Estate planning: Sibling Rivalry At Its Worst

VIDEO TRANSCRIPTION – Estate planning, sibling rivalry at its worst. I’m going to share a story from our client file. We have a client, sadly, that his father died in 2023. 

The oldest sister who wind up changing the trust and did not disclose that to her siblings, and she reported that to the court where she actually disinherited one of her sisters that they had an argument.

In creating the setting, oldest sister had a rental property. The oldest brother had a rental property. Then they had the father’s house. So it was a total of three properties. Hi, I’m Steven D. Cooper, also known as Coach Coop with Coopers Accounting Service because your financial freedom matters. If you’d like to learn more great tax tips, download a popular financial guide at our website. Your financialfreedommatters.com or click on the link below this video.

You have three properties, a total of six siblings. Baby’s sister got disinherited, so legally you had five siblings. Big Sister sold one of the properties in 2023.  Baby bro did not receive his to almost three years later. So obvious he was upset, but he was troubled at how the sister was managing the estate.

So he asked his sister a few questions that just did not sit right with him. And he went and hired a lawyer to then get some legal documents to support what has she done or has she has not done. Sadly, she has not filed a tax returns for a tax year 23 and 24.

But, oldest sister nor big brother were paying rent. That means that there were a total of five siblings. So that means that technically the estate should have received the rent so it can be divided up by 20 % or 1 fifth. So he challenged that.

Big bro, big sister felt that they were the two oldest ones and they weren’t entitled not to pay that. Well, he then took them to court and realized that they were in violation of the agreement. Now, sadly, as this comes across.

I had to embrace him as well as his youngest brother. They asked him other questions and they were not tax related. They were legal related. And I structured them, you need to talk to your lawyer first. Then once I hear back from your lawyer, I then can give you the tax tips to go within that. Here was their question. Big sister’s driving father’s car. Okay.

She’s making the payments. Okay. Well, is the insurance in her name or is it in our father’s name? Well, once again, that’s a legal question because that can have impact on the estate if the sister gets into an accident. Most lawyers, they want to go where the money is. 

The money is where the estate is because the state actually owns two properties and that’s still under dispute right now. This is the purpose of these videos to explain to you how your estate should be planned out. And sometimes you got to over plan certain things because you don’t know where the civil rivalry comes in at.

For more easy financial tips, sign up for our financial tip newsletter by going to yourfinancialfreedommatters.com or click on the link below this video. You can also download our financial guide as well. If you’d like a free 20-minute smart money consultation, call us at 562-436-2600. Well again, I’m Steven D. Cooper, also known as Coach Coop. You definitely wanna watch the next video.

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