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END-OF-LIFE
ISSUES
Wills, living trusts determine
how property passes at death
By Patricia Sitchler
We are, all too often, optimistic procrastinators. There will always estate (his one-half interest in their community property) passed
be time to make a will or transfer assets to that living trust we pur- to their daughter and her husband’s two sons instead of passing to
chased. But life happens. The following vignettes are just two ex- her. So now her minor daughter and her husband’s two sons own
amples of how procrastination can prove catastrophic. one-half of everything including the car and the house, the furni-
ture, bank accounts in her husband’s name and the motor home.
JIM’S STORY Jenny’s attorney is trying to negotiate a settlement with the two
Jim has been trying to sell his mother’s small farm for several stepsons for their one-third interest in everything Jenny and her
husband owned.
years. Taxes are rising along with costs for maintenance. He’s had
an interested buyer but the title company is telling him that there
was no will probated for his stepfather or his mother, and that the
land was still in the name of the estate of each deceased owner. But
Jim’s mother had told him that she and his stepfather had left the
farm to him, and had given Jim the “notebook” of documents they
purchased at an estate planning seminar that was supposed to make
sure that Jim inherited the farm. His mother explained that she
didn’t really know what the notebook contained but she was sure
that the documents would “avoid probate” after she and her hus-
band died. Jim showed the notebook and living trust to the title
company but the title company suggested that Jim needed to go to
court to settle his ownership rights since the notebook documents
were never signed.
JENNY’S STORY
Across town, Jenny is struggling with estate problems herself.
Her husband was killed in an accident, leaving Jennifer to care for
their teenage daughter. Jenny and her husband never got around
to signing wills, believing that if one of them died, their community
property would naturally pass to the surviving spouse. But her hus-
band’s two children from a prior relationship are demanding their
“share” of his estate. And the lawyer Jenny contacted told her that
the two stepsons had a right to part of her husband’s estate. How
could this happen?
Jim’s and Jenny’s dilemmas are typical of probate horror stories
— stories of families who failed to create an estate plan that would
ease end-of-life issues for the surviving relatives. Jenny would sub-
sequently find out that under Texas law, her husband’s half of their
16 San Antonio Medicine • April 2015
