Questions about a parent's estate stay with us, don't they? This is particularly true if we don't get a chance to see the will for ourselves. This reader asks a question that many others also wonder about. Here's the question:
"I am son to a father that left us at an early age. He had very little to do with me over the years and only ever paid the small court required child support until I turned 18. He was remarried and never had more kids that I am aware of. He passed away suddenly while I was in my 20s and I received no information or contact regarding his will. As a son would I not be entitled to see his will and if his death happened say 20 years ago and his wife is still alive today, could I do anything?"
This question contains one of the most common misconceptions about wills out there. That a son or daughter is automatically entitled to see a deceased parent's will is assumed by many people. The assumption is wrong. There is no such entitlement.
Many people find this rule to be counter-intuitive. It makes sense to some people that a child should be entitled to see a parent's will. However, it simply isn't the case. You are not entitled to see a deceased person's will unless you are either the executor of the will or a residuary beneficiary of the will. Normally an executor would only contact those who were to inherit under the will.
A will is a private, personal document. As such, nobody is allowed to see it that has no legal reason to see it. Wanting to see it doesn't count. In my view, this is one more reason why people need to be super careful about who they appoint as executor, as we all know there are some executors out there who take advantage of privacy rules to deprive legitimate beneficiaries of their inheritance.
My guess would be that your father left his estate to his second wife and also made her the executor. If you (and any siblings) were over the age of 18 at the time and were not handicapped, you would not have been legal dependents and therefore he would not legally have to leave anything to you.
Your question about "doing anything" is a bit open-ended. If you are asking whether you could ask to see the will, yes you could, but you have no legal right to insist upon it. If you are asking whether you could get anything from the estate, I believe your chances are slim to none. In the absence of legal dependence on your father, what would be the basis for a challenge? And just as importantly, what would be left of the estate to collect on?
Lynne:
ReplyDeleteDealing with a difficult beneficiary that is demanding a copy of the will only weeks after his father passed away. Also claims that once the will is probated he can review the "public document" anytime. I don't feel at this time giving him a copy of the will could serve any purpose other than having him ask more questions about the will and take up more of my time. Do you recommend updates to a beneficiary that chooses to be difficult and argumentative at every turn? Do you recommend giving a copy of the will right away even if we are going to probate? How much is the executor required to take in this area from an individual like this? My thoughts are to stop updates and just complete the work. At the end of the process as long as the wishes of the will are complete why don't I just call in all the beneficiaries with the lawyer at that time for a copy of the will and review prior to disbursing the cash. Your advise has been great in the past, please give me your valued opinion again. Paul.
Hi Paul,
DeleteI don't see the advantage in "stopping all updates" to someone who is agitating for more updates. I usually recommend to executors that they update all beneficiaries on a regular basis to discourage the beneficiaries from constantly asking for more. Give this beneficiary the same updates you give the others. Otherwise all you're doing is antagonizing someone who apparently is already jacked up.
How much you're required to take is a good question. You're doing a job, so you should be as professional as you can. Try to remain compassionate to beneficiaries who are suffering the loss of a loved one, but not to the point that you're driven to distraction. If you have to screen calls or reply only by email, for example, then do that. If this beneficiary is going to be getting a copy of the will at the time of probate, and you are proceeding to probate as efficiently as you can, then you can ask him to wait for his copy. You can explain that you are trying to keep costs and executor fees as low as possible and that sending out documents that are coming to him in a couple of weeks anyway is only duplicating cost and effort.
I'm curious as to what is motivating this beneficiary to want the copy ASAP. Is he worried that a specific item is missing or that something specific is wrong? Reassuring someone that all valuables are in secure custody and that the locks have been changed on the house to prevent items from disappearing might help.
Waiting until the end of the process to report to beneficiaries is something you're entitled to do, but I would expect that waiting until then is going to make all of the beneficiaries anxious.
Lynne
In British Columbia, the law is a little different than in some other provinces. Before a will is probated, the executor must give notice of his or her intention to apply, as well as a copy of the will, to certain people even if they are not beneficiaries, including children. In B.C., and independent adult child may apply under the Wills Variation Act to vary the parent's will, which is not the case in most other provinces.
ReplyDeleteThanks Stan for that very helpful addition to the original post. By the way I'm a huge fan of your blog and I encourage everyone in BC to read it.
ReplyDeleteLynne
2 years ago my relationship with my Mother who was living with us at the time became very strained resulting in her moving in with my sister. After my mother died recently I have been told my mother had written a new will leaving everything to my sister and appointing her as executor. I have asked to be present at the reading of the will, she told me there will be no reading and I can not have a copy. Am I entitled to see the will or do I have to take her word that this will exists and she indeed gets everything.
ReplyDeleteIt's extremely unlikely that there is going to be a reading of the will. That's something generally only done in fiction.
DeleteAs I said in my original post, if you are not a residuary beneficiary of the will, you are not entitled to see a copy of the will. If you are not prepared to take her word for it, which many disappointed beneficiaries are not, you might ask a lawyer to write to her for written confirmation of your status under the will. Though this might still not produce a copy of the will, you'd at least have a paper trail of her fraud if it later turned out she was deceiving you.
Another idea is to go to the probate court nearest where your mother resided and do a search under her name to see if a will has been sent for probate.
By the way, after reading three very rude comments that you left here for me(which I declined to publish), I think I can guess why your relationship with family members "became very strained". You were upset that I hadn't answered your post. This blog gets as many as 3,000 hits a day right now, and a huge number of posts. Yours was one of two dozen I received that day, in addition to the 10 or so emails a day I get from readers as well. I spend several hours a week of my own time giving out free information to those who are looking for it, and sometimes it takes a long time to get to them. If you really couldn't wait for a response you could have just hired a lawyer instead of sending rude messages to me. News flash: the world doesn't revolve around you.
Lynne
I would like to purchase one of your books so that I can find answers to a number of questions regarding the process of dealing with a family estate. My mother recently passed away (in Alberta) and 2 of my sisters are named executors. I would like to find out what the process is without asking them any questions. I recently asked them for a copy of the will and I did not hear back from them. If my question was off base I need to find out what the process is, what they are having to deal with and how long things take to happen. I don't want to be like the person described in the September 28 post and be a nag. I live in BC. I hope the rules are the same in both provinces. Which book do you recommend please?
ReplyDeleteHi. I'm sorry to hear about your mother's passing.
DeleteIf she passed away in Alberta, her estate is likely to be administered in Alberta. Obviously there is a will, since there are named executors. If the will is going to be probated, this should happen in Alberta.
The process is very different in each province. The general rules are the same and the legal principles are as well, but the forms and even the names of documents are different.
The book I wrote that deals with the subject matter you're concerned with is called "Alberta Probate and Administration Kit". You can get it online at self-counselpress.com, or amazon.ca or at Chapters Online.
If you are a beneficiary of the will, you are entitled to see it. So far they haven't even said whether you're a beneficiary, though most people do expect do be beneficiaries of their parents' wills. I don't think one reminder to them makes you a nag :)
Lynne
my mother in law passed away in 2001 he on was exector of the will, he refused to show anyone the will but made mention on several occacssions that my husband was mentioned in her will, my father in law has not passed and a copy of his will was provided, does my husband have the right to request a copy of his late mothers will now, and is the executor required to show him,
ReplyDeletemy husband has been forced to purchase property that was indicated was left o him in the will of his late mother.
Hi Lynne,
ReplyDeleteAt the risk of duplicating a question already asked, I have a similar one for you. My godmother passed away a year and a half ago. She appointed her book keeper as executor. The book keeper made it her business to contact my parents and my sister and brother (also godchildren) about this, and told my parents that the godchildren were included in the will. She also formed an email group that included the godchildren and offshore relatives to apprise us all of my aunt's condition (she was placed in a care home) and the executor's disposal of my godmother's assets before her death.
Now that the will has been probated, the executor has been silent. My sister has written to her about the godchildren's status, and was told there is nothing in the will for us.
We have found the executor's behavior to be rather odd, even inappropriate, during this process, and suspect, correctly or not, that she may have insinuated herself into our godmother's confidence for her own benefit. Our godmother had quite a lot of money, and a history of trusting unscrupulous people.
Long story short, is it possible to find out if the godchildren were included in the will? I don't need to see the will per se, just to be sure that what the executor says is true. If it's true, fine, but if not, this woman needs to be taken to task.
I hope you can give me some guidance, and thank you in advance for any help you can offer.
Seeing the will itself is the most reliable way of knowing whether any particular person was included as a beneficiary, as well as to see whether that person was a residuary or a specific beneficiary.
DeleteThe difference is that a residuary beneficiary is entitled to a full accounting of everything the executor does with the estate.
It appears that your sister has already received a written confirmation from the executor that there is nothing in the will for the godchildren. Therefore I assume there is nothing to be gained by writing to her again.
Other than asking the executor or looking at the will itself, there is no way to know whether you are in fact a beneficiary.
If you are reluctant to ask the executor for a copy of the will, try going to the courthouse closest to where your aunt lived and requesting a copy of the will and accompanying probate documents.
Lynne