Hubris

Yesterday I made handshake deals to sell my parents’ condo, boat, and car in Florida—all three on the same day. I felt like such a badass.

And now I’m paying for it. But whenever I pay for it, you get more helpful information. That’s the only thing keeping me from screaming.

Today my uncle managed to get me a meeting with his estate attorney, who impressed me right away—compared to my dad’s lawyer, she’s a dream. But because she’s so sharp, she noticed something as soon as I slid the documents to her across the conference table: my dad’s death certificates are INCORRECT.

Long story short, the death certificate lists his secondary residence, not his primary residence. In the post-death fog, my sister and I didn’t realize that the crematorium forms we were filling out would be used for the death certificate, and the rest is history.

If the trust had been airtight, this wouldn’t be a big issue—but because of that one messed up life insurance policy, we have to go through probate in Florida. Which means we have to get the Illinois Department of Public Health to correct the certificates. Which will take forever. Which means all those handshake deals I made might fall through.

Or not! There’s still a slight sliver of hope in that we haven’t technically filed the will in court yet, so it’s technically not lying to say that nothing is in probate, so…we’ll see. I will, of course, keep you posted—and the future “my parents are dead and now I have to sell their property” page is going to be a doozy.

Based on today’s experiences, I’ve updated two sections of the site:

• Rather than a single bullet in a longer list, I’ve given death certificates their own section with more detail.

• I’ve also added a section about whether or not you need an estate attorney. (If at all financially possible, yes!!)

Has writing this purged me of my frustration enough to let me sleep? Probably not, but it’s worth a shot. Tomorrow is another day.