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KRS 392.040

Lands in which surviving spouse to have no dower or curtesy

Applied in 6 court decisions — leading case Wides v. Wides' Ex'r (1944)

Most recently applied in Gilchrist v. United Bank & Trust Co. (In re Gilchrist) (January 2011)

History: Amended 1974 Ky

How often courts cite this section

1942196019802000201110
citing decisions per year

Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.

(1) The surviving spouse shall not have dower or curtesy in land sold but not conveyed by the deceased spouse before marriage, nor in land sold in good faith after marriage to satisfy an encumbrance created before marriage or created by deed in which the surviving spouse joined, or to satisfy a lien for the purchase money. If, however, there is a surplus of the land or proceeds of sale after satisfying the lien, surviving spouse may have dower or curtesy out of that surplus of the land or compensation out of the surplus of the proceeds, unless they were received or disposed of by the decedent in his lifetime.

(2) If the decedent held land by executory contract only, the surviving spouse shall not have dower or curtesy in the land, unless decedent owned such an equitable right at the time of his death.

Official source: Kentucky General Assembly. Reproduced from public-domain Kentucky statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.