House deed question: DEED WITH RESTRICTIVE COVENANT

Hello.
I have a house in Queens, bought ~25 yrs ago. The mortgage was paid off.
Recently, I added my wife to the deed. No money changes hands. We did this with the help of a real estate attorney.
For some reason, the new deed (after adding my wife) shown in ACRIS city record has the document type of “DEED WITH RESTRICTIVE COVENANT”. The old deed (when I bought the house) has a document type of “DEED”.
1. Does anyone know the different between the 2 types?
2. Should I be worry about issues later down the road when it is time to sell?
3. Did we do something wrong in the process that caused this? If so, how to fix this?
The attorney is on vacation now. I will ask her later when she is back. I just want to have an idea what is going on.

Thank you.
JM.

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stevecym | 6 years ago

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A restrictive covenant is not a type of deed but language in a deed. You may wish to read the deed to see what the covenant may be. it could be something that limits your use of the property. depending on what it may be, it may be nothing. for example, let’s say I own two commercial buildings (side by side) and I sell green widgets. I decide to sell one of the buildings but I do not want someone else moving in next door who sells green widgets, so as I sell the building I have the deed changed to say that any future owners cannot sell green widgets. or it can relate to something else, perhaps an agreement between neighbors that they will not build beyond a certain size in the lot. these agreements go with the deed from seller to buyer so the covenant may be old (we have an easement behind our house and I wonder if that is a kind of covenant now that I am writing this). what many would know to be a restrictive covenant would be restrictions placed on the transfer of property to members of certain races ( I think they did that in Levittown on LI); restric tive covenants based on race or religion are illegal and now unenforceable if still in the deed.

I would look at what the covenant is and then decide if you think it is something that may impeded the sale of your house. it may be nothing, or it may be something common to all the houses on the street, or it may be something unenforceable.

but what do I know? I am only a woodworker.

Steve