Moshkito
craigb
batsbrew
DID HE DIE?
Not yet, but he's been put into a final care hosp!ce.
As usual, the fights have already started ... family and this and that ... the saddest thing I have ever seen, and it is when you know that greed is at the front, and not the appreciation for what dad did. Not even grateful for anything they get or not get ... the education you can get from someone like that in terms of the arts is ... incredible ... but they didn't learn anything, I guess.
Sorry ... using my family as an example. And it ain't over here either! I'm abstaining for almost everything, and if something comes this way, fine ... if not, fine. I already cleared my "accounts" internally with mom, anyway. So not getting anything, anymore, not even the original paintings of a couple of surrealists ... that are probably worth a nice penny!!! And mom is "giving them away" to some Portuguese this or that foundation -- Gulbenkian I think, which is OK, they have supported Portuguese studies for years!). Lucille should end up in a museum somewhere, like the Smithsonian ... but it will probably get sold for 50 million!
Yes, these things can be like being thrown in a shark tank however... my advise, having just gone through this is to take your inheritance, it is yours unless you were written out for not being or doing what someone wanted and I hope that isn't the case. I decided to be fair in the face or thieves and liars and some how I came out ahead. I was honest and when my sister couldn't do things, I split things and in most cases gave her first choice, we packed things for her and moved things for her. She had some romantic idea about buying the house instead of selling it. She is 73yo, in bad health, obese, diabetic and all her doctors will now be about 60 miles away. I advised her a couple of times that she shouldn't buy the house, although if she did it would greatly simplify my life, I would (and did) get a check and walk away. You know what? When I advised her that she shouldn't buy it she became suspicious that I had some other motive... I didn't, sa a vie. Now she has a house that needs a roof, has insulation problems, stairs she can't go up, a new roof, and a few other things.
Of course, both mom and dad had died... but not before they tried (unsuccessfully) to poison my dad's mind against us. My niece was stealing money, she stole a LOT. Dad asked my wife, she is a CPA, to help him because he didn't know where his money was going. It didn't take my wife long to figure it out. He asked if he could get his money back. Yes but he would have to prosecute his grand daughter. He wouldn't do that and after he was gone we honored his wishes and treated it as water under the bridge.
So, we set up an account for final expenses, flipped a coin to see who went first and then split up furniture, artwork, and heirlooms. We each took our own stuff first.
It well IMO, because I decided to be firm but fair... it was amazing to me that I was assumed to be a liar, assumed to be "up to something" for trying to help but I came away from it with no bitterness, I doubt that is the case with my sister and her family but I'm not them, I'm not like them.
They say that you can choose your friends but you can't choose your family. How true. It is certainly true to that the "love for money" is the root of much evil.
I took your way when my aunt and uncle died. I was appalled when I found that my sister's kids (and my sister) were at their house when my two cousins were going through things, getting what they could. Decades ago when my maternal grandmother died they went to her farmhouse and removed the light fixtures from the ceiling, took featherbeds, doorknobs... they were the great grandkids... I didn't even know about it until later because I don't think that way. The nephew got busted by my uncle (my mom's brother, one of my grandmother's kids) pulling the ivorys off the keyboard of the piano in the house, which happened to be HIS piano, lol... he was like what the he77 are you doing to my piano??
So yeah... I completely understand not wanting to be in the "shark tank" but if you do it with honor and honesty you can have what is yours and come away with no regrets. If you just refuse to be involved you
may find that it becomes something that continues to bug you, at least a little. Let them do the fighting, you just stand on and use whatever rights you have but it your mom is alive what is anyone doing, isn't any estate hers to have, use, or dispose of as she see's fit?
These things are hard but nearly as hard if you refuse to fight but also refuse to be run over. IMO anyway.
J