THIS TITLE IS LEGAL

When a property owner dies and leaves real estate to their heirs, most people — even brokers and lawyers — assume one thing:

👉 The new title must list every single heir by name.

Sounds logical, right?

I used to think so too.

Until recently, when I came across a title that proved me wrong.

The registered owner section listed multiple individual names…

and then, in one line, simply stated:

“Heirs of [Decedent’s Name]”

No names.

No breakdown.

Just that.

To be more specific, the ownership portion of the title looked something like this:

Owner: Jose Rizal, of legal age, Filipino, single (50.00%)

Address: XXX

Owner: Saturnina Hidalgo, of legal age, Filipino, single (25.00%)

Address: XXX

Owner: Heirs of Deceased Paciano Rizal (25.00%)

Address: XXX

Naturally, I asked lawyers how this was even possible.

Turns out… it is.

They explained that in certain cases, the heirs of a decedent execute a Special Power of Attorney appointing a single Attorney-in-Fact to represent them. When this is presented to the Registry of Deeds (RD), the RD may register the ownership using a collective description instead of listing each heir individually.

It’s legal.

It’s valid.

And it’s one of those things you’ll never learn from textbooks — only from encountering real titles in the wild.

Just when you think you’ve seen everything…you haven’t yet.