Kentucky · Spouse signatureKentucky dower and curtesy: the spouse's interest in land sold during the marriage

Kentucky keeps a statutory dower interest for both spouses. When one spouse dies intestate, the survivor has, besides the inheritance share, a life estate in one-third of any real estate the other spouse held in fee simple at any time during the marriage but no longer held at death – unless the survivor's right has been barred, forfeited or relinquished (KRS 392.020(1)(a)); the same rules apply to a husband's interest in his wife's land as to a wife's in her husband's (KRS 392.010). So when a married owner sells, the non-owner spouse's dower interest in that land survives the sale unless that spouse relinquishes it. The statute excludes a few situations: land sold but not conveyed before the marriage, land sold in good faith after the marriage to satisfy an encumbrance created before the marriage or by a deed the surviving spouse joined, and land sold to satisfy a purchase-money lien – though the spouse can still claim from any surplus the decedent didn't receive or dispose of (KRS 392.040).