Living trust in Arizona

Our father passed away and left his affairs in the hands of one of his sons. He had a living trust set up with everything to be shared equally between his 5 kids. His wife has also passed. The son who has been named to handle the trust, sell and distribute the property and funds, and has power of attorney from his dad, has seemingly dropped the ball, and has done little or nothing to complete his assigned task. Many, many months have passed and he now won't even return our phone calls, or answer our questions. Can we get him removed from the task, and replaced with a lawyer? or? It is not a very big estate, under 100 thousand but nothing much is being done that we can see, and we need the funds for medical reasons. Thanks for any help you can give us! Cholla in AZ.

This is really an intra-family matter with often serious pyshcological overtones.

Handling an estate after the death of a parent is often a burdensome and thankless task. Sometimes there are a lot of odds and ends to deal with, including bills to pay, papers to go through, and assets and claims to reduce to cash.

At the same time as that goes on there often is sadness, and sense of loss. Some people cope by keeping the estate open as a way of not coming to grips with the finality of the death. Family members go through their grief in different time frames, and it does not mean that the one who takes less time loved Dad less, or the one who takes longer loved him more.

When siblings call in an effort to speed along the person selected to handle the matter, even for the best of reasons, resentment often creeps in -- and it can sound to him as if other family members are saying "All I want is Dad's money" while he thinks "I alone am grieving". And that can set up a counter reaction and drag things out further and build resentment.

Might you make it clear to your brother that you also miss Dad, you appreciate his grief, you know that there is work involved, you recognize what he has been doing on the estate, and know that it is a burden. You might offer to assist him with the burden, or suggest that he get a professional (using the assets of the estate to pay for it) to take some of the burden off him.

[Edited by ALawyer on 02-17-2001 at 05:23 PM]