Supreme Court unanimously favors Isabella County in estate dispute case
A house sits in the snow at 3176 Andrews Drive, in Mount Pleasant, on Wednesday, Nov. 3, 2025. The building is currently in the midst of a house dispute involving the Supreme Court. (CM-Life | Mark Hoover)
On June 23, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) ruled in favor of Isabella County in an estate dispute case against the Pung family, that their Fifth and Eighth amendments were not violated.
The court decided that the Pung family had lost their property and were not given the right to receive compensation based on the property’s fair market value, according to the SCOTUS's opinion in the docket written by Justice Samuel Alito.
The docket said the Pung family was not entitled because of repeated notices and failure to pay taxes. When the property was foreclosed and auctioned, the owner is given no more than the amount it was sold.
“Thus, the court concluded that Pung should receive $73,766.07—the difference between the sale price of the home and the tax debt,” the docket said.
The case comes from a decade long pursuit when Michael Pung, the named plaintiff and executor of the estate, sued the county for his late brother Timothy Pung. He sued after the house, was wrongly foreclosed due to $2,241.93 in property taxes and was auctioned less than the property value.
Michael argued that his Fifth and Eighth amendments were violated and he deserved just compensation of more than the estimated $74,000 that was given.
At the time the house was auctioned, its value was $194,000. The Pung family argued the property was sold more than enough to cover the debt owed.
Michael went to federal and district court until the case made its way to the Supreme Court.
According to a press release, Matthew Nelson, Isabella County’s lawyer for this case, said to the Supreme Court that all property owners need to pay their taxes. People who don’t pay those taxes shift that burden to their neighbors.
“Pung’s fair-market-value theory would impose unprecedented burdens on jurisdictions that wish to collect unpaid taxes and might well make tax sales impractical,” the docket said.
The court opinion said that under Pung’s rule, tax sales would cause the government to lose money and would not work as a feasible debt collector system.
The Supreme Court ruled against the Fifth Amendment because it protects a family to surplus proceeds but not compensation for a fair market value. The Eighth Amendment was not violated either because it was not an excessive fine and offered no protection in this case.
“Neither the Fifth nor the Eighth Amendment requires the government to compensate former owners based on the hypothetical fair market value of their property,” the docket said.
The lawyer for the Pung family, Attorney Philip Ellison, did not respond immediately back at the time of this article.
The Supreme Court held a unanimous vote in favor of Isabella County. However, the case will be back in the Sixth District for further proceedings based on SCOTUS’s ruling.
