Tennessee Estate Litigation Legal Questions

The omitted beneficiary should have been notified and told that they were to inherit 1/3 of the assets. Attorney who drew up will is not under any duty to notify. The attorney who probated the will normally asks the other beneficiaries who is still living and has to depend on what he is told in how to distribute the estate. If the other beneficiaries told the attorney that the omitted beneficiary was dead, then he had a right to rely on what he was told. Need to try and track down original court case file from when the estate was probated and see what the petition to probate says about the beneficiaries.... Read More

Paying taxes on property does not entitle your father to ownership. The only ways to get legal ownership of property are by purchase, trade, gift, title of joint ownership, or inheritance. Is your father one of your grandparents’ two children? If so he would be a legitimate heir to the property. Finding the deed or title to ownership of the property is necessary and may be much simpler than you think. Call the county courthouse where your grandparents owned the property. Ask the clerk to mail you a copy of the deed. It is very inexpensive - roughly $10 in Oklahoma and I doubt if it’s much more in Tennessee. To Your Success, Gale Allison, Principal AttorneyAllison Firm, PLLChttp://www.theallisonfirm.comhttp://www.linkedin.com/in/galeallison.com... Read More

You cannot get a single, standard answer for several reasons: Estate plans are written for individuals. Asking the minimum time required to settle an estate is like asking the minimum time it will take your baby to read well enough to pass a test. What you may think is involved in administering the estate may be a far cry from what the law says is required. What type of person you are matters. Do you process information slowly?  Are you a procrastinator?  Must you be nagged to do your part? Are you a messy record keeper or are you organized? All this affects the time a lawyer has to spend to attend to your matter. Who you hire matters. If you hire a lawyer who works in many areas of the law, a generalist, it could take that lawyer longer to complete the process than a lawyer who only does estate and probate work and is very familiar with the steps. Lawyers and their staffs (associates, clerks, paralegals, and clerical) are paid hourly at different rates. If your lawyer has a staff, some of the work can be done by a lawyer and other steps can be done by others. If not, you pay the higher attorney rate for everything. So, you can see that there is no standard fee for settling an estate. Here are some tips for getting an idea of what you’ll spend: Contact 3 probate lawyers serving the Tennessee area where the person who died was living at the time of his or her death. Ask the cost of a 1 hour conference to review your case. Choose the best and most experienced lawyer you can afford, schedule the conference and arrive ready to pay for the lawyer’s time. Bring everything you have related to the case – Wills, Trusts, prenuptial agreements, deeds other documents or written statements of the deceased, bills, receipts of payments, etc. After reviewing your case, the lawyer should be able to provide you with a plan of action (barring unforeseen circumstances) and an estimate of costs. He or she certainly will be able to provide you with the hourly rates of the attorneys and other staff in his or her firm who could work on your case. Then you can decide whether to hire that lawyer or talk to another. No one is trying to deceive you. You are simply asking a question that the lawyers or their receptionists have no way of answering by phone or email. It is a good thing you are not getting answers. No decent, honest estate and probate lawyer would make a guess about such a thing without reviewing your individual case and even then it will most likely be only a guess.  To Your Success, Gale Allison, Principal AttorneyAllison Firm, PLLChttp://www.theallisonfirm.comhttp://www.linkedin.com/in/galeallison.com... Read More

Make a police report. If your uncle or the girl cannot prove legal ownership or authority over (such as being named Executor by court order) the items they took or sold, the police may be able to assist. Regardless, you need to hire the most experienced probate lawyer you can find in Tennessee. Things may not be as they appear to you, or they could be worse. Your uncle may have had the estate probated and have received a court order from the judge naming him Executor, but if this were the case you would have been notified of that. On the other hand, there are laws of inheritance and probate that determine who must inherit, who may inherit, and who is not eligible to inherit, especially when there is no Will. Under Tennessee law your uncle would inherit nothing unless his name was on the titles of each piece of property as a joint tenant with right of survivorship. An executor is not the same as an heir and is not necessarily entitled to receive any part of the estate. The executor's job is to see that the heirs receive their inheritances. Bottom line is you need a probate lawyer to provide you with the following: 1. Objectivity so you can find the truth. This means ability to review the situation without the anger, betrayal, confusion and sadness you feel. This will help to clarify what has occurred.2. Experience using the truth in court. Look for a Tennessee lawyer with a record of success practicing only in probate and estate matters, instead of a generalist. 3. Knowledge to get the job done properly and cost effectively. Estates are often confusing even without the mess you describe. An experienced, successful probate lawyer has a much better chance than anyone else of figuring out what has occurred, understanding the complexities of the law, explaining your options, and helping you fight this battle. Start interviewing Tennessee probate lawyers immediately. To Your Success, Gale Allison, Principal AttorneyAllison Firm, PLLChttp://www.theallisonfirm.comhttp://www.linkedin.com/in/galeallison.com ... Read More

If you have a Prenuptial Contract you can absolutely control this answer and still do estate planning to benefit your fiancé, while not exposing your and her estate to claims by her ex-husband. The ex-husband can only make a claim for himself on your fiancé's estate if he is entitled to do so under their divorce decree. However, there is the issue of their child. If he is guardian of the child, the ex-husband can make a claim on behalf of the child. This is because a child has a right to inherit a portion of his or her mother's estate, unless she specifically disinherits the child. As guardian of the child, your fiancé's ex-husband would have the right to come into court and claim the child's share. The court is likely to rule in favor of the child. Still, depending on the circumstances of the divorce, the court may see fit to order the child's share be placed in Trust and managed by a Trustee or perhaps by Co-Trustees, if the parents share guardianship. It would be wise to visit a Tennessee Estate Planning attorney about options available for you and your fiancé, including a Prenuptial Contract, so that your separate and joint assets are protected and there is no confusion about your final wishes should one of you pass away. To your success,Gale Allison, Principal AttorneyThe Allison Firm, PLLChttp://www.theallisonfirm.com ... Read More