Highlands County Enhanced Life Estate Quitclaim Deed (Individual Grantor) Form

No section of the Florida Statutes creates the lady bird deed. The instrument that Florida homeowners use in place of a transfer on death deed, a state that never adopted the Uniform Real Property Transfer on Death Act, rests instead on common law reaching back to Oglesby v. Lee, 73 So. 840 (Fla. 1917), on a century of conveyancing practice, and on the Florida Bar Uniform Title Standards adopted in 2019 to give title insurers a consensus rule for accepting it. This form prepares that instrument, formally an enhanced life estate deed, in quitclaim form for an individual grantor.

A remainder the grantor can erase

The deed works by splitting title in a way ordinary life estate deeds do not. The grantor conveys a remainder to the named beneficiary while reserving a life estate enhanced with the full set of powers Florida title practice looks for: to sell, convey, mortgage, lease, gift, or otherwise dispose of the property without the beneficiary's joinder or consent, to keep every dollar of the proceeds, and to divest the remainder entirely, including by recording a later deed. Uniform Title Standards 6.10 and 6.11 confirm that a life tenant holding these powers can convey or encumber the fee alone. The beneficiary holds nothing fixed during the grantor's life; if the grantor dies without exercising the reserved powers, title vests in the beneficiary at that moment, outside probate. This form adds a lapse provision: a beneficiary who does not survive the grantor takes nothing, and title stays with the grantor's estate plan rather than the beneficiary's.

Quitclaim words for a family transfer

The conveyance uses the remise, release, and quitclaim words of the statutory quitclaim form in section 689.025, Florida Statutes, so it passes exactly the interest the grantor holds and makes no warranty of title. That character suits the transfers this deed usually documents, parent to adult child on a long-held home.

Homestead is the hard part

Florida's constitution requires a married owner's spouse to join in any lifetime gift or conveyance of homestead, and its restriction on devise can defeat a remainder in homestead at death. This form is prepared for an individual grantor: it carries signature lines for one grantor, two subscribing witnesses, and a single notary certificate, and no spouse joinder block or homestead waiver language. The guide describes how marriage, homestead status, or a surviving minor child interacts with the arrangement the deed makes, and where those facts place a conveyance outside what this form recites.

Two witnesses, seventy cents

Execution follows section 689.01, Florida Statutes: two subscribing witnesses, with printed names and post-office addresses that recording offices have required since January 2024, plus a notary acknowledgment stating physical presence or online notarization. The Department of Revenue's published ruling on enhanced life estate deeds, TAA 20B4-004, treats the recording as no present transfer, so clerks collect the minimum 70-cent documentary stamp rather than tax on a mortgage balance. The download includes the fillable deed formatted to section 695.26 recording standards, a completed example on an Orange County fact pattern, and a plain-language guide to every blank; the materials are informational and are not legal advice.