parent's estate

[littlebittybobby]

okay----i feel your pain, faux. Better hang onto the Family Farm, even if ya hafta buy the spendthrifts out. Because, after all the legal battles, taxes, and everything, all i had left of my bequest was a very, very modest sum. But yeah----i then proceeded ta piss it away on catt & dogg food & old, junk cars & trips to the wreckin' yard! So anyway---how do ya like that for bad mismanagement?

[iris lilies]

okay----i feel your pain, faux. Better hang onto the Family Farm, even if ya hafta buy the spendthrifts out. Because, after all the legal battles, taxes, and everything, all i had left of my bequest was a very, very modest sum. But yeah----i then proceeded ta piss it away on catt & dogg food & old, junk cars & trips to the wreckin' yard! So anyway---how do ya like that for bad mismanagement?

Your saga is preserved on the internet for all to see and is an often cited case. That drama was much like Jarndyce v. Jarndyce, the case in the Dickens novel that drug on for generations and in the end, the attorneys got it all.

[littlebittybobby]

okay----soons i get my gummint ss welfare check, im gonna head down ta the mini mart, gas up, get beer, ciggarettes & lottery tickicks. Wish mee luckk. Yup.

[pony mom]

Thanks to everyone who posted; it looks like 7 years for almost all of these papers, which is longer than I wanted to keep them, but better safe than sorry. Will give my boxes one more go-over and get rid of anything that doesn't fit the "must keep for taxes" or isn't in the "this is interesting family information to know." I already had something like that pop out yesterday that answered a question I had had about how long my mom worked, at what age she retired, so it was good to get that answer and realize she was about a year older than I was when she retired for good.

I've been tempted to shred some of my cousin's estate papers early, but I still have a nagging fear that somehow the IRS will come after me. My accountant has scanned copies of everything I would need, but the fear is still there. Actually, you're supposed to keep it 7 years from the year filed, but one pile is going next year for sure.

My accountant told me that in 2020, the IRS received so many tax returns that they tossed many of them; if you owed, you got lucky. His personal return was probably one of them so we eventually had to refile when I never received his refund. Yet when you're just a bit late with paying them, they're onto you immediately and charging you interest.

Trusts: my cousin set one up for my sister's benefit and I was the trustee. She had bankruptcy problems and was an alcoholic and couldn't be trusted with any money. This made it tricky for me, because he didn't want her to know how much money was in it, or to receive it and waste it. She was on disability and had her cancer treatment covered by the state, so most of her expenses were covered. However, my cousin knew about her debts and stated that the money was not for paying those off. It was tricky for me, not letting her know when the money was available, the amount, etc. For anyone who sets up a trust, be very specific when and why the funds get released, especially if more than one beneficiary is involved. I was lucky that it was only me and her, but money can make people ugly really fast.

[Tybee]

I heard of one case where the person became incapacitated and their child went to court and got appointed conservator, then put assets in a trust that only the child controlled, with terms that the child could withhold any money to beneficiaries on the basis of their behavior. So basically hijacked the inheritance and appointed themselves arbiter of who inherited and when. This was not in line with the clearly executed and recorded will that the person had.

[early morning]

families can be very tangled things. My FOO has never been, but we're pretty chill and don't envy what each other has. DH and his brothers had some emotions running high after his father's passing, but there wasn't much to split up so really more an annoyance than anything. the problem was with the BIL family living with FIL at the time of his passing, and they didn't want to move out because "Dad wanted us to have the house!!". Yes, he did - but they were supposed to be PAYING on it, and they did not. Fortunately FIL had all that documented and with a bit of saber-rattling on the part of the estate lawyer and some push from the realter we hired at their request, the house was sold. The realtor went to their church and they actually thought he'd side with them and refuse to list it. Of course he did not, so that embarrassed them as they'd told all their churchy friends that "Dad had moved in with us" - NO, they moved in with HIM and stiffed him for whatever they could get- and soon everyone knew it, they actually changed churches after that. They finally moved out and all was settled. They're still annoyed, 15 years later, but they have never had any money, and there's no way they would/could have made the payments on the home-equity credit line FIL had used for updating the house, let alone the taxes and insurance on it. The house WAS the estate, and we were able to sell it and split the money evenly, so we all got a little something, instead of it all going down the drain. And I'm a small enough person to actually be a tad gleeful about how it turned out, to be honest.