[WSBARP] Transfer on Death Deed Questions

[Mark Anderson]

Dear All:
Mother owned real property.  Mother executed and recorded a transfer upon death deed to Daughter in 2021.  Mother died in 2022.  A death certificate for Mother was recorded thereafter.  Daughter wants to sell the property.
A title company asserts that, pursuant to RCW 64.80, creditors and parties with a possible interest in the property have one year after the Grantor's death to contest the transfer upon death deed and are referring to this as a "redemption period."  In order for Daughter to sell prior to the running of this one-year period, the title company is requiring a fully executed and recorded Lack of Probate Affidavit and Deed from Mother's heirs.  The title company also went on to (inexplicably) tell Daughter that, "The grantees will be the recognized Heirs of the estate."
I acknowledge that RCW 64.80.100(2) says that a beneficiary of a transfer on death deed "takes the property subject to all conveyances, encumbrances, assignments, contracts, mortgages, liens, and other interests to which the property is subject at the transferor's death, including liens recorded within twenty-four months after the transferor's death...."  Or, in my view, RCW 64.80 does not expressly grant anyone the right to contest the transfer upon death deed itself.
So why would the title company interpret RCW 64.80 in the way that it did, both as to timing and substance?
Mark B. Anderson
ANDERSON LAW FIRM PLLC
821 Dock St  Ste 209  PMB 4-12
Tacoma, Washington 98402
+1 253-327-1750
+1 253-327-1751 (fax)
marka at mbaesq.com<mailto:marka at mbaesq.com>
www.mbaesq.com<http://www.mbaesq.com/>
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