Who Gets the $7 million townhouse?

The Horatio Street townhouse 

Back around the time young Bob Zimmerman moved to New York and legally changed his surname to Dylan, Bill Cornwell and Tom Doyle moved into an apartment in a West Village townhouse on Horatio Street. Cornwell later bought the building, and there they stayed. Although gay marriage was unthinkable half a century ago, the two men became a well-known couple in the West Village.

In 2014 Cornwell died at age 88. His will left his personal possessions and his townhouse to Doyle. But the will is invalid, signed by only one witness – New York State requires two. So Cornwell died intestate. Nieces and nephews will inherit. Could Tom Doyle lose the only home he has known for over five decades?

Not without a fight, writes Attorney Arthur Z. Schwartz:

Tom has come to my office and we have come up with a plan. While New York never recognized common law marriage, Pennsylvania did until recently. Bill Cornwall and Tom Doyle vacationed there a number of times, and New York Courts will recognize common law marriages if they would be recognized in a state where a couple visited, even if the visit was brief. I have made Tom Doyle’s rightful claim to 69 Horatio Street. It is a claim born of love and the cruel refusal of New York to recognize gay marriage for so many years.

Could the plan succeed? In any event, the moral of the story is that Bill Cornwall should have shaped his estate plan sooner and better.