Posted by ScottyHOMEy on October 23, 2009 at 05:32:19 from (71.241.192.2):
In Reply to: Will posted by sammy in Kansas on October 22, 2009 at 20:16:31:
Your friend needs to get to a lawyer. It sounds like his late wife did.
Laws will vary by state. When someone dies intestate (without a will), the court appoints and administrator/executor. In such cases, there is usually established law that determines who gets what, with surviving spouses being at the top of the list. In the absence of a spouse, it will often be divided among surviving children or grandchildren under a fixed set of rules.
Those people who are ordinarily in line for something in a case like that are often called heirs-at-law.
If the person dies testate (WITH a will) they can leave as much or as little to anyone they please. Again, it will vary by state, but if a person chooses to disinherit someone, as this woman did, and that person would have qualified as an heir-at-law had she died intestate, some states require (it sounds like Kansas might) that the will specifically say that that person is to get nothing or a token $1 so that it is known that the decedent specifically meant to disinherit, and didn't just forget to include them. This allows a probate judge to alter the terms of a will in a case, say, where someone names their children in their will, but then has another child after the will was drawn.
It isn't always done out of meanness or spite. I've seen cases where one child, for instance, got his inheritance while his parents were still alive. They gave him $100k to establish a business. In their wills, they each gave their entire estate to the surviving spouse. If the spouse did not survive them, the rest of the surving children each got their own $100k, with the rest going to charity. Another instance of that type, is a childless couple I worked with who were both quite wealthy individually. I'm talking eight- or nine-figure kind of wealth for each of them -- the kind of money where there would be no financial hardship on the survivor, and both their wills specifically exclude the spuse and are leaving their entire estates to charity.
How your friend makes out may also depend on how their homestead was deeded. If both their names were on it, it might depend on whether they were named as joint tenants or tenants-in-common (there are other variations in some places). In one case, the homestead would belong entirely to your friend. In the other, the most the wife could transfer in her will is her half-interest to the son. Given the circumstances, I suspect that would be an awkward, uncomfortable arrangement, but it wouldn't put your friend out in the cold right away.
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