Who has a right to see a will?

[BadLuck08]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)?

Alabama

My wifes father passed away recently. She has three older sisters. The other sisters are doing everything in secret. Going through the safe and discussing wills and deeds. So far my wife hasn't been able to see the will. Does she have a right to see it?

Thank you

 

[justalayman]

before a person is dead, only the people that person wants to see the will.

after they are dead, it must be submitted to probate where everybody in the world can review it if they desire.

A will is meaningless unless it is submitted to probate. Has anybody opened probate?

 

[BadLuck08]

The will hasn't gone to probate yet.

 

[justalayman]

has anybody even opened a probate file yet? If not, why not? Nobody can do anything with the estate until probate is opened and a personal rep/exec/whatever it is called in this situation is appointed by the court.

 

[curb1]

justalayman,

Is that right? You said, "A will is meaningless unless it is submitted to probate."

It is not necessary for a will to go to probate, is it? If there are no assets in which a title change is necessary and the estate values are small, why go through probate?

 

[justalayman]

justalayman,

Is that right? You said, "A will is meaningless unless it is submitted to probate."

It is not necessary for a will to go to probate, is it? If there are no assets in which a title change is necessary and the estate values are small, why go through probate?

for a will to be enforceable, it must be probated. Now, if there is nothing within the will that is actually affected and probate is not otherwise required, then it would not be required to probate the will. There is a lot more that a will does other than transfer real estate. Without a will, the laws of intestate succession will direct the dispersal of the assets, or their value but it still requires an authorized person to do that.

In the case at hand, there is apparently a will and real estate involved. Sounds like probate is needed.

 

[BadLuck08]

It has only been a couple of days. I am sure it will happen soon. I have probably jumped the gun a little with my questions. The wife is just upset that everything is being done without her blessings.

 

[justalayman]

well, nothing should actually be "being done" until there is a PR/exec with the authority to do something.

If it's only been a couple days, it is quite soon to get too worked up unless she sees stuff being disposed of.

 

[BadLuck08]

This will went to probate at least 2 months ago. The situation now is that the executor of the will (one of the daughters) is basically doing nothing. What she has done she had to be prodded like a cow going to slaughter to do the little things she has done.

The electricity is still on, cable is still on, checking accounts still open, exec is also destroying the statements. Life insurance hasn't been applied for. Appraisals haven't been done. The executor just isn't doing the things that need to be done.

Can the executor be replaced? What procedure would that require? The attorney handling the probate hasn't been contacted about these problems yet.

Thanks

 

[justalayman]

an executor can be replaced under certain circumstances. Somebody would have to ask the courts to remove the exec if the exec is doing something improper.