Buyer’s instructions

Buying a forest property owned by a death estate is very similar to buying from any other property owner. The deed of sale will be signed by an administrator authorised by the death estate acting as the seller. Usually, the administrator is one of the parties to the death estate or an executor appointed by a court.

The most important things to be taken into account when buying a property relate to obtaining the registration of ownership and the responsibility issues of a property sale.

When a property is purchased from a death estate, the death estate is an undistributed one in which case the property is still very likely owned by a deceased person. However, the death estate may have obtained a title by explanation for the property after which the death estate is the official owner of the property. If no title by explanation has been obtained, the buyer of the property must present the reports on the deceased’s family relationships and the other necessary documents concerning the parties to the death estate in order to get registration of ownership for their acquisition.

In a property sale wherein the seller is a death estate, the seller’s responsibility pursuant to the Code of Real Estate is distributed among the parties to the death estate, regardless of quality faults or other similar errors. The obligations and fault-related provisions pursuant to the Code of Real Estate also concern the death estate i.e. every party to the estate. In a possible error condition, the buyer can demand the death estate to cancel the transaction or to lower the price, for example. In an error condition, it should also be noted that in practice, none of the parties may have been in possession of the property being sold and, therefore, the maintenance and repairs related to the building belonging to the property may have gone neglected for years before the sale. However, the parties are still responsible for the information concerning the property and for ensuring that the buyer is provided with the correct information, and the parties are still responsible for the faults in the property, just like any other sellers. This is why, in cases where the property’s seller is a death estate, things such as ordering a condition survey concerning the possible residential buildings and having further information about the property’s features obtained by a competent professional broker become increasingly important.

So-called open forest assets information is available at different sources. The information is based on a laser scanning implemented every ten years. Metsätilat.fi implements the forest calculation as field work because the laser scanning data can be inaccurate, the forest may be damaged, and the maintenance situation in forests may have changed over the years. Additionally, the forest’s diversity, conservation and Forest Act sites must be inspected physically. The field work provides an accurate picture of the property, which prevents errors in the tree and terrain information.

Using field work to examine the quantity of trees, log stock, maintenance needs, living environment, road conditions and readiness for harvesting is important as forest property sales involve large sums of money and the information must be verified.

Sometimes, surveying the growing stock can be supported with open forest assets information to draw the compartment borders, but the numbers of trees, sapling stands heights and qualities are verified with field surveying. Angle gauges and tree height gauges are still needed in the work of the Metsätilat.fi brokers.