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My oldest sis and I were not told that my mom had passed away. I have a will that was not submitted. The house was sold in 2003 and my mom did not go into a nursing home. Was it legal for my middle sister to take all of her assets (after death)because she had poa? Now what do I do about the will? Does the will mean nothing? There were no other wills submitted.
Why weren't you told or why didn't you know before this?
No poa does not mean you have legal right. In fact it means you are to be trusted with doing right by the estate.
I would consult a lawyer because she should not be left to get away with this.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ALaib11233
The Power of Attorney terminated at the moment of your mother's death.
You can still submit to the will to Probate. I don't know if your sister submitted some other Will, didn't go to Probate, what that situation is, but to answer your question - the Will prevails BUT it must be filed.
You will obviously have a problem because your mother died 7 months ago, distribution of some assets may have been made, now you are bringing up the subject of a Will. It will be up to Probate Court to decide how to proceed.
Estate attorneys have all the forms and know how to have them filled out properly. You can do this yourself but time is of the essence here and doing it yourself incorrectly can eat up valuable time. Also the attorney will pose more of a threat to your sister as she can't just deal with you directly anymore once the will is sent to the Probate Judge.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ALaib11233
You are asking a mixed bag of questions - Wills are one things and the rest of this is another.
If you are addressing what happened under the P/A, the Attorney is right - you have an uphill and probably losing fight.
The prepaid funeral money is just that - money set aside for the funeral and that's what it, by law, is to be used for. Anything left would be controlled by the terms of the Will. You can't "gift" prepaid funeral money to anyone. It's money set aside for the funeral, usually (as far as I've ever seen) held in trust BY the funeral home. I don't understand that part of your question.
The Will could and should be filed - I still don't understand, Attorney in the family or not, why it wasn't. If the Attorney family member KNEW there was a Will and didn't file it or said there was no Will, he can be disbarred.
Most prepaid funerals are nothing more than a high priced life insurance policy, ** a few funeral homes had their own private plans, but most are just a form of life insurance. So you can contact that funeral home and find out about getting the money paid out, since another home did the funeral home. It is possible that if they were "paid" for a funeral in advance, a partial refudn would be possible.
Next POA does not mean anything at all at this point and time, that all ended at death. Also unless you were officially given notice that you were no longer POA both of you can have POA, 4 or 5 people can have POA for one person, all that allows them to do is sign for someone, reallly nothing else.
And in probate if some items are suppose to go to other people, the probate court can require her to return them.
Someone please tell me how to delete questions and answers of posts of your own.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fr_Chuck
Quote:
Originally Posted by peanut22
You can do "edit" if it's within a certain time frame or you can hit the "report this post" or something like that on the upper right and in the fill in the blanks part give your reason and ask the moderator to pull it.
You cannot pull/change someone else's post.
I am now concerned - has something happened to make you not want to discuss this?
[QUOTE=JudyKayTee]You can do "edit" if it's within a certain time frame or you can hit the "report this post" or something like that on the upper right and in the fill in the blanks part give your reason and ask the moderator to pull it.
You cannot pull/change someone else's post.
I am now concerned - has something happened to make you not want to discuss this?[/QUOTEI
I feel as though Im not getting the right answers. And Im not thinking that Im looking for something I want to hear. After talking to a attorney today. It seems like I may be in a no win situation. You have to wait to see if the sister filed a will and you also have to file yours in time with all the necessary papers to be filled out. So you have to hire a attorney and pay a couple of hundred. The sister is going to get away with what she has done. I was the honest one who didn't want to do what she did to us. I have to pay $300.00 and plus to submit the will and pay a bond. Don't know if you get it back. And then if she turns up with one Im screwed out of my money I put into it. The whole things seems like it doesn't make any sense. If there is no other will written then maybe it could be in my favor a little but I have to do the running around to another state. Have to pay a inheritance tax on the prepaid funeral. Its such a big mess for a little thing that I didn't imagine could ever happen. I wish I could just throw everything away but I can't because its my duty to see this thing threw.
[QUOTE=ALaib11233]Quote:
Originally Posted by JudyKayTee
OK - I understand. Sounds like one big mess and a mess that could ultimately cost you a lot of money - with not a good result.
I know you think it's your duty to see things through but sometimes you win the battle but lose the war. I have seen siblings and children and step-parents battle to the death, battle until the estate funds are burned up.
These estate problems with sibling are a miss! I wish I could tell you something warm and wonderful and enlightening - but there's nothing like that out there and I know you know that.
While not arguing with an attorney, the date of the will, a will will have been either properly witnessed or notorised or both, so the newer will would be the proper one. And you can find out if she filed one by contacting the probate court, If she has filed one, you can get a copy and see what is the current will.
But fighting an estate is costly, but there is little or no inheritance tax unless you are talking about a very, very large estate.. In which the attorneys should be lined up willing to fight for you for a share.
But again your issue is you don't live close enough to do things without hiring someone
But I have to say the part about "waiting for her to file her will" do you know she has a will, if she does not, there is nothing to wait on, you can contact her and tell her you are filing yours if she does not have a newer one, but if she has not filed one, and you are not aware of a newer one, you are free to file yours first, and she can object to it, and file hers to replace yours if she has a newer one. I don't mean this wrong, but I believe I would get a second opinoin on that legal advice, if the estate is large enough to worry about
Quote:
Originally Posted by Fr_Chuck
There is no will submitted by the sister. I already checked with register of wills. You have a time frame to file and you can file last minute. But that puts me in a bind because I don't know how long it takes to do the necessary paper work and submit it before you submit the will.
But I guess the other question is there anything really to fight over.
I know when my aunt passed, there was a used car, some funiture and a few hundred dollars, by the time I paid an attorney ( paid back for his fee from estate) there really was nothing left after he got paid.
Well my husband threw the will in the trash. He said my family is greedy and nuts and he said let them do the fighting. So now I don't have to do anything.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ALaib11233
No one knows who you are, of course, but are you aware you cannot legally destroy a valid Will - it appears that this Will might favor you and so your siblings would be relieved that it is gone but, honestly, this is a very not-so-smart thing to do if someone is aware of the Will and protests.
I understand that you are upset but it is frightening to me that your mother prepared a Will, her final wishes, and you have destroyed it without admitting it to probate.
Another lesson to be learned - file your Will with the Attorney, the Court, someone, because it can be gone in seconds and your wishes will not be followed.
Not lecturing you, it's already done, and I don't know all the circumstances.
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