAR

Jack brings up a good point.

Even after the OP's ownership of the land, he/she would need permission from both the DAR and the DENR to decide what can be built on it and where.  It appears to me that the former is concerned with over-development of farmland into residential areas while the latter is concerned with the environmental systems that a building may interfere with.  

[virginprune]

The land my partner bought was agricultural. It took best part of a year to change it to residential for the title to be released in her name as a residential plot with permission to build. All the relevant changes are only done in Manila.