Handling my mother's estate and what I learned from it

My precious mama's hand in mine,
shortly before her death.

I just finished administering my mother's estate. It was a simple estate, as estates go, and yet it still took about 5 months. Still, many times it takes years, so it was quick.

I have never been anybody's executor before. It was a chance to serve Mom one last time, even though she is not here any longer. It was a chance to serve my brother and sister also. They live far away, and it made sense for me to be the one to assist in this way, and it was my honor to do so. I'm also a control freak and probably would have driven my brother or sister crazy had one of them taken on the task! It was a lot of work, but I learned a lot from the experience, and I'd like to share what I learned for those of you who are in a similar situation, or may find yourself there someday.

1. It's easier if the decedent and executor reside in the same state. 
We had moved Mama from her home in Minnesota first to Wisconsin for a couple of months, then as she declined further, to a nursing home in Lansing, Iowa, where I could be close for visits. So her legal residence was Iowa at the time of her death, as is mine. Being a resident of the same state (and indeed the same county) made things easier from the start. One set of state laws to obey, one court system to navigate.

2. If there is any real property, try to sell it while the owner is still living.
As Power of Attorney (POA), you are sworn to act in the best interests of the person, not yourself. If it's your parent, you have the additional responsibility of treating your parent with loving respect, and if she says she is sure she will be going home very soon and you know she won't, it may feel very weird to go ahead and take the steps of selling her house or her car, but truly it is in her best interests to do so. Our mom had agreed to sell her house when she made the initial move to Wisconsin, to an assisted living apartment, but with mental decline, she forgot that decision, and talked often of going home. It was quite clear to all of us that she would never be safe on her own again. We did sell her house, and then her car, and set aside the funds for her living expenses in the nursing home. We did not do it to make things simpler when she died, but that's how it ended up. I'll explain that in #4.

3. Part of the liquid funds should be stored in bank accounts with a "payable on death" clause.
After my dad's death, Mom started to update the beneficiaries on her retirement accounts and insurance, but did not get very far with it. I helped her as her POA. While I was looking into this, I learned that bank accounts, too, can have beneficiaries if they are set up as "payable on death." We consolidated Mom's accounts from about six banks (as a Depression kid, Mom liked to spread her money around to different banks, because you just never knew) to one national bank with branches all over the country and electronic billpay. While we were at it, we made the savings account payable on death, with the three of us kids the beneficiaries. The benefit here was, soon after Mom's death when we received the death certificate in the mail, we were each able to go to a local branch of her nationwide bank and receive the funds from the split of that bank account immediately, without it having to go through probate. This account was really the bulk of Mom's assets.

Since then, Barry and I have set our savings account up this way, so that when the time comes, our three kids can have the funds from that account well before the estate is settled.

4. Look into "small estate" laws. If the estate qualifies, this is hugely preferable to full probate.
I learned that many states, Iowa included, allow very small estates not to go through probate. Iowa's limit is $25,000 at this writing, as long as there is no real property. This turned out to be another blessing of having sold Mom's house before she died: No real property. And since all but a little of her other assets were either in retirement funds or the payable on death bank account, her remaining funds were very small - enough to bury her, set her gravestone, and pay the last of her bills. Well under the limit for small estates. While there was still a need for some of the work of probating the estate, it was much simplified. And administering it as a small estate made possible #5:

5. Consider the crazy idea of - gasp - not using an attorney.
I have a bit of a queasy feeling recommending this, so I'll just say, it worked for us. I did a lot of reading. I read Internet articles, but I also read the actual Iowa state code on administering a small estate. I took good advice from my mother's banker, and I discovered a goldmine of information in the clerks of court at our county courthouse. They dispensed excellent guidance (as differentiated from legal advice) and pointed me in the right direction for my research, and helped me get back on track when I missed a step. They did this with kindness, compassion and patience. I was careful not to abuse them, and I hope no one else will do so either.

I also had an attorney in mind to step in if I got to the point where I needed help. I did not go into this with a plan that I would absolutely not use an attorney. I went into it planning to do as much as I could effectively do without one, but kept my options open. If your family is not getting along well, don't even try. If you are not communicating well, don't try. If there is any chance that anyone in the family will suspect you of wrongdoing in any way, don't try. In those cases the attorney fees would have been worthwhile. In our case, with the three of us talking daily (through a Facebook chat), with our loving spouses all giving us support and space to accomplish this, with the trust we had built over the past few years of looking after our parents together, and with the transparency upon which I insisted, i.e., overkilling them with information on what I was doing, we were all confident moving ahead with this. Families under stress act strangely. I thank God and my siblings, and their families, for how well we got through this together.

As for the actual paperwork to file, the Iowa state code told me a lot about when to file which document, and frequently what verbiage should be in the document. I tried to keep it simple. I formatted the documents in the way the court did, for the first document they sent me, and kept the naming convention the same throughout, always putting the case number in the file name. I skipped legalese and kept my language as straightforward and concrete as possible. Sometimes I found samples on line. (Remember that they are state specific.) I identified people any time I mentioned them for the first time in a document (the decedent, the personal representative). I think I filed at least one document I didn't really need to file, but that's okay. It was transparency, and it put everything I was doing on record in case it should ever be questioned.

6. Bite the bullet and get an estate TIN (taxpayer ID number).
I was well into things before I was asked for the estate TIN. I had not gotten one. I had been using Mom's social security number. But one of the retirement account companies wanted it. And then later that same day, another one wanted. It was sort of the Bader-Meinhof effect in action, I guess. Anyway, I groaned, whined, and finally bit the bullet. I applied for the TIN. Turns out it's a completely electronic process that took just a couple of minutes - and I had the TIN within a couple of hours. Shoulda done that from the start.

7. If possible, be an Iowan.
I would say this about so many things. I love Iowa! I'm not a native, but I am deeply attached to my adopted state, and this experience with administering my mother's estate just solidified that. The Iowa State court system is amazingly technologically advanced! I only actually set foot in the courthouse once, and that was at the very beginning, when I did not know how to start, and stopped in for a chat with the clerks of the court. Ever after that, everything was done electronically. The courts system has an excellently set up web site where we submit all paperwork and have all paperwork returned to us. The turnaround time is phenomenal! One petition I filed electronically on a Friday during the lunch hour was processed, accepted, and responded to within... get this... 20 minutes. I'm serious. If I had to drive to the courthouse and drop off paperwork, wait for the mail, wait for court dates, none of this would have been so slick. They were fabulous. I cannot speak highly enough of this system.

In conclusion, in retrospect, I put a lot of hours into this task, and had I had an attorney, I would have saved some time, but there was not a ton of money to speak of, and for us it was worth the effort to save the attorney fees. I had a strange feeling when I did the last task of the estate and was released from my duties. Relief, sadness, nostalgia. Thankfulness that I could do this for our family. Interest in blogging for the first time in months.

Peace.

A visit with my sister and nephew

I got to take a couple of days off this week, dropped Kieffer at college orientation at UNI and then drove north to Roseville where my sister Laura and her son Nathan are visiting our parents. It has been 2-1/2 years since we saw one another. It was a short but precious visit.

What We Did Last Week

We Stahls spent last week visiting my parents in Roseville, Minnesota. A big project we accomplished (okay, mostly Barry accomplished, we helped somewhat) was to sand and refinish the hardwood floors in the dining room and hallway. These floors have been under carpeting nearly all the time since 1958 when their cute midcentury ranch home was built. So the floors are in great shape, just needed some love.

Now my mom says she thinks she'd like to have more floors exposed, since this turned out so nice. Those will be much easier, as this area was the part that you basically have to walk through to get to any other part of the house.

The time frame of your raising, and how it makes you who you are

I wrote this on a preparedness/survival message board in response to a question about how the time frame of one's raising might affect one's interest in preparedness. And now in rereading my answer, I see that I didn't do a very good job of answering the question. but I thought I'd share it here anyway.

I was born in 1962 to a schoolteacher mother who grew up on a small Kansas farm, and a physicist father who was helping design weapons guidance systems to fight the Cold War. Both were kids in the Great Depression and had a lot of thrifty habits that came out of that.

They went through a back-to-the-land thing when I was young, like through my mid teen years. They wanted to try organic gardening, buying milk from a farmer, buying organically raised beef on the hoof and having it butchered to order, and keeping us eating as few refined foods as possible. We rebelled and sabotaged their efforts at every turn, but some of it did soak in; I bake my own bread because my father baked the bread for the family for a couple of years, and I garden because they did, and I can sew because she could, and I am thrifty because they knew how to be. They also taught me important lessons such as a personal faith, being a member of a church, making giving a habit just like paying the mortgage, paying my debts, and sobriety. I owe all I am to their raising; however, I will not let anybody blame them for my faults.

Spring Grove Syttende Mai Garage Sales 2011

Barry's parents are visiting this week, and just typing that tells me how I am neglecting this blog, because you should already know that. Anyway, this morning my partner in crime Lisa Fruitful and my mother in law Jane Stahl headed off to Spring Grove to garage sail. We did very well.

Some highlights were the wringer mop bucket I had been saving up for on line - for only two dollars! - and those nifty lime-green sneakers up there, shown on my feet. They are wonderful. I also got a pair of Born clogs. The big HORSES thing is a sign - and there are 3 of them!! A Hoosier bread drawer for 25 cents... A red dial telephone... A Blue Ridge Pottery pitcher... A pair of antique granny boots... An old gas can... Teacups for Lil Miss A... Lots of fun stuff. I'm worn out. :)

Church story

The offering plate was passing, but it stopped with my son. He held it in one hand while digging furiously around in his clothes with the other, trying to find his offering which I knew he had brought. We waited. We all waited. Finally, he dropped some cash in the plate and passed it on.

Turns out that he was WEARING HIS PAJAMAS under his slacks, and his offering was in the pajama pocket. Inside his slacks. In church.

I'm still not sure how he got it out of there without disrobing right there in the pew.

Escaped

We managed to get away from everything for a couple of days and go up and visit my parents in Roseville, Minnesota. Barry and Kieffer spent parts of 2 days clearing the heavy snow from my parents' roof, which my father was very concerned about; there was already some warning leakage going on, and everybody but everybody has horrible ice dams right now, him included. The house gave a sigh of relief when all that heavy snow was down. The ice dams are still there but we have some warm weather (in fact it's actually raining right now) so maybe they will soften up.

More fun stuff was that Barry and my dad pulled the carpet up from their hallway. They have oak floors throughout the first floor, except for the kitchen and bathroom, but have kept them covered with carpeting for most of the time since the house was built in 1958. It was so much fun to see what was under that carpeting. Gorgeous, narrow boards, no warping, no staining, just so pretty. I am, of course, itching to rip up the rest of it, but they are not ready for that, and may never be. Hardwood has a lot of strong points but it has its downsides, too. Anyway, it was fun to see that pretty wood.

And both evenings we were there, my father built a fire in their Franklin stove in the basement and we all gathered there and watched movies, first The Blind Side, which we had all seen but it had been awhile, and then The Mystery of the Sands, with an extremely young, pre-Logan's Run Michael York and Jenny Agutter. Kind of a cool story. I don't think the movie has ever been released on DVD; my father had found a decent VHS copy, though.

Now we're home, and everybody has scattered to where they need to be, and I need to get to work, too.

Thanksgiving

We had our Thanksgiving Sunday afternoon. Here we are just before asking the blessing. Left to right, around the table: My mother, Maryanna Root; Barry; Kieffer; my father, Marvin Root; and our youngest, Lil Miss A.

My gorgeous mother

Just thought you'd like to see how gorgeous my mom is. This was taken a few years ago (that's me in her lap) but she is still gorgeous. I'm so thankful I still have my parents.

Two Saturday's Aprons waiting in the wings, will have to wait a little longer

It's been a crazy week.

My mother had her knee replaced on Friday the 3rd. Everything went really well despite her numerous complicating medical issues, and they sent her home on Labor Day, feeling pretty good. It didn't last. Tuesday, she went back into the hospital with complications mostly centered around her blood thinners and how they affected all kinds of other stuff. I drove up there Wednesday night (thank you Dina for letting me just take off like that!) and I just came home this afternoon. So did she! She's back to feeling well and ready to take back up with learning to walk all over again. We feel we watched a miracle happen, as she was very sick (too sick for surgery), then okay for surgery but it was delayed, then doing quite a bit better and might not need the surgery after all, then doing even better and definitely didn't need the surgery, and then doing great, and then sent home. We are giving thanks.

Barry and Kieffer had to put on Lil Miss A's birthday party on Wednesday in my place, but it sounds like a good time was had by all, and the house was still standing when I got home. I really appreciate that they made it possible for me to go be with my parents like that. I didn't actually do all that much up there, just spent time with them - both of them at the hospital, and then with my father in the evenings and mornings so he didn't have to go home to an empty house.

We are blessed.

Oh, and a funny story: My parents, as I have mentioned about 40 times, are members of a Messianic Christian church in Hudson, Wisconsin. Thursday was the high holyday of Rosh Hoshanah, which of course they were missing because they were stuck in the World's Funnest Place, the hospital. So a contingent of folks from their church came to the hospital room that afternoon bringing shofarot (my new word of the day - plural of shofar is shofarot). That's ram's horn trumpets, in case you didn't know. Yes, I'm serious. They blew the shofarot (quietly) (with the door shut) in my mother's hospital room. It meant so much to my parents that the festivities were brought to them, and it was a sweet, if unconventional, thing to do. They also brought lots of food.

Want to hear what a shofar sounds like? (This is just a clip off YouTube, has nothing to do with Beth Immanuel's celebration. Also it's a lot louder than it was in the hospital.)

Eight loads of laundry later...

... I can talk about our summer trip.

We put over 2500 miles on the car, visited 3 sets of family members and at least drove through, if not visited, 11 states. And maybe the District of Columbia, except that I don't think the Beltway counts. Anyway, we visited Barry's parents in Western Pennsylvania first. That's where we took all our pictures. I forgot all about pictures after we left there. So it doesn't even look like we made the other stops.

Here are my parents-in-law, Jane and Ron Stahl, relaxing on their front porch swing.

And here they are with their son.

These are some lovely red currants that were ripe at their house. They let me pick them. ALL of them. I froze them and brought them home. I plan to make jelly this weekend.

Now I want to put in red currant bushes at our place. They are just so gorgeous on the bush! And delicious little critters, too.

My parents in law nicely invited all the local relatives over to spend an evening with us. Here are Britta and her great grandmother Emma Jean. Barry's aunts and uncles on his mom's side came too. We had smoked brisket and it was awesome. Really a lovely evening with lovely people.

Then, on Friday afternoon, Barry got to help the neighbor bale hay, using the same tractor, the same baler, that Barry helped out with when he was a kid - and indeed, the same one that the neighbor's grandfather used. It's been in the family a long while.

This was still the first cutting of hay. It's been so wet there they could not make hay till July! That is not a good thing. This should be the second cutting already.

 

This photo was taken at night and it's not very good, but I'm including it anyway. This is the neighbor's grown son who took my son on a ride in his hot rod. It is loud and fast. I know nothing of hot rods but I liked the paint job: Matte black. He says it's just primer, but I liked the effect.

Lastly, I took way too many pictures of the hummingbirds at their feeder. These little guys are so quick, it's very hard to capture them even digitally.

 

Great, huh? Tons of pictures of a bunch of hummingbirds and none of my nieces and nephews. Ugh.

Anyway, from there, we drove east to Staten Island, New York, for a couple of days with Barry's younger brother Wayne and his wife Roseann and their daughter. They have a lovely 1920s home made much lovelier by their beautiful landscaping, which has progressed phenomenally since our last visit. We got to worship with them Sunday at Bethel EFC and then they had a lot of friends, family and neighbors (who also count as friends, of course) over for an Independence Day barbecue. Little kids leaped in and out of the wading pool all afternoon, we all moved from shady spot to shady spot and talked and ate and ate and ate, and Wayne presided over the grill. It was a great day.

The next day we headed down to Northern Virginia, Woodbridge to be more precise, to visit my brother Aaron, sister-in-law Vania and their three kids. Another great, though short, visit. The kids played, we talked, Vania and I took in a used book sale and hit the Salvation Army store, I wheedled the kids and their father into putting on an impromptu instrumental music contest (M on violin, C on trumpet, D on recorder, and Dad on classical guitar) for us. And Barry worked on the back patio for awhile, cleaning things up and trimming plants. He doesn't like sitting around, hence the hay-baling and vine-trimming.

Then we headed back home, with a night spent back at Ron and Jane's and then a long push from Western PA to home. Over 2500 miles in 9 days. A real blessing.

Happy anniversary to my in-laws.

Ronald and Jane Stahl were married 48 years ago today. We are thankful for all these years they have loved each other and set an example of a faithful marriage.

Family news

I have not posted here (blathered enough about it on Facebook, I guess, for most lifetimes), but my father in law, Ron, in Pennsylvania, had a heart attack a week ago Wednesday. He has a pretty high pain tolerance, which is why I think he wouldn't go to the hospital. I'm trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. :o) Anyway, he didn't call his doctor till the next morning, and of course his doctor told him to get himself to the ER immediately, and so by the time he finally got some care for this, it had been many hours since the initial event. He failed a stress test, had an attempt at angioplasty which also failed, and then this Tuesday he had bypass surgery. He's evidently doing fine; we are not hearing much, so we hope all is well.

Barry has finals next week but as soon as they are over he will be catching the train back there to spend the next 2 weeks helping his dad settle in at home and helping his mom, too. I'm thankful all is going as well as it is, and that Barry was able to take off and do this. Had this happened a month ago, I don't know what he would have done. To leave then would have meant trashing the semester of work. God is so in charge here and we are thankful.

Blaze Orange Daughter

Britta is home for Thanksgiving, and Barry's sister Ronda, her husband Bill and their little girl are also here from Texas. Bill has been trying to bring in his first deer. This afternoon he took Britta out with him, and she asked me to take a picture of her in blaze orange.

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving service over at the church tonight. I always wish I could stay home and then I'm always so glad I didn't, once I'm there. It was wonderful. I just love my church.

My brother as Dr. Horrible

I love it! My sister-in-law custom made the lab coat from that ubiquitous Matrix coat pattern that lots of people start with. Didn't she do a great job?

And the Death Ray looks strangely familiar.

Lovely, lovely old linens!

I got a present in the mail this week from my sister-in-law Roseann: Some wonderful vintage linens. Look at this table set! I'm guessing it's a bridge set, though I will still use it on our dining table. It is linen with insets of crochet work. And look at those S's! Roseann wrote, "When we got married, an old woman gave them to us and said they had belonged to her parents. I kept them for sentimental reasons all these years but they never saw the light of day and I think you would appreciate them more." And I love them! Now if we can just keep from slopping catsup or raspberry jelly on them. I know they're meant to be used, but I don't want to wreck them, either.

Not in the pictures are a set of cross-stitched pillowcases and matching dresser scarf which are also pretty, quite a bit more recent in vintage, and currently airing on the clothesline.

U-pick! I-pick! We-all-pick!

Lil Miss A and I picked about 22 pounds of strawberries this morning. Most of them are in the freezer, though we ate plenty, and shared them with the neighbors.

Quilts and More Quarterly Challenge: Aprons!

Remember I told you about my sister-in-law Vania and me entering the All People Quilt Quarterly Challenge? Well, we each finished our aprons a few weeks ago. Vania mailed hers to me so I could do the photographs, and then I returned it to her, and we uploaded them today. I thought I'd show 'em to you here, too.

To see all 6 photos, click here.

Happy 45th birthday to one of the cutest little boys ever.

Look at that cute little guy! That's my brother Aaron as a little boy. Aaron is much bigger now, and quite a bit less cute, though his wife may disagree.

Happy birthday, brother dear. (You can give him good wishes yourself if you like, on his blog.)

















Here he is again. That other photo was undated; this one is dated November 23, 1965, so he was about 2-1/2. I would have been 4-1/2.

Thanks to Papa and Mama for the scanning ordeal today that yielded these wonderful pictures.

Another reason why I love that man.

Yesterday I was typing away (in the basement, because, believe it or not, even though we had a frost just 2 days ago, it was 88 outside and HOT), and my wonderful husband made me lunch. It's water crackers, hummus, strawberries, sliced avocado and two kinds of cheese. Am I pampered or what??