Ludwick's Estate

Citations

• 255 Pa. 548
• 100 A. 448
• 1917 Pa. LEXIS 491

Syllabus

<p>Decedents’ estates — Beal estate — Devise—Jurisdiction Orphans’/ Court.</p> <p>1. The Orphans’ Court has no jurisdiction to determine the title to the real estate of a decedent as between several claimants.</p> <p>2. Where a testator directs his administrator to appoint appraisers of his real estate and permits certain of his children to elect whether to take the real estate at the appraisement, the only jurisdiction of the Orphans’ Court over such real estate is to supervise the exercise of the testamentary power given the administrator in the appointment of the appraisers. When the appointment is sufficient and free from fraud, it is conclusive and requires no confirmation of the court, nor does it belong to the court to award to any the subject of the appraisement.</p> <p>3. A testator by will directed that his administrator should “appoint three disinterested men who shall under oath value and appraise my real estate that is the farm on which I now reside and it is my will that my son......shall take my real estate at said appraisement, but if (the son) should refuse to take my real estate at said appraisement then my daughters......are to have the privilege of taking my real estate at said appraisement according to ■their seniority of age and if none of my heirs should agree to take my real estate then I order that my administrator shall put it to sale.” An appraisement was made and filed and the son died thereafter intestate, leaving issue. Testator’s two eldest daughters claimed the right to take the real estate at its appraised value. The Orphans’ Court awarded the real estate to the two daughters upon their paying the appraised value. Held, that the Orphans’ Court had no jurisdiction over the subject-matter of the controversy and the petition was dismissed.</p>