Tag Archives: death

Did he really just get the lorry?

Although this actually happened in the UK, it could just as easily have happened here.

Fred McGuinness owned a scrap yard. When he died at age 64 in 1987, he left everything to his wife Edith.

He had four children: David, Freddie, Kevin and Denise. David claimed that he and his brothers had been promised shares of the business to pay them back for all the years they spent working in the family business.

When Edith died at age 87 in 2013, David fully expected that their time had come to get their reward. However, Edith left everything she had, including the yard, to Denise. The only other bequest was a small one to charity. In a letter Edith wrote to accompany her will, she said that she and Denise had been excluded from the business and “mistreated”.

Although Denise owned a quarter of the business, her bookkeeping role had been eliminated, she never got a bonus and her pension was a “pittance”.

Edith also wrote that “since Mr. McGuinness passed away, she had watched his once-thriving business ‘go to nothing from greed’.”

Edith’s estate was valued for probate at more than £3million after tax and the court heard that a £12million offer had been received for the yard.

Although David had “taken it for granted” that he would inherit part of the yard, the probate judge disagreed. He said there was never “a cast iron promise” that the yard would be divided among all of the children.

The judge further ruled that the only thing David would inherit was a classic Morris lorry, valued at about £10,000.

You can’t assume that what’s been casually mentioned as what you’ll inherit will stand up in court. If you feel that something should rightly be yours, be sure to discuss it with your parents while they are still alive and get their commitment put into a legal document. Otherwise, you may find yourself – like David – without the inheritance you had been expecting…and experiencing friction with any other heirs.

Everyone should have a will that outlines what they wish to happen to their assets when they die and clearly spells out the terms. If you have assets, don’t delay. Get a will written today. You can either find a “do it yourself” version on the web or, if your estate is larger or more complicated, find an estate attorney who will prepare one for you.

For more information about estate planning and will writing, go to our website, www.diesmart.com.

Ghosting – Do you know what it is?

According to Wikipedia, ghosting is a form of identity theft in which someone steals the identity, and sometimes even the role within society, of a specific dead person (the “ghost”) who is not widely known to be deceased.

As our population ages and more and more people are dying every day, identity thieves are keying in on this fact for their gain. An Ohio family found out about ghosting the hard way about a year ago when one of these thieves stole over $2.2 million from their deceased father’s estate.

“Ghosts” steal a deceased person’s personally identifiable information and use it for things such as account takeover, tax refund fraud, medical ID theft and driver license ID theft. They also apply for new credit cards and loans using this information.

By the time the family of the deceased finds out about the theft, it may cause problems with the estate and may cause great expense to lenders or others who were fooled. In some cases, creditors will try to come after the estate, even if the money owed is because of ghosting.

Here are a few helpful hints to make sure a “ghost” won’t cause problems for you when a loved one dies.

Send the IRS a copy of the death certificate. That way, a “ghost” won’t be able to file a fraudulent tax return and collect any refund.

Send a copy of the death certificate to credit card companies and other financial accounts that were held by the deceased and ask that those accounts be closed.

Notify each of the major credit bureaus and ask them to put a death notification on the accounts of the deceased.

Don’t put too much information in an obituary. Thieves can use date of birth, exact address, mother’s maiden name to help open new accounts.

Be alert and check the deceased’s credit report for questionable activity.

For more information about identity theft and other issues related to estates, go to www.diesmart.com.

Which state is the first to adopt the revised UFADAA?

Oregon became the first state to adopt the revised Uniform fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act when Governor Kate Brown signed it into law on March 3, 2016. It will become effective on January 1, 2017.

The revised act is designed to ensure that account holders can retail control of their digital property and can plan for its disposition after their death. It also helps avoid circumstances where online service providers delete deceased’s accounts without authorization or refuse to hand over access and information to permitted fiduciaries.

Will your state be next?

For more information about the revised UFADAA, go to www.diesmart.com.

Do you know what your digital assets are worth…and what happens to them when you die?

A 2013 estimate by McAfee found that the average person’s digital assets are worth $35,000. That may be in things such as airline miles, purchased media, online bank accounts, Bitcoins, domain names. Regardless of what they are in, their value can add up quickly.

As my attorney put it, “The digital world is today’s Wild West. There are no sheriffs and no predictable law.” Yet you have to find a way to protect these assets and to pass their worth on when you die.

A recent blog by Sharon Fisher gave some great examples of people who didn’t do anything and what happened when they were gone.

A son gave up about $2000 that resided in a PayPal account because his father hadn’t left a will granting him possession to those funds.

Michael Hamelin, a hacker who died in an accident had secured his family’s systems so well that even with the help of other hacker friends, his wife hasn’t be able to gain access to some of their files, including the only copies of digital photos they owned.

Peggy Bush, who we previously wrote about, was a Canadian widow who was told by Apple that she’d have to get a court order for the company to reveal the password to an iPad card game she and he husband linked to play.

In addition to policies of each company that has an online presence, laws vary by state. It’s a very complex situation.

Be sure you have a plan for how to deal with your digital assets. Check out our book, ACCESS DENIED: WHY PASSWORDS ARE AS IMPORTANT AS YOUR WILL, which will walk you thru the issues and help you to figure out what to do.

The Mushroom Death Suit – almost ready for use

We’ve reported before on unique ways to dispose of someone’s body after death. However, a friend found a new one that already has people lining up to use it – The Mushroom Death Suit. The brainstorm of Jae Rhim Lee, it’s a burial suit that contains mushroom spoors. They will be able to “eat” your body and neutralize its toxins after you’ve been buried. The suit will prevent toxins in the human body from being released into the environment after death and is also intended to help deliver nutrients to plant roots more quickly and efficiently.

The first real user of this suit will be Dennis White, a 63-year-old man suffering from a neurodegenerative disease. He hopes that this will make his death a greener process.

The Infinity Burial suit (the other name for this product) is available in pod form for animal burials as well.

Whether the suit will actually work in practice is yet to be seen…but it’s certainly an interesting idea.

For more information about traditional and non-traditional ways to dispose of a body after death, go to www.diesmart.com.