clifffaith
TUG Member
- Joined
- Feb 24, 2016
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- Location
- San Juan Capistrano, CA
- Resorts Owned
- Worldmark
I think I'm going to have to tell my elderly parents to remove me as executor of their estate. For the last few years I've had the worry as to how easy my sister will make the process of having her move out of the house so it can be sold. Hope has lived with them since 2013 when she had a brain aneurysm (she fully recovered). She also has long term mental health issues that always kept her from being fully functioning, even when she lived on her own (my parents paid half her rent for years and drove 40 minutes to her place to do a large grocery shopping trip that they paid for once a month). It could be as easy as giving her her share of the stock accounts and she finds herself a new place to live so the house can be listed, or she could dig her heals in requiring an eviction process, or at least causing a major delay. She refuses to talk to my mother about her plans for when they are gone, saying she isn't ready to think about it.
There is not enough money to split the estate without selling the house (this is California where the house they've lived in for over 45 years has increased tremendously in value). Hope has zero credit, having lived off of my parents and whatever disability funds she could claim for years, so no one will give her a mortgage so she could pay me off and retain the house. That is actually a good thing, because retaining the home would quickly devolve into a hoarding situation (cats, as well as other items). Property taxes, etc would not be paid because she can not handle her own affairs, and she'd lose the house anyway. My parents are bound and determined to die in their home, in spite of my plea that the remaining spouse move in with us and sell their home so I won't have that burden. We have a guest house and a granny unit so there is room for Hope temporarily as well; she does not want to live with us, nor do we want her to, so my suggestion to a surviving parent moving in with me would be to give her a big chunk of money so she can get herself permanently set up elsewhere.
Friday my father saw fit to blindside me with "Hope doesn't trust you". What?! This is my sister who is the sole driver in their family, who is out pet sitting, yet again, for five days at a time leaving my dad who is under hospice care, and my mom who has a serious wound issue requiring multiple trips to various doctors each week, alone several times a month, and yet she doesn't trust me to see to my parent's estate. We have shelved our move to a retirement community until both my parents have died because I can't trust my sister not to be taking care of someone else's pets leaving them without a caretaker nearby, so I guess the mistrust is mutual.
After mulling the lack of trust issue over a few days, I think I need to protect myself (my peace of mind, as well as our assets) and get my parents to put a lawyer or "professional executor" in charge. In fact our own estate is set up so a "bank" is in charge of doling money out to keep my sister off the streets, while safeguarding the bulk for our final charitable bequest upon her death. I don't care what that costs, since I won't be here to see it, but I don't want my parent's estate eaten up by lawyer bills. I'm happy to help empty the house and work with the realtor, but I'm not happy to have to evict my sister or hire my own attorney to protect myself against her. Any suggestions are welcome.
There is not enough money to split the estate without selling the house (this is California where the house they've lived in for over 45 years has increased tremendously in value). Hope has zero credit, having lived off of my parents and whatever disability funds she could claim for years, so no one will give her a mortgage so she could pay me off and retain the house. That is actually a good thing, because retaining the home would quickly devolve into a hoarding situation (cats, as well as other items). Property taxes, etc would not be paid because she can not handle her own affairs, and she'd lose the house anyway. My parents are bound and determined to die in their home, in spite of my plea that the remaining spouse move in with us and sell their home so I won't have that burden. We have a guest house and a granny unit so there is room for Hope temporarily as well; she does not want to live with us, nor do we want her to, so my suggestion to a surviving parent moving in with me would be to give her a big chunk of money so she can get herself permanently set up elsewhere.
Friday my father saw fit to blindside me with "Hope doesn't trust you". What?! This is my sister who is the sole driver in their family, who is out pet sitting, yet again, for five days at a time leaving my dad who is under hospice care, and my mom who has a serious wound issue requiring multiple trips to various doctors each week, alone several times a month, and yet she doesn't trust me to see to my parent's estate. We have shelved our move to a retirement community until both my parents have died because I can't trust my sister not to be taking care of someone else's pets leaving them without a caretaker nearby, so I guess the mistrust is mutual.
After mulling the lack of trust issue over a few days, I think I need to protect myself (my peace of mind, as well as our assets) and get my parents to put a lawyer or "professional executor" in charge. In fact our own estate is set up so a "bank" is in charge of doling money out to keep my sister off the streets, while safeguarding the bulk for our final charitable bequest upon her death. I don't care what that costs, since I won't be here to see it, but I don't want my parent's estate eaten up by lawyer bills. I'm happy to help empty the house and work with the realtor, but I'm not happy to have to evict my sister or hire my own attorney to protect myself against her. Any suggestions are welcome.