Don’t you believe it! Nothing brings out the devil like splitting an inheritance among siblings! Picture the Arab-Israeli conflict - “But God wanted me to have this land!” “No, God gave this land to me!” “I have it in writing that He wanted us to live here!” “He told me Himself in Person that it would belong to me!” Being Christian will be of absolutely no benefit in the ensuing conflict. Better to have these things sorted out beforehand.
A will can refer to a memorandum that lists individual items going to specific individuals. Your dad can create and change and play with that list until the moment he dies (or becomes incapacitated) so he doesn’t have to decide all that right now and he will have time to talk to the kids as recommended by other posters to see who wants what.
But more important, I think, than the will itself, which is VERY important, is the advance directive. I don’t know what your sibs are like, but I have six and every one of us has an opinion about our mother’s healthcare decisions (as with everything else). She foresaw potential conflict so she met with an elder care lawyer and signed a very clear healthcare power of attorney, specifying what should happen in pretty much any eventuality, and she let us all know what it says to head off any argument later on. Luckily she’s still in excellent health [knocks on wood]. You do not want to have your dad in hospital and the bunch of kids arguing, should he be put on life support? does he get a ventilator? should he be tube fed? do we pull the plug? All that stuff should be decided and shared now. Same with the financial power of attorney. ONE person should be named to deal with your dad’s business and to make decisions. Good luck.
Tell him that he can either deal with a lawyer now or force his kids to deal with a lawyer after he’s gone. Setting up a trust now (which he would retain complete control of during his life) can likely ensure that the house will pass to his children without having to go through probate court, and he can establish sensible management of the property (like majority vote of the children). If he simply writes a will or dies intestate, the property will probably have to be probated, which ensures the involvement of lawyers and a court, and the house could wind up being owned by all eight children in such a way that every one of them has an individual veto on any plan for the house (which, in practical terms, likely means another lawsuit).
Disclaimer: I am not your lawyer. This comment is not intended to create an attorney-client relationship, and you should not rely upon it to resolve any legal questions. This is not legal advice; it’s just anonymous chat.
I would suggest that when you meet with your father that you discuss setting up a living will and a living trust.
As for your daughter, sit and talk with her first. I think that I would bring her along. She ddoes not need to be in the room with you and your father when you are discussing heavy things. But having her there will be helpful for your father, her grandfather, and will mean something for her.
Before my dad passed on he got his house in order. There were 6 children involved. He deeded over sections of the ranch to us. Each kid got his section from 14 to 24 acres according to dads discision and our use of the land. By deeding the land to us our base on the land was lower than if we recieved the land from a trust, which means higher capitol gains when we sell.
He made me me the job of carring out his final wishes. I live out of town and if anyone did not like my disesions and got mad at least there would be distance. We all had things that were special to us. Example I got Dads old liciences, marine text books, and training aids. Dad sent us the stuff that was special to us so there would be no question. He had me sign on to his checking account.
After he passed away we had a wake at the ranch house, my brother’s family had been lliving there 15 years. The next day we gathered together to go over the will and besure that the things dad wanted to have were in the right hands. We found that Dad had signed the pinks on both of his cars. I was having car problems at the time and everyone suggested that I could better use the cars. At the end of the second day everything but one thing had been settled, all of us kids wanted Dads sea chest. When I brought it up I was like “no the one thing that I do not know how to handle is Dads sea chest.” My oldest brother said that is no problem Dad gave it to me 6 month ago. Man was I relieved. When all was done and I had settled all Dads affairs and bills there was about $3,000 left in dads checking account. When we got together for Labor day I asked my brothers and sisters what we should do with the money? Well our family get together was pot luck with Pop always supplying the meat. So it was descided to just keep the money in the bank and Pop would keep on buying the meet. Every year we get together all the brothers and sisters along with other “family” and the invintation goes out to “bring a side dish Pop will be providing the meet”.
My point is plan now get a lawyer and if your family is close then discuss it together. You may be able to set up something that will honor your father for years.
My dad has a similar outlook on such things as Eric Cartman’s mother has on her son: willful blindness. The denomination to which he belongs is in the midst of a lawsuit over whether a splinter group has the right to append the “International” to the name; his contention is that the splinter group must not be spirit-filled.
My plan is to opt out of inheriting myself if possible, and to, if possible, annoy my eldest brother into declaring he never wants to see me again.
Well…not really on the second part. That’d involve cutting myself off from my sisters as well.
IANA lawyer, but my wife is and does estate work all the time. As noted above, your Dad is sailing directly into creating an epic family fued.
A typical will/POA/medical directive package for somebody with modest assets and no trusts runs less than $1000 around here. If Dad won’t spend the money, perhaps the kids can take up a collection. $125 apeice is cheap insurance against all the mess that I hope most of them can also understand lies ahead.
If Dad has any understanding of the dynamic between his kids, surely he can be shown how it’s all but guaranteed that Bro 3 and Sis 4 will never agree and he won’t be around to referee. Doing that refereeing in writing now is the caring thing to do. Leaving a jumbled mess and a festering fued is selfish.
The fact your Dad is thinking at all about getting his affairs in order is all good, and indicates he ought to be receptive to this approach.
Nobody does estate planning for themselves; they do it for their loved ones, and they owe it to them to do the job well enough to not be a burden, nor a cause for brother to set hand against brother. (Hint: throw a little Bible in there about familial conflict.)
What if you could find a lawyer who belongs to your dad’s denomination? Could your dad be persuaded that such person would act his family’s best interests, out of appropriate spiritual motivation?
I don’t think you’re being entirely unreasonable about involving your stepdaughter. There’s nothing wrong with her being an observer to any kind of estate planning. However, there’s nothing to be gained from her being in the thick of any resulting family battles.
ETA:
Am I wrong to find your dad’s way of thinking rather sweet, even though it’s dangerously naive? He sounds like a good father who thinks only good of his children. He assumes that since his children are, for the most part, good, they’ll always behave well and play nice together.
I don’t think an ‘estate planner’ is necessary unless you are looking at paying estate taxes. If your father’s estate is less than $1,000,000.00, you are likely safe for the foreseeable future (keep in mind that IANAL), but I would certainly recommend a lawyer if only to insure that your father executes a valid will. If your father refuses to see a lawyer, it behooves you to find out exactly what is needed (how many witnesses, is a holographic will acceptable?). Another issue that a lawyer will help with is dealing with issues that may happen between now and the time he dies (one of his children dies? More grandchildren?). Pay attention to who is named as executor. Many states also provide for the wills to be ‘self proving’ (the witnesses sign a separate notarized statement). This will allow the probate court to skip the step of finding the witnesses.
You might also want to discuss any financial accounts he has. If he has named a living beneficiary for those accounts, those amounts will not be probated (they will go directly to the beneficiary). He may not even remember naming a beneficiary, so have him get in touch with the institution, find out what it is and change it if necessary. He has likely named his wife. You can make things easier by changing it to the estate (to which it will pass anyway).
Be upfront with your siblings about your role in this and get their input.
For all your father’s faults, at least he understands the need to discuss the issue. Many don’t.
Oh please get a lawyer to do this stuff. Please please please. It is ALWAYS better to do things right the first time, and that is doubly true with wills, trusts, etc.
My husband is an attorney, and he wouldn’t have dreamed of doing our wills & trusts himself- we hired an attorney who specializes in that stuff to do it. Even better, the same guy had set up my grandfather’s trust and my dad’s trust, which was so helpful considering that both those trusts will play into our own (grandpa’s already has).
Other steps that may or may not have been discussed:
1] Find the money and list it [incoming and outgoing.]
…get all the household bills in order. Make a folder and label it bills. Put in every scrap of the current bolls for his life, mortgage, insurance outgoing payments, utillities, magazine subscriptions…EVERYTHING. Find and identify and have a folder for incoming money, bank accounts, pension payments, bank statements, EVERYTHING. make sure that ever penny in or out is accounted for. Identify them, locate them, know them.
2] Identify the household belongings, house, cribbage board, fingerpainting from kindegarden. Get a cheap digital camera and take a picture of it, burn it to cd and identify who is going to inherit it or if it is going to the junkyard or to auction. This is also good to track beliongings for insurance purposes.
3] Funeral arrangements - where the body is to go, prepay for the funeral, and make a list of the music to be played, readings, and who is to speak, how you want it done, and where to plant the body/creamate the corpse/toss it to the fishes. When it is preplanned and done, he can be sure to have the ceremony he wants.
4] Medical - the whole living will thank. DO it, so he knows he wont be the next Terry Schiavo.
Think of it as the chance to do an ultimate spring cleaning=)
My thanks to everyone who has responded. We had the meeting in question, in which I basically said, several times, “Pappy, get a lawyer.” Once in Italian. Beyond that I must regretfully wash my hands of it.
