Family dispute on entering father’s estate into probate?
My father passed away in February of 2008. My parents were divorced and never remarried. The Will he left stated that all assets go to the estate, and the estate goes only to the heirs.
The estate is very small, valued under $30k. There is no real estate, only personal affects, a pickup truck, and a travel trailer. We (the heirs) are content to liquidate assets and split evenly. We created a small estate using affadavits of heirship and have a federal tax id etc, everything needed to make the estate legitimate.
Our grandmother (his mother) has been interfering since the beginning. She has the keys and titles to the truck and the trailer and refuses to give them to us unless we enter the estate into probate, effectively blocking the sale of the truck and the trailer. This “standoff” of hers has been going on for over a year, even after a lawyer told her that only the heirs, not her, could enter an estate into probate. We’ve been content not to push the issue with her since she is family, but at some point she will need to hand over the rest of our property.
Somehow she has managed to get a court hearing and is not only attempting to get it into probate against the will of the heirs, but also to place our uncle as executor.
How is this possible? We thought only we could enter it into probate? What should we do?
Anyone can enter a will into probate. If someone feels that the conditions of the will are not being met by affidavit probate, they have every right to have the will probated.
Executor will be the person named in the will; or a relative who qualifies.
Many times the executor of a will is not an heir. Banks are occasionally executors.
You will not be able to sell the truck until the probate court approves the transfer. Anyone can submit a will for probate. Anyone can nominate an executor.