Tag: Contested Probate

Video

Introduction

Hello, it’s Andy Stautz at Stautz Law, and I am back for another talk about Indiana estate planning and probate. Today’s talk is just kind of a general informational discussion of how the intestacy rules work.  

So I’ve previously made videos on what the intestacy rules are, what happens if you die without a will? That’s covered elsewhere on the site. What I want to emphasize today is a very specific point about that, which is the intestacy rules aren’t optional.  

Main Point: Rules Not Optional

Just because the surviving family members want, you know, want everything to go to the kids and nothing to go to the spouse. Or there’s a predeceased child and so there are grandkids and the surviving adult children don’t want anything to go to the grandkids. That’s not how the rules work.  

You know, the intestacy rules are optional in the sense that you can make a will to get around them. But if you fail to make a will, if there is no will, then the estate administration has to proceed according to the intestate rules. There’s no, oh, we all, you know, that’s not what he wanted, for instance. You know, it’s not optional in that sense.  

Exceptions to Intestacy Rules

Now, I put an asterisk on this for two reasons. One, obviously you can make a will. right? The intestacy rules are entirely optional in the sense that you can write whatever you want into your will.  

The other part of the asterisk though is sometimes if everybody really does agree, you can get around the intestacy rules using a family settlement agreement, which is a provision in the Indiana Code that lets you basically agree to compromise a controversy about estate administration. Now that’s subject to court approval, obviously, and it’s also subject to everybody agreeing, which, you know, can be obstacles in a lot of the cases.  

Effects of Non-Optional Rules

So I guess what I’m getting at is for people who are unhappy with how an estate administration is going or unhappy that there was no administration at all, or there’s family contention there, the favorite son or daughter doesn’t get to decide what’s going to happen just because there’s no will or doesn’t get to decide what seems reasonable to the family. There are rules about this and you need to make sure that they’re followed. 

That could mean that you as an heir or a potential, in analyzing an heirship situation, an inheritance, you might have more rights, you might have less rights. But you can’t just take a person’s word or opinion at face value there. So that’s what I was trying to get at with this talk. Obviously, that’s very general kind of background information about like how the law works. If you want specific advice, you need to talk to a lawyer about your specific situation. I’m happy to do that. Give me a call. And that’s all I have for today. Thanks. Bye.