Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire How did or would you handle estate stuff?

Maybe the old fugger will give it all away to ? in his will. I dunno. Dont care either. Its his chit, not mine.

LOL.....make them do all that cleanup

That's wonderful perspective.
Sadly, a lot of times this isn't always the case.

Do all of your correspondence with her by registered mail with a return receipt, not regular mail or by email.

Doggon. Why cant a iron loading press ever make the yard sales around here

If possible look in every pocket, i find money at goodwill in old suits. Taped money under drawers and behind pictures

I've done a couple estate clean ups, the ones who help clean up can have what they want. The others can delete my number. People piss away their own money and want to fight over other's pennies.

Or a local rescue mission, etc. Many will come with a truck and load up the boxed donations and furniture.

During the lock down we cleaned out and painted 3 large closets, part of the project was to segregate and box up donation items.
Wife and daughters rented a storage unit close by and stored the boxed up stuff in there until the rescue mission staff are off lock down status.

Ideally, the most rational thing to do with personal property is to have a bequest list for specific items BEFOREHAND, signed in ink by the testator, and have a pro deal with the rest. They take a giant bite, but with all the other issues with estates, in the end, I really didn't care about the proceeds from all the "stuff."

Didn't care because my mom, in moments of lucidity, actually made out a list by hand (thank God) and after I had to second-guess the estate lawyer (yep, EYE had to look up the governing statute), I was able to keep the stuff from "my side" that my Mom had brought to her final marriage -- some multigenerational sterling, some nice bronzes, a couple of paintings, the family jewelry, including some from my auntie that was supposed to go to my cousin. The stepsiblings, on the other hand, wanted to cash out her stuff and split it, or I'd have to account for it and I'd pay them for the residual. The picayune penny-ante was just insane.

If you've got space and the patience to pick and sell, fine, but executing a flawed estate is already enough of a nightmare. Have a pro do it, it's over quickly.

If there is enough, have a public auction sale.

My mother passed in January and we had to deal with the same thing. When my sister was ready to sell her house she had an auctioneer come in and sell what they didn't want, so she decided she would handle the stuff in my mothers house the same way. What she over looked is people often have personal family materials and paperwork etc and left that to the auctioneers to figure out. Fortunately they were professional enough to set that stuff aside. Most stuff, but obviously other peoples stuff isn't going to sell for much. A good auctioneer knows who to call that collects (and resells various goods) and has them there to take advantage of the good deals. Wasn't much left and they offered to take what was left to good will. I think my cousin took care of that stuff, don't know what she did, nor do I care. Then my sister didn't want to come and check on the house to see the condition just put it on the market. I said NO WAY. I went down there and having thought about it knew the interior hadn't been painted in over 30 years, and the carpet was filthy, not to mention my mother banged up the interior doors with her electric scooter. I got the house painted on the inside, had the plugs, switches and plates changed from that ugly color they were back in the 50's, to white, and the carpet cleaned for $2500. I interviewed 4 real estate agents, and picked one. House was pending in 3 days, and closed with the pay out in less than 30 days.

That's just how we handled it. Figure out what works for you.

we made a quick and dirty division right after my parents died. it caused hard feelings but oh well. the bandage came off and the scab healed. kinda. don't drag it out. sell everything and split the cash.

My mom’s stuff dwindled as she downsized. Sold it, donated it and gave it away as it went. She’s in a nursing home now. Nothing left.

I was involved when my great aunt passed a few years ago. Nice lady. Childless, husband had passed. Closest relatives were two nephews and two nieces. My mom being a niece. One nephew lives 2 hours away in the same state. He came to the service and left an hour later.
The other two were contacted.

Step daughter charged in with her family searching the home for a will. Don’t think they ever found one.

I tried to help sort and clean up the place. Realized pretty quick their motives were to “inherit” everything. No other direct family ever showed. Really became a mess. I left one afternoon and never returned. Didn’t take a thing. Whatever standing I might have had as a direct descendant wasn’t worth the effort. If I’d have invested the time and effort to chase off the vultures and sell the stuff proceeds would have benefited the nieces and nephews. None of which would or could help. No idea what became of her belongings, properly, or trailer.

Trailer was 30 years old. Belongings and decor matched. Run down garage from the 60’s housed a bunch of old tools and an 2003 Taurus. Property was on the side of a steep hill, guessing an acre.

Within weeks of that experience wife and I updated our wills. I also began and continue to get rid of things that have accumulated at our place over 30 years. Hope to make it much easier on our heirs than that disaster.

We had an estate sale.

Do the same after your sister gets what she wants.

Sell it all, and give your sister her half.

What doesn't sell, give to Goodwill.

We had $15k in sales of just junk nobody in the family wanted in the estate sale.

Someone is ALWAYS gonna be much more "entitled" than the rest of the family. There will always be hard feelings.

Every family has the "one"...

When my father passed my mother put the word out that we could come get what we wanted and anything left after a certain date would either be sold or sent to goodwill. If more than one person wanted something she went with the "first come, first served" concept. My father died of cancer so he took care of things like guns and major sporting good eqpt before he died by gifting them to who he wanted. So we're talking about the little stuff here.She gave a decent amount of time, 3 months, so nobody could claim "they couldn't get there." That system seemed to work pretty good.

I was quite impressed with the way my grandparents estate was handled. They did not have a lot of valuables. Being SDA, there was no jewelry. But after seventy five years of married life there was a lot of memorabilia. Grandma's handmade, by herself, china hutch, her old china, a couple rifles, Grandma's old bolt action .410 which she used to protect her chickens and guinea hens or to catch them for dinner. A few oil paintings on the wall which had been done by shirt tail relations, a Piano, etc, etc.

They also had about $70K left in the bank accounts. So a date was selected, the cash was distributed equally among the six sibling adult children.

Then an auctioneer went through the home with the heirs and sold the contents of the house to the heirs. Whoever wanted something bad enough to outbid his brothers and sisters got it.

Then the proceeds of the auction was again split equally among the siblings. One 65 year old sister was pissed, because she had spent her entire life depending upon the old folks. She lived in a trailer beside their home, and was assured she would gain possession of the house and an acre of ground after Grandpa and Grandma passed. She seemed to think that meant she was entitled to the entire contents of the home as well.

Very true. Seems usually the “one” is the least deserving, gets the lions share, and harbors the hardest feelings.

For my folks. I told them what I want and let the other 2 fight over the rest.

Certain guns I bought for my dad, I want back. Stuff like that.

My kids screwed, I'm leaving her the Bill's and gonna enjoy life....lol

makes the most sense,

now that pictures are free, before the yard sale, take a bunch of pictures and email them, she may actually want a particular piece of furniture, or kitchen gear. (canisters, mixing bowls) you never know what people will care about.

what a great favor she did for you! I hope you and she are at peace.

I would have a huge fire before I had a sale. You can always make a couple grand but burning good stuff is something you don't get to do very often.