I’m reading an academic work on slaveholders and it mentions the phrase “life estate” and indicated that someone who was given a life estate in something could hold it during their lifetime and it would go to their children afterwards.
If an individual has a life estate in something they can use it during their life time but they cannot transfer it to someone else, encumber the title, “waste” it, etc. They have it for the duration of their life.
But after their death it may or may not go to their children. If A gives B a life estate in property, A can indicate what happens to that property after B dies. A can indicate it goes to B’s children or that it goes to someone else. It does not have to go to their children–A can decide what happens to it when it sets up the life estate for B and grants B a life estate in the property. A could say that it goes to B’s children upon B’s death or that it goes to someone entirely different.
Don’t assume.
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