My uncle recently died. He had one child, was divorced, remarried and had two more children. He paid child support until his first child was 18, saw him only a few times while the child was growing up. After age 18, the boy never heard from him again. My uncle put his other two children through college and was quite generous with them. The first boy has two young sons which he is raising alone - they are my uncle's only grandchildren although he never saw them. My uncle's second wife is a very selfish woman. If there is a will with my first cousin not mentioned, can he challenge the will and collect? If there is not a will, does all money automatically go to my uncle's second wife or can my cousin inherit a portion of what would have been his father's portion? Oh, my cousin resides in Utah, but my uncle was a resident of California.

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Originally Posted by snasusan

My uncle recently died. He had one child, was divorced, remarried and had two more children. He paid child support until his first child was 18, saw him only a few times while the child was growing up. After age 18, the boy never heard from him again. My uncle put his other two children through college and was quite generous with them. The first boy has two young sons which he is raising alone - they are my uncle's only grandchildren although he never saw them. My uncle's second wife is a very selfish woman. If there is a will with my first cousin not mentioned, can he challenge the will and collect? If there is not a will, does all money automatically go to my uncle's second wife or can my cousin inherit a portion of what would have been his father's portion? Oh, my cousin resides in Utah, but my uncle was a resident of California.

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If there was a properly prepared Will (by that I mean a Will prepared by an Attorney admitted to the Bar in the State where your Uncle resided, which I understand to be California) and your Uncle left nothing to your cousin (again, using California-appropriate legal language) there will be no grounds to win a contest. Of course, your cousin can contest but I don't see him "collecting."

In NYS the wording is along the lines of, "I specifically make no provision for X," this language being proof that the omission of that person is not an oversight. At one point language along the lines of "I hereby leave one dollar for X" or "I make no provision for X for reasons known to him" but these provisions were challenged in Court and a handful of the people contesting won so the more general phrase is now being used.

Someone in California would have to answer the without a will question but my research indicates: "Upon the death of either spouse, the community property is split equally and the surviving spouse receives his or her share of community property outright. The deceased spouse's 50 percent share of community property is part of his or her estate and is subject to his or her will or living trust. " The balance, I can only assume, would be divided among the heirs.

Depending on how long ago your Uncle died your cousin should have received notification that the estate has been admitted to probate. Has that happened?

All the one son can do is contest the will while it is still in probate. It will depend greatly on exactly what and how the will is done. Without a will he should have a small share with the other children but wife will still get the largest percentage. But also remember if home is owned in two names with right of survivialship it does not go into probate, if there is joint bank accounts with right of survivialship it does not go into probate, so if a person does all of the money and property correctly, there will be little to divide to start with