Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:12):
He served at the Pentagon as an army jag. He
graduated from Notre Dame and has two law degrees from
Boston University and Georgetown University. He's been practicing law for
over thirty years. He's your family's personal attorney. It's time
for the David Carrier Show.
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Hello, and welcome to the David Carrier Show. I'm David Carrier,
your family's personal attorney. And you've found a place where
we talk about a state planning, elder law, real estate
and business law. Plus you know the rule of law.
You know the fact that, oh my goodness, we are
just going headlong into an abyss of authoritarianism and terribleness.
(00:55):
And if you believe that, well and drink some more
milk and creete, I think some more milk, have another cookie,
cuttle up with your deady bear, and you know, get
over it. Oh well, six one six seven seven four
twenty four, twenty four. That's the number to call at
six one six seven seven four two four two four.
(01:17):
We'll get your question, comment or concern on the air. Now,
this is the part of the show where we actually
do some legal type stuff. How about that. Now, of course,
this is not legal advice. All right, this is not
legal advice. For that you have to pay me tons
of money to get actual legal advices. Reasonable anyway, so
(01:38):
you know, don't try this at all. I am my
mother's durable power of attorney POA. No you're not. You're
the agent acting under her durable power of attorney.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Okay?
Speaker 2 (01:48):
Can we say it like that? Her skill nursing facility
refuses to give me any financial statements. Why because they're jerks.
I guess my mother has been in a skilled nursing
facility for almost two years now. Administration there refuses to
acknowledge that I am acting under her power of attorney.
They will not give me any financial statements or anything
I may ask for. My mom has long term Medicaid
(02:11):
or SSI check or pension check and Medicare, and we
pay the facility every single penny that she makes. I
know beyond a reasonable doubt that they are stealing money
from her. Let's say I cannot let this happen to
my mother because they are angry with me since I
will not sign over her pension account to them. All right,
(02:31):
So this is a little bit confusing because if mom,
if your mom is actually on the Medicaid. Then all
of her money, as you say, every penny is is
going to the facility. Mom gets to keep sixty dollars
a month. But it's hard to understand why they would.
(02:52):
It's hard to understand why you would have any access
to anything. Will not sign over the pension account. Now,
it is true that there are some business office managers
in the long term care facilities that like to be
the representative payee and they like to have the pension
check or annuity checks whatever it is, directly to the facility,
(03:15):
go directly to the facility. Because it has happened, it
does happen that kids who once they get the money,
they don't send it on to the long term care facility. Well,
that of course is not a problem in your situation.
Although you can understand why a facility might have a
policy where they would prefer to be the representative payee
(03:40):
under Social Security, the fiduciary and if there's a Veterans
administration thing going on, pension going on, you know, you
can see why or whatever. You know that the money
comes directly to the facility. You can understand why they
might want that. But the idea that they won't give
you a financial statement that and and besides, if you're
(04:03):
not getting the financial statements, how the heck are you
handling the medicaid? Because you've got to account on an
annual basis. You know, you have to explain where the
money went, and to do that, you have to show
that there was a that there was a bill from
the from the facility. So this sounds like one of
those situations where the communications are broken down and there
(04:29):
isn't what would you want to say, you know, not simpatico,
not you know, you need to work together for mom's benefit, Les, okay?
Can we can we establish that as a as a
primary goal. It's hard to understand why the why the
institution wouldn't give it to you. So, you know, you
(04:49):
do say here that they're stealing money from her. How
could they be stealing money? She doesn't have any money?
I mean, what are they stealing? The sixty dollars a month,
you know, that's all that's all she would be entitled to.
And besides, once you get to that two thousand, you know,
she's only allowed to have two thousand dollars. So if
you get to that two thousand dollars limit, they've got
(05:11):
to find something to spend the money on. Because if
she goes over two thousand, not in the month she
goes over it because it's income that month, but the
following month. Right now, she's over assets. She's not eligible.
And so you know, you think, well, what's sixty bucks,
it's nothing, Well, it's enough. Eventually you'll go over. So
(05:35):
if the facility, if what you're saying is the facility
is stealing money. In other words, they're charging her for
god knows what, for haircuts or chewing gum or something
to eat up that sixty bucks a month, you might
be right about that. You might very well be correct
about that, because she doesn't have any other money. It
couldn't be anything other than the sixty dollars. And there
(05:59):
might be a good reason why, you know, once a month,
once a month, he gets a ten pound lobster, you know,
for dinner or something, you know, just to keep that
keep that balance down. Now, that does not excuse them
from not communicating with you and telling you what the
situation is. And but there's no there's no money here
(06:23):
to steal. Okay, let's let's just stop. Let's let's accept
that number one. Then the second question is well, why
the hell aren't they dealing with you? What's the problem. Well,
as as you've heard me say already today, getting facilities,
getting financial institution, whoever, to actually accept a power of
(06:45):
attorney can be a hassle, right, I mean, they should
accept it. It's it, if it's valid, if it meets
all the criteria, they should accept it. They should cooperate.
But especially nowadays, there seems to be less cooperation and
more concern about liability and whatnot, which, what the hell please?
(07:14):
But there you have it, you know, because there it's
a it's a it's a balancing act, right. On the
one hand, they want to cooperate, perhaps to some extent,
they want to cooperate, uh and keep the customer satisfied.
On the other hand, they don't want to be tagged
with liability if they didn't ask enough questions. So it
(07:37):
seems like the pendulum has swung in favor of we're
away from customer service, away from you know, doing what's
what's necessary to be done, in favor of protect the institution.
It does seem that we're looking at a trend like that. Nevertheless,
(07:58):
they should accept it, and so what you really need
to do instead of trying to sue these folks would
be to find out why the hell they won't take it.
Go back to the why not go back to the
attorney who grew up the document in the first place.
Maybe it's only effective on disability. Maybe there's some flaw
in the document. I don't know, but certainly with regard
(08:24):
to the first one, that they're stealing your mom's money, No,
I don't see how that's possible if she's on the
Medicaid right if they are, but if they are continuing
to charge her for haircuts and stuff like this, you know,
or you see some bogus expenses on there, I would
double check to make sure that those expenses are not
(08:46):
being incurred in order to keep her below the patient
allowance so that she can remain eligible for the Medicaid.
That's what I would, you know, That's what kind of
springs to mind on that one. Let's see, Dad just
went nursing home May of this year, doesn't have a
(09:07):
will or a power of attorney. They just now started
taking Social Security and Medicaid drained his account I was
paid for. I can't afford to pay property taxes. So
will the state take the house or will be sold
for back taxes. And the answer is yeah, yeah, will
they take the house eventually if you can't pay the
taxes on the house, all right, apparently he's eligible, right,
(09:29):
So what will happen is the local authority, you know,
whether you're city or township, is going to seize the
house and sell it for the taxes. That's how that
that's how that goes. Now there's some there's see here's
here's how bogus this is. It used to be that
when they took it for when they took your house,
(09:50):
they just sold it and paid off the taxes or
sold it for taxes, and the person who bought it
didn't have to pay for fair market value. They just
bought for the tax they've bought the tax. Well, now
you're supposed to give back the extra money if you
sell it for more. The family is supposed to get
the extra money. But in a situation like this, who
(10:12):
gets the extra money? Well, that knocks mom off of dad,
knocks dad off of the medicaid because you now he's
got too much money. Until the money's all gone, and
then you're right back, You're right back where you started.
When we get back, I'll explain what we do in
a situation like this where you just can't afford to
pay the taxes to maintain the house empty. There's some
(10:35):
good things we can do there. Even listening to the
David Carrier sell, I'm David Carrier, your family's personal attorney.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
This hour of the David Carrier Show is pro bono.
So call in now at seven twenty four. This is
the David Carrier Show.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Carrier Show on David Carrier, your family's personal attorney. Now,
we've got an email here that no will or power
of attorney. Dad just went to nursing home in May, Okay.
So that's six months ago. Right, does not have a
will or a power of attorney. Oh you're thinking, I
mean what they just now started taking his social Security
(11:42):
and Medicaid drained his account. Oh there's a surprise. His
house is paid for, but I can't afford to pay
property taxes. So will the state take the house or
will be sold for back taxes? And this isn't out
of state from Illinois. In here, your situation is worse
than in Michigan. Okay. In Michigan, at least they don't
(12:05):
put a Medicaid lean on that. In Illinois. Your the
house has already got a lean on it, so you
can't do anything with the house without paying back the
state of Illinois. All right, And that's true in almost
every well forty three states last time I checked, did
this sort of thing. Michigan doesn't. Michigan, Pennsylvania, Florida, Texas,
North Carolina. There are a few states that do not
(12:27):
slap a lean a Medicaid mortgage on your house right away.
Michigan doesn't do that. And thank goodness. Now we've got
a divided government again. Yay for divided government. It's not
likely to okay, because Republicans are always against it, and anyway,
forget about that. This is not the case in Michigan
(12:48):
as in Illinois. But let's look at Michigan because that's
where we are, right give him this letter writer, he
screwed because it's forget about it. You know, they put
the Medicaid mortgage on the house. You can sell the house.
They're going to hold the money. But in Michigan, so
let's say parent goes into the nursing now number one, okay,
he's got there was no planning for this. This is
(13:10):
what we're talking about with the this is this is
where this is where Luke Skywalker right does everything right,
and then oh, guess what, I didn't have a bomb
or a torpedo to blow up the desk star with
because I just didn't have one. Whoops, you did everything
else you got there, and it's like, oh no, okay,
(13:31):
you need the basic tools, you need the power of attorney.
You need this stuff done before someone goes into long
term care facility. But you're this situation very common, very
very common, where you have a house and the question
is what do we do with it. I can't afford it.
I can't ord to maintain Dad's house taxes until he's
(13:54):
up keep you, et cetera. Okay, so you have two possibilities.
The first is you sell it. You sell the house
and you got a pile of cash. Well, now Dad's
off the medicaid right until the cash is all gone.
Ooh that's a bad thing. Or you hang on to
the house. But you can't hang on to the house
because it's going to get sold for taxes and then
(14:14):
you get more than Dad gets money and the money
goes away. This is why it's so important to have
a power of attorney because what you can do. What
you can do is now you have to go to
probate court and get appointed conservator for the house. Right,
let's assume a guardian and conservator. Guardian so that you
(14:35):
can deal with his residential with his medical stuff, and
conservators so you can deal with the house. Under Michigan Medicaid,
you're allowed to keep let's say you rent the house
out for one thousand dollars a month, thousand bucks a month, Okay,
you're allowed to keep sixty percent off the top for
administrative expenses without explaining what those administrative expenses were. We
(15:00):
all together on that. So, so if you if you
rent the house out for a thousand bucks a month,
you get to keep. The kid who's administering the house
gets to keep six hundred dollars a month. Four hundred
dollars goes to the nursing home. Four hundred dollars right
off the top. And it's just a safe harbor kind
of thing. They're allowed to You're allowed to do that. Now,
(15:22):
what if the expenses were actually seven hundred dollars a month, well,
you can still do that, or even a thousand. I'll
say the expenses worth thousand dollars a month, every penny
that you received as rent went right back out the
door again in expenses. Well, so long as you show
that right, but you have to account for that, then
(15:43):
you can. You can do it that way as well.
But for a situation like this right where you've got
you know, you've got to get the you got to
get the guardianship, you've got to get the conservatives ship,
and and now you're renting out the house. House. Don't
do it yourself. Do not do it yourself. Get a
rental management company, you know, get a management company to
(16:06):
stay management company to do this for you. You don't
need to do this. They're going to take ten percent
or eight percent or something percent off the top. So
what you got, you got sixty percent to play with
the rest of it. The rest of the money can
go to other administrative expenses like the taxes, the insurance,
you know, whatever else. Uh, you've got to whatever other
(16:28):
bills you've got to pay. But then that way you've
maintained the property. Now here's the thing. You've got no will,
you've got no nothing. So now we're gonna have to
go to probate court and ask the judge, you know,
to do a ladybird deed a transfer on death deed
or trust or something like this, so that the house
(16:49):
does not go through probate when Dad dies. Because if
the house goes through probate when Dad dies, all this
was for nothing. Kiss it goodbye, because the state of
Michigan is coming after it if it goes through probing.
So you did all this, Oh, I did the guardianship
and the conservatorship, and we saved the money and we
paid the lawyer with the sixty percent. Okay, you don't
(17:10):
have to go out of pocket on this. Just deal
with somebody who knows what they're talking about, all right,
and we'll take their fee out of the out of
the rental proceeds. Right. So you're paying someone to manage
the property. You're paying the lawyer, but not you personally.
It's coming out of the coming out of the house
to do all this stuff. There you go, Okay, no
(17:31):
money out of pocket, and we preserve the asset. Now,
if it's done correctly, when Dad dies, you get the house.
That's pretty good. Huh, that's not you know, better than
a smack in the face with a dead fish, right,
that's that's not bad. That's good. Okay, good, But what
else can we do? Well, what if you say, well,
I just don't want the hassle of dealing with the house.
(17:52):
I want to get done with it. Fine, let's say
the house is worth two hundred thousand dollars. Let's just say,
and these numbers are not correct, I'm going to give
you but illustration. So what I'm gonna do is I'm
going to sell the house. And again, because there's no will,
because there's no trust, there's no power of attorney, I
(18:14):
can't do this without asking the probate court. Pretty please,
let me do this, Okay, all right, now, if you
have if you had it set up correctly, right, then
this is a no brainer. But you don't have a
power of attorney. You don't have the ability to do this.
And incidentally, just because you have a power of attorney
a document that says power of attorney on it, all right,
(18:37):
ninety percent of them, ninety five percent of the ones
that I see, I can't use them because they don't
let me do what I'm about to describe. So what
I want to do is I want to sell the house.
I get the two hundred thousand dollars. Okay, I'm going
to put one hundred thousand in a trust right for
the kids. For the kids. Because I did that, it's
(18:58):
divested and now for ten months Medicaid won't pay. I'm
going to take that other one hundred thousand. I'm going
to put it into an annuity that will pay the
nursing home for the next ten months. Okay, so one
hundred thousand over here for the kiddies, which it has
to be that way because if it's for dad's benefit,
then it all counts and this falls apart. But if
I put it over there for the kids, and I
(19:20):
put one hundred thousand, that's going to pay the nursing
home for the next ten months during the penalty period.
At the end of the day, there's one hundred thousand
dollars left over for the kids. Which is if you've
muffed the final act of your life, right, this is
what you're letting your kids in for. All right. You
think your kid's going to remember, oh, dad left us
(19:41):
a two hundred thousand dollars house. Well, no, you didn't.
What you did which you made him go through all
this rigmarole to scrape something left. I mean, look, fifty
percent is better than zero percent. Okay, and you did
get See this is the thing. You got the house,
trials and tribulations, you maintained the house, you did all
the good things. You were Luke Skywalker and you flew
(20:03):
to the Dusk Star and you're ready to go. Oh
but at the very end, whoopsies, I forgot to load
the bombs. It's like, what what you did? Everything else? Right?
You think? Are you a hero? When you go back?
There's nothing to go back to because the death Star
blew everything up? Right? I mean, you gotta follow through
with this stuff. It's the last few pages of the stories,
(20:27):
the last chapter, the last few pages of the last
chapter that tell whether you're a hero or a goat.
Don't be a goat. You're listening to the David Carrier
shell on David Carrier your family's from selling attorney.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
David's got the how too you're looking for Just call
seven four. This is the David Carrier Show.
Speaker 2 (21:07):
Well, come back to the David Carrier Show on David Carrier,
your family's personal attorney, celebrating Morning in America yet again? Huh?
I'm you know. Have you ever had that experience of
election where nothing really changed?
Speaker 1 (21:24):
Right?
Speaker 2 (21:24):
I mean isn't that isn't that usually how it goes?
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Right?
Speaker 2 (21:27):
Oh, it doesn't really matter who gets elected, blah blah blah.
And and now you've got the richest and probably the
smartest guy in the world and his gig there themis
you know, musk and Ramaswami. There, you're gonna gonna figure
out how to how to get some efficiency out of government.
(21:50):
You think things aren't going to change, Oh my goodness,
But that's the big picture here, right, that's the macro.
We're here for the micro. We're here to make sure
that you do not screw up your story, right, make
sure that you leave a you know that it should
be a triumphant sort of thing rather than go out
(22:11):
with a bang or a whimper. It's up to you.
And you know that's the thing. It's like, not everybody
flies rocket ships Tomors. I get it, certainly, I am
not reflying any rocket ships to Mars. But with the
folks that we see on a daily basis, right, And
it's all middle class people, right, It's all people who
(22:32):
worked and say, look, if you're if you're a gazillionaire,
you go to the guys downtown, right, you go the
people that you see at the country club and the
people you play go with, and you know that's that's
who you go to see, the people I work with.
You know, how do you know that God loved the
common man made so many of us? You know, I mean,
(22:56):
I'm gonna I'm more likely in running you at Sam's
Club or whatever, which which incidentally, I do appreciate when
people say hi if you do recognize me. But anyway,
that's a that's a kind of a fun Yeah, that's
really sort of the difference to me. Are we getting
together at the country clube or at the Seams Club? Yeah,
(23:16):
we booked the lunk to the club. Oh, Costco too,
I go to Costco from that time. Anyway. The point
is that if Bill Gates is worried about leaving stuff
to his kids, and he is, why not you Right,
It's not like you're gonna leave him a multi bazillion
(23:36):
dollar or whatever empire what have you. No, that's not
gonna happen. But twenty thirty forty fifty thousand dollars at
the right time, at the right place, that's a huge difference. Right.
If we do things correctly, then we don't lose the house.
If we do things correctly, you don't go broken long
term care, and you know, and again, first and foremost,
(23:59):
I think it's a matter of taking care of yourself,
taking care of your spouse. That's what you've got to
do first. But once we've checked those boxes, then well,
why would I want to throw away the leftovers at
that point? Why would I want to end my story
on a downer? Why not I end it with you know,
the sun is rising on a new generation. You know
what I mean. You made it possible for your grandkids
(24:22):
to go to the prep school, the elementary school, whatever,
the private school that got them into whatever and other
success in life, right, I mean, it doesn't take that
much money. A seed is not that big. It's a
small thing, the seed, but it has great consequences, and
(24:42):
you can have great consequences. You can be the hero
you have been as you live your life. You've been
the hero of your story. You're the one who's been
made doing the things that are necessary right to get
you through yet another day, moving in the right direction.
And all I'm saying is it's very little that needs
to be done to cement that victory, right, Like I say,
(25:06):
you know, Luke fwis'es or you know, Humphrey Bogart makes
it to the makes it to the airport. You know,
he's got to else. Still got to get on the airplane,
get out of Casablanca. So anyway, be the hero of
your story. Let's get to another. Is that too far afield?
I don't know. So let's let's get down the cases.
(25:28):
When my mother goes into a nursing home, will I
lose my home? That both are named are on the
deed for the last twenty five years. Mom's getting up
there in age, so she's not in long term carey
yet in twenty twenty one, in two thousand and one
space honestly, two thousand and one, I paid my mom
one dollar to have my name put on the deed. Okay,
(25:51):
I hate it when people say this, have my name
put on the deed, because there's all kinds of ways
for your name to go on the deed. You would
be assured of staying there. Right. It could be a
life estate, it could be a joint tenancy. It could
be a joint tenancy with rights of survivorship. It could
be tenants in common. Okay, and those aren't the only
(26:13):
ones there are. It could be. It could be a
transfer on death deed where you only get it when
you're dead. You know, So when you write to me
and you say this, put my name on the deed? How,
I mean, what did they did they take one of
those return address stickers and sticking on the deed. No,
you know, somehow or other you're on the property, but
(26:36):
you're not telling me how. You need to tell me how.
It says I've been paying the mortgage taxes and homeowners
insurance ever since, which means that the mortgage was already
on the house, right, and you've been paying the home
owners and so you've been spending the money. Hopefully you're
a joint tenant with rights of survivorship hopefully right, you
(26:57):
would hope, but maybe not. We don't know.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
Home.
Speaker 2 (27:01):
Let's see, I've been read of it. If at some
times she's put in a nursing home, will I have
to sell the house to pay for that? No, you
don't ever have to sell the house. Now, if you
screw things up, which does routinely happen, If you screw
things up, and now you run up a bill at
the nursing home and you can't pay it because you
(27:22):
didn't mom didn't qualify for the medicaid.
Speaker 1 (27:26):
Right.
Speaker 2 (27:26):
If that's the case, she doesn't qualify, then the nursing
home likes to get paid because they like to pay
the people who are taking care of your mom. Right,
So what they're gonna do is they're gonna sue your
mom and then they're gonna seize the house and they're
gonna sell the house, and then they're gonna pay back
their own lawyers who need to get paid for suing
your mom and get in the house. And then you know,
(27:49):
mom's off the Medicaid, so the money's all gone all
over again. And I mean that's how it usually works,
right in this case, your name is on the deed
whatever that means. Okay, So that's so, how is your
name on the deed if let's say, let's say the
nursing room doesn't get paid and you're on the deed
as a joint tenant or tenants in common all right,
(28:12):
so you own a half of the house, mom owns
a half of the house. They can still lean put
a lean against the half of the house that mom owns, right,
and they can seize that and they can sell that,
and now you're screwed.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
Right.
Speaker 2 (28:25):
If you're joint tents with rights of survivorship, ah, a
different story. You know they would still because it's mom's homestead,
she was living there. They're not going to count it.
They're not going to count the house, right, and they
can't take an in. When mom passes, then you own
the house. But what if it was simply joint tenants
without rights of survivorship, Well, then they could rupture. You know,
(28:47):
if you do anything that's contrary to the joint tenancy,
like put your share in a trust or something like this,
now you break the joint tenancy. So there's all kinds
of ways to screw this thing up and only a
couple of ways to get it done correctly. Let's say,
best case scenario, you did joint tenants with rights of
survivorship back in the day. Well, now we're past the
(29:07):
five year look back, right, that's good. When mom passes,
you get the house. That's good. But what if you
want to move. Mom's in the long term care and
now you want to move, you don't want to stay
at that house anymore? Too bad, So sad for you,
you're going to have to stay there because if you
were to sell the house, joint tenants with rights of survivorship. Right,
(29:28):
and you're going to sell the house, You're going to
pay a certain percentage of that to Mom based on
mom's age. So Mom still owns half the house. Right,
she has the right to live in the house. So
either you got to split it even Stephen or depending Again,
this all depends on how was that deed prepared back
(29:50):
in the day, right, because Mom could have deeded the
house over to you and retain the life estate, which
is sort of like that Ladybird deep kind of thing
that people talk about. Well, well, in a case like that,
you have the remainder interest, but Mom has the Mom
has the current interest that has value frequently more than
happen usually, you know, quite a bit more than half
(30:12):
of the value of the house, seventy percent of the
value of the house, depending on ease. So the idea
that you're put on the house, it should have been
done thoughtfully, It should have been done with consideration. Right,
It's probably not the best way to do it, but
it was done. So the next thing we need to
do is bring in the deed. We need to put
(30:32):
eyeballs on the deed to figure out exactly what happened.
And this is the kind of confusion that can be eliminated. Right,
You don't have to worry about this stuff if it's
been done correctly. This see mom bought the house to
you know, helping out and all the rest. Heroic story.
Let's make the ending a good one. Let's make it
(30:53):
a triumphant ending instead of oh and then I lost
the house to the nursing home. It doesn't have to
be that way. I mean, listening into the David Carrier Show,
I'm David Carrier, your family's personal.
Speaker 1 (31:04):
Okay, David's working and working and taking your calls. Now,
(31:28):
this is the David Carrier Show.
Speaker 2 (31:31):
Welcome back to the David Carrier Show. I'm David Carrier,
your family's personal and training. Making sure that you are
that you. Yes, you are the hero of your story. Right,
and remember that's the last few pages that matter. I mean,
one of the one of the stories we tell in
(31:51):
the in the Three Secrets workshop involves a friend, personal
friend whose family multi generation five or six generation farmers. Right,
and the farm passed along and eventually went to my
buddy's grandfather. And the problem is and the grandfather great guy,
(32:14):
all the rest of it you know, world War Two,
storing the beach at Normandy, that kind of thing. He
wasn't at Omaha, He's one of the other beaches. But anyway,
the point is that he was, you know, a very dedicated,
heroic type figure, right but when he but he didn't
plan ahead for the long term. He didn't plan ahead
(32:36):
for this stuff. And as a consequence, when he got
the Alzheimer's, the farm went to pay for it. So
when and this guy had been sort of a thing
in the community, you might say, you know, he was
a successful farmer. He had a long history, he had
a big family, all the rest, and they've been there forever.
(32:56):
And the thing that my buddy, his grandson, said was
the hardest was sort of the the tut tutting, you know,
you know, too bad, you know, because he had everything
going and then this happened, you know, and his uncle
went from being sort of the you know, he's long
(33:18):
past now, but went from being the hero, uh to
you know, a figure of sympathy of you know what
I mean. He went from being the guy he was
throughout his lifetime too. More of a cautionary tale, more
(33:38):
of a oh poor his name is guy, but poor guy.
You know what I mean. I mean, you want to
be remembered as the you know, as the as a cautionary,
as the pathetic loser. You know, people felt sorry for him,
unless said they didn't feel sorry for him. Nobody thinks
he's a bad person, right, but really, and that's what
(34:03):
this is about, Okay, that's about making you the hero. Uh,
making you the hero of your story? And uh and
why shouldn't you? Why should you not be uh the
hero of your story? It seems like to me that
that's like I don't know, why not? All right, let's
get to a let's get to something else here. Oh,
(34:26):
here's a good one. Now, what is the nature think
about this? If you're a beneficiary, what is the nature
of of an inheritance? Okay? Like kids think that they're entitled, right,
There is an entitlement aspect of leaving stuff to kids,
(34:47):
which is really not the right not the right thing
if you want to leave it to them for four
square behind that, okay, But if you want to give
it all to the church, God bless you, right, So,
how can and so here's the question in an email?
How can I persuade my mom not to disinherit me
in another sibling through a Ladybird deed granting her home
(35:10):
to one child. My mother revealed that to In September,
my mother revealed to me, I guess there's a blank
here anyway, that she and my dad had decided to
give their home to one of my brothers as payment
for him agreeing to be their caretaker. Now, this is
like this really bad, stupid, awful, terrible thing to do.
(35:30):
You should never do this, but it is something that
people they do it, you know, So there it is.
Yesterday I received the letter in which Mom says she's
engaged a trust in the state's attorney to draft a
Ladybird deed, the transfer and death deed granting ownership of
their home valued at seven hundred thousand to the one sibling.
Now that's not going to take effect until after they've
(35:52):
both passed, and anything can be changed in the meantime,
which is very good that things can be changed if
mom or Dad wants to. My father, who has progressive dementia,
declared during the discussion of this topic at my home quote,
we are not giving the house to David, not me pertinence,
(36:13):
not personal on the other siblings, David. I don't believe
Dad is mentally competent, and then if he were mentally competent,
he would object to this. If he were mentally competent,
then he would object to disinheriting me and my other brother.
Confident my parents have resources to pay my brother for
caretaking a million dollars in IRA assets. The mom disagrees
(36:35):
was my best course of action.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
I mean, you know, laid back and think of England.
I don't know. I mean, it's not your money, Okay.
If mom and dad want to do this, Mom and
Dad get.
Speaker 1 (36:52):
To do this.
Speaker 2 (36:54):
Now, it's it's quite a bit of money, okay, So
that might be a reason to get involved. But you
got to look at what if you if you talk
to mom and she doesn't want to do it, and Dad,
who you think is mentally incapacitated right now, how do
you he's made this decision. At least he's signed off
(37:16):
on it, and some lawyer is signed off on it,
no doubt, with witnesses and a notary who will testify
that Dad is competent. He knows what he's doing. So
what can you do about this? Well, you can talk
to him about it. You know, you can have a
conversation about it. You can do a you know, a
prepaid not prepaid, but a caretaker agreement where you agree
(37:39):
to pay brother you know, out of the proceeds thirty
bucks an hour or whatever. He's not going to get
the house while either one of them is alive anyway,
I'm guessing as labor indeed, right, So while either one
of them is alive, he's not going to get the house.
So he obviously doesn't need the money right now. So
why not do a you know, agree on a fee?
(37:59):
You know, how much does it? How much your brother
get paid? Thirty bucks an hour? That's the going right
around here for non meers. Help make it forty, make
it fifty dollars an hour. Fifty bucks an hour. That's
four hundred dollars a day, all right, You agreed to
pay brother four hundred dollars right for an eight hour day,
four hundred dollars a day, twelve thousand dollars a month. Well,
(38:22):
it'll take a few years to eat that up, but
that could be a charge against against the house. You
could do it like that. There are options. But if
mom and dad will want to give the house to brother,
then they're going to get the house to brother. And
you've got to be very careful about pushing too hard
because pretty soon you're not disinherited yet. There's a million
(38:42):
dollars and other stuff, right, So go ahead, push it
hard enough. You know what do they say, f around
and find out, you know, screw around and find out.
You don't want to do that because you can wind
up being disinherited altogether. So be grateful for what you
get from your parents. So they want, they love you,
they want to help you out, I don't doubt. And
(39:04):
if they choose to go in this direction, then they
choose to go in this direction. It's their stuff. If
they want to give it all to David, your brother did, well,
they can do that. It's their stuff. Okay. You know
there's no hint here of undue influence or anything else.
So and Dad is probably plenty competent to do this.
(39:27):
But you know the alternative going through probate court and
having them declared incompetent all the round. Do you really
want to inflict that on your family? Maybe you do.
Maybe this other brother is being exploitive, then it's worth doing.
But if not, leave it alone, even listening to the
David Carrier shell on David Carrier your family's personal attorney
(39:48):
inviting you to come to one of our workshops, the
Three Secrets Workshops. How do you get started in the process?
Davidcarrier Law dot com.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
You've been listening to the David Carrier Show a lively
discussion addressing your questions and concerns, but not legal advice.
There is a big difference, so when making decisions that
affect your family, your property, or yourself, the best advice
is to seek good advice specific to your unique needs.
If you missed any of today's show, or would like
additional information about the law offices of David Carrier, please
(40:34):
visit Davidcarrier Law dot com.