In re Estate of Muriel R. Mills

At the time of her death, decedent Muriel Mills she owned property in Manchester. She had granted a "home equity conversion mortgage" on the property to Financial Freedom Senior Funding Corporation. The mortgage deed was recorded at the Hillsborough County Registry of Deeds. The terms of the mortgage included a statutory power of sale that allowed Financial Freedom to foreclose upon the property under certain enumerated circumstances, including the death of the borrower. The terms also provided that the "Borrower shall have no personal liability for payment of the debt secured by this Security Instrument" and that the "Lender may enforce the debt only through the sale of the Property." Petitioner was appointed executor of the estate. By letter, counsel for petitioner notified Financial Freedom of the decedent's death and of the opening of the administration of her estate. Counsel also requested the current balance due on the mortgage debt as well as any information regarding "any assignment of the mortgage." Thereafter, Financial Freedom did not file notice of a claim or present a demand to the petitioner pursuant to RSA 556:1, :3 (2007). Later that year, counsel for Financial Freedom sent a letter to the estate explaining that she had been instructed to foreclose on the mortgage in the name of respondent under the power of sale contained in the mortgage. The letter also informed the estate that the note had been accelerated and the entire balance was "due and payable forthwith," and included the total amount of the balance due on the debt. In response, petitioner's counsel wrote to Financial Freedom claiming that it, "or any of its related entities, abandoned any interest[] that it may have had in the property" because it failed to file a claim within six months after the grant of administration of the estate. The next month, the mortgage was assigned to respondent and thereafter recorded at the Hillsborough County Registry of Deeds. Petitioner then filed a petition to quiet title in the circuit court, asserting that Financial Freedom had "waived, lost, or abandoned any interest that it would have had in the property" and, therefore, the circuit court could issue an order quieting title to the property so that the beneficiary named in the decedent's will could receive the property. Financial Freedom appeared at the hearing and moved to dismiss the quiet title action. The trial court ruled in Financial Freedom's favor, and petitioner appealed. Finding no reversible error in the trial court's decision to dismiss, the Supreme Court affirmed that dismissal. View "In re Estate of Muriel R. Mills " on Justia Law