Billy Shears
Junior Member
What is the name of your state? Oklahoma
My mother, a widow, passed away last month at age 84. She sold her house a year and a half ago in a small town and moved to OKC to a retirement center. She asked her financial advisor, who she felt loyal to and trusted, to handle the proceeds prudently as she would need it for income. So he put the entire proceeds from the sale, $40k, into a single CIT bond, paying semi-annually, with a maturity in 2021. Whether this was a suitable investment comes to my mind. Her remaing asset, $20k, was in an annuity. So she had total assets of $60k.
We notified her financial advisor of her death, who informed us she had a beneficiary for the annuity, but not the CIT bond. He apparently failed to put a POD on this when he set this up. Seems rather negligent to sell a long-term bond to an 84 year-old widow without getting a POD or named beneficiary. So now the executor of the will, my sister who lives in Minneapolis, will now have to spend time, money, and court costs to go through probate in OKC.
The bond does have a Survivor's Option, which meets the requirements, and we intend to exercise to get the full principal refunded. My questions are the following:
1. Are there any other options to expedite this? The advisor says we need to get a Letters Testamentary before taking any action.
2. The CIT bond - appears CIT is having liquidity trouble as they had to access a line of credit yesterday to fund bonds maturing in 2008. Will we still be able to exercise the 'death put' if the company fails or files bankruptcy? Can the advisor's firm be liable for this inappropriate, unsuitable investment? If my mom had lived, it's questionable she could have depended on this for income given CIT's precarious financial situation.
My mother, a widow, passed away last month at age 84. She sold her house a year and a half ago in a small town and moved to OKC to a retirement center. She asked her financial advisor, who she felt loyal to and trusted, to handle the proceeds prudently as she would need it for income. So he put the entire proceeds from the sale, $40k, into a single CIT bond, paying semi-annually, with a maturity in 2021. Whether this was a suitable investment comes to my mind. Her remaing asset, $20k, was in an annuity. So she had total assets of $60k.
We notified her financial advisor of her death, who informed us she had a beneficiary for the annuity, but not the CIT bond. He apparently failed to put a POD on this when he set this up. Seems rather negligent to sell a long-term bond to an 84 year-old widow without getting a POD or named beneficiary. So now the executor of the will, my sister who lives in Minneapolis, will now have to spend time, money, and court costs to go through probate in OKC.
The bond does have a Survivor's Option, which meets the requirements, and we intend to exercise to get the full principal refunded. My questions are the following:
1. Are there any other options to expedite this? The advisor says we need to get a Letters Testamentary before taking any action.
2. The CIT bond - appears CIT is having liquidity trouble as they had to access a line of credit yesterday to fund bonds maturing in 2008. Will we still be able to exercise the 'death put' if the company fails or files bankruptcy? Can the advisor's firm be liable for this inappropriate, unsuitable investment? If my mom had lived, it's questionable she could have depended on this for income given CIT's precarious financial situation.