I was purchasing a commercial property and Sellers (and their Realtor) didn't bother disclosing the life estate (from previous owner) and I found it when reviewing the title work...fortunately it was something that I could work around for several years but it cost the current owner at the time $50,000.00 off the purchase price....not a big deal removing the life estate when the person died after about 3 years and in my instance a death certificate satisfied the title company when selling parts of the property.

Jim's uncle sold the raisin grape ranch, and the buyer, another local farmer, allowed him to set up a life estate for the house. But when the farmer went to finance the property, the bank said no way, and demanded that the life estate be removed. Simple to do, Uncle just signed a form. And was allowed to live in the house for two more years, but the buyer was an old friend.

(ETA: value was in the vineyard acreage, the buyer farmer lived elsewhere, and the house eventually was used by workers.)

Find out WHO has the Life Estate and how old they are.

There is a famous example in France where a buyer died before the life tenant, having paid the utilities and taxes on the building since the sale and the heirs waited another decade.

Never forget the cautionary tale of Jeanne Calmet, a 120 year old woman with a life estate who outlived her buyer. He had purchased it subject to the life estate when she was 90. She lived to be 122. (Oops, just read that this was referenced above).

I read she had a great sense of humor and sent her buyer an "I'm sorry" card every birthday. :)

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1995-12-27/news/9512280029_1_jeanne-calment-elderly-woman-christmas-day

From the article:

When Calment was 90, Raffray, then 47, agreed to pay her a "rent" of
$500 a month until she died, on condition he would inherit her house in
Arles, a system common in France.

Throughout the next 30 years, Raffray paid Calment more than $180,000, three times the value of the house.

"We all make bad deals in life," Calment joked to Raffray on her 120th birthday.

Thanks, everyone.

Yes, but to be fair, the laws are quite different in France, which encourages that sort of thing there. I believe tontines are still legal in France, too.

I think you need legal advice and a title policy. These kinds of title matters are too iffy to follow such advice as we can give on an internet forum.

For sure if they'd been serious about an offer, Sylvia. But as I said in the OP, for other reasons they decided not to try for it, so this is just something that made me curious.