An 83-year-old Alabama woman has agreed to move out of her home of 60 years, bringing an end to a legal battle that reached the state’s highest court.

Corine Woodson inherited her late husband’s share of a nearly 41-acre property in Auburn when he died in 2022.

And for the past 20 years, a local developer, Cleveland Brothers, Inc., has been fighting in court to buy the land and build a subdivision.

After settling her appeal in a lawsuit this week, Woodson will not keep her home, said her attorney Jacy Fisher, of Gregory Varner & Associates in Birmingham.

Fisher told AL.com that she could not provide additional details about the settlement, as the terms are confidential. But she said she was grateful to the Cleveland Brothers, Inc. for “their reasonableness and consideration” in the agreement.

“Corine is very satisfied with the settlement and is grateful to God for answering our prayers,” Fisher said in an email. “Although I was excited about the opportunity to argue this case before the Alabama Supreme Court, I’m happy to see an 18-year-old partition case (especially one that falls under the old partition statute) end with Mrs. Woodson preserving some of her family’s legacy.”

In the original case in Lee County, District Judge Russell Bush ordered Woodson to pay a $3.97 million bond to the Cleveland Brothers while her appeal proceeded. Fisher said that a “financial sponsor” covered the bond, which allowed Woodson to appeal.

Woodson and her late husband made their home on the property decades ago. But the single property is co-owned by the descendants of her late husband’s ancestors, passed down through the family for generations.

Woodson inherited a share of the property when her late husband passed away in 2022, and she was added as a party to the case.

Woodson offered to buy the entire property in January 2023, per court records, but a judge in Lee County ruled last year that she waited too late to make an offer. In September, Woodson appealed her case to the Alabama Supreme Court, asking the justices to let her buy the property.

The property is under “tenants in common” status. That means ownership stakes of the land are held as percentages, rather than divided up by owners with individual parcels.

Some family members already sold their shares of the land to Cleveland Brothers, Inc.

Woodson inherited an 11% share of the land. A court-ordered appraisal found the property’s value to be $3.97 million.

On Monday, Woodson filed to dismiss her appeal, per court records.

It’s unclear when she’s moving or where she’ll live. Woodson, as well as her power of attorney, listed in court records as Mavis Melissa Woodson, did not return requests for comment.

Billy Cleveland, partner at Cleveland Brothers, Inc., did not respond to a request for comment. He told AL.com in November that the company wasn’t “trying to oust Corine Woodson from the house.”

Woodson’s husband, Willie Woodson, inherited his share of the Auburn land that’s been co-owned by descendants of his ancestors and passed down through the family for generations. His ancestor, Ben W. Woodson, who was a sharecropper, originally owned the property in 1911 and left it to his 12 children or their heirs and descendants when he died, per court records.