Lawyers Share Their Most Interesting Will Readings (r/AskReddit | Reddit Stories)

lawyers who read wills to families what is the most interesting bizarre offensive surprising thing you have had to read out loud to my daughter Anne who created my beautiful granddaughter Jane and her dear fourth husband John who laid hands on my Jane I leave $1 your money grubbing B starts to Jean I leave all of my money three assets save $5,000 and my best gun which I leave to my son Bill on the condition that he beats John bloody during the time between my funeral and my burial Jane bail your uncle out of jail please other than names this is the exact wording of a great uncle's will part of it anyway at age nine Jean told her mother that John had molested her and her mother told her she deserved it for being aerosol T so great uncle took Jilin and raised her and his two kids got exactly what it says his son also got a truck and technically a house although he only kept it until Jean was a legal adult and could afford the tax on it Bill got full custody of Jean when his father died and he put every penny of her money into a trust fund to mature when she was 25 because he felt like his sister would try to get the money he was right kamar and in case anyone wondered yes Bill got his five grand he didn't get arrested though because John had a warrant on him so they didn't dare call the cops bill did kindly inform the police of his whereabouts a few weeks later when I was a clerk in law school at the state Court of Appeals the adult children of a rich woman tried to invalidate the will basically the woman was worth about eight million dollars and all the children were working professionals earning six or seven figures while the woman had used the same hairdresser for multiple years and left a considerable amount in a trust for the hairdressers children's education the remainder of the estate who was given to different charities basically the kids were mad they didn't get a carte edit a lot of people asking how it turned out truth is I don't know we remanded on some procedural issues and I never followed up on it if it comes up like if you're wealthy leaving $1 zero zero zero to each kid we'll make it a lot more difficult to invalidate leave them nothing and they can create a lot of doubt and questions not really what you don't want to do is just leave them out you can simply say that so-and-so is to receive nothing little tude out there the only real reason to leave them something is to make it less likely that they'll contest so you give them some significant generally more than a thousand but then say that if they contest they get nothing so they can take 100k and walk or they can roll the dice on a lot more given how hard it is to invalidate wills especially because the reason they were disinherited is usually clear and good it can be a tempting offer I once had to tell the son of the deceased that his mother's priceless boy with Apple painting with will to a hotel concierge edit spelling the Consul Aires was probably sleeping with her I go to bed with all my friends my estate planning professor told us about a guy who had two families neither of which knew about the other until it was time to read the will this wasn't like a love child mistress type scenario both were nuclear multi kid families both families showed up for what had to be one of the most awkward will reading in history I don't really know how he pulled it off other than that he was away on business frequently I don't know how it happens either but it must be more frequent than expected before I got married my wife mentioned that she had an uncle with two families that found out about each other after her uncle passed fast forward eight years we decide to go on a holiday to the UK for a holiday and meet up with her family on one of the days the next day another set of cousins come by and I made the social gaffe of assuming they were the family of a different uncle nope this was the second family in my trusts and estates class in law school we read a case about a man who left everything to his wife but only if she got his body stuffed and left it on the living room couch forever luckily for her the Court invalidated that part of the husband's will Pyke part of the reasoning was that it would make it impossible for her to date remarry if she had her husband's creepy dead body glaring at anyone who came to see her I'm going to have my husband do this when I die except how I want to be done up more like one of those standing stuffed polar bears you see clawing and snarling we had a client itemize his rock collection in his will including directions that certain rocks be deposited in certain rivers across Canada Edit apparently I need to start watching this Breaking Bad show their minerals Jesus Christ Marie I know I know no lawyer here but I had to share a woman came in after her mother's funeral with some correspondence from the company I work for insurance she was worried there was a bill she needed to pay and was coming to tell us her mom had died she just looked so tired and we got to talking while I looked at the policy to close it out she shared that in the last few years her mom had slipped into dementia and she single-handedly took care of her how she missed her but just was run ragged and she hadn't taken a vacation in forever I realized what she had was not a health policy it was a life insurance policy naming the daughter as the beneficiary for about 50 K I told her and she just started crying it made me cry and I got up and hugged her and sort of just held her while she cried she pulled away and said I have no idea what she left at four everything's been paid for I said this might be her telling you to go on that vacation and relax it was so touching and she had no idea that the policy existed edit thanks for the gold : those bracket I used to work for an accountant and we used to make wills as well an old man probably around 70 left all his money to his mistress while his wife only got the goldfish I had to tell him that if his wife contested it she would most definitely win he said he didn't care and it used to use decks too if there is a lawyer on this forum can you please answer some of these questions we did a little section on law while doing my accounting degree in to my knowledge the wife has a high chance of winning the case example if all he had was furniture in the house in the house itself then the wife would get it all regardless of what the wool said just to clear up confusion I'm for Australian not USA I thought it was in there but it wasn't lawyer here a once amended Oval for a doctor in which he disinherited his son by removing everything he had intended to bequeath and replacing it with a manure spreader I didn't ask any questions because changing your will is an easy thing to do but one day the doctor will die and his son will have essentially be told to each tea we had the client who was a widowed farmer who owned several heavy equipment caterpillar trucks etc' he had two sons who were already working with him at the farm and a daughter who was working in the city he willed the heavy equipments to the daughter when asked why since these equipment were essential to the farm he said that the farm was to go his kids equally but his girl needed to know he always wanted her to join their venture and dispel her notions of alienation because she was a girl not me but my friend's father's father died and he said when the guy reviewed the will with his lawyer and his sister it said to give 100% of the assets to his sister he said he had no idea why his father did bad he wasn't on bad terms or anything it was shocking to him the sister didn't share anything with him either and they were on pretty good terms before that so many good family relationships break completely because of these things it's so sad to see how important materialistic value is to some people and how it can overpower years years of emotional ties obviously it can create high frictions but the sheer selfishness of some people after a loved one's death astonishes me oh dear my first not me but a friend post someone had left an entire golf course that he owned and managed in secret to his son they were avid golfers but always went to another course I still don't know why someone would lie about downing a golf course some people like surprises I'd be thrilled if my dad had been hiding a golf course from me for all these years as a big reveal when he died I would just be like why could we never go there together because that's where I take the kids of my other family and I didn't want you to to run into each other to my wife I leave her lover and the knowledge that I was never the full she thought me too my son I leave the pleasure of working for a living for 25 years he thought the pleasure was all mine best dis ever was in my wills and trusts book in law school as an example of people talking sh t in their wills you are supposed to discourage them as lawyers from doing so that's so classy though it's probably the best dis I've ever heard read extremely well-spoken underhanded in the best possible context all while being seemingly totally appropriate considering the allegations and mature with the ultimate final word I was working as a legal secretary and had to leave someone's caps to various people fine but I also had to leave money in the cat's name to various organizations one of them was named Mr Bobo I enjoyed it thoroughly it's very rare to read a will out loud that's mostly in the movies normally I just make extra copies and pass them out to whoever and the family wants to read it edit one though the most unusually thin oval I saw was man leaving a good chunk of money for his mistress that wife knew nothing about it was interesting to see sadness and anger fighting to win in the war she finally laughed and said was a mother duck er speaking as an actual estate attorney thank you for pointing out that this is basically a Hollywood myth if I had a dollar for the number of people who call me wanting to sue because there was never a reading of the will a friend of mine was adopted at birth and her mom died though we'll gave half the estate to her two natural daughters my friend got nothing WTF that was vindictive beyond belief it's like saying yeah I raised you but you were never truly my child ya friend didn't really understand it she was so hurt her mother never talked to her any differently than her sisters never told people she was adopted or anything so it was a punch to the gut for her my maternal grandpa was wealthy he divorced my maternal grandma remarried and promptly dropped dead of a heart attack he was only 48 and had no will so everything went to his new wife my mum's stepmother she was actually really nice and was planning on making sure that everything was fair till she died in a car accident six months later she was a widow herself prior to marrying grandparent had an owl from 15 year old son from the previous marriage who got everything my mom and her siblings had to go to the auction at their childhood home and buy back as much of their heirlooms and memories as they could afford and truthfully still some of what they couldn't edit I know words kind of reminds me of the story of the guy who meet a bombshell girl in a bar he said My father is 98 years old and is a billionaire he will be dead within a month we should get married the next day she became his stepmother my father-in-law was an accountant for some rather wealthy people one of them was asking him to assist with writing up his will worth millions the final addition he suggested was that if the children contested it they'd get nothing they contested it for years I got this weird light catching thing from the oldest principal from my ducking charter school it came in handy though and saved me and my friends lives at least it's better than a golden-winged ball although that did turn out to have an invaluable artifact in it best will story I personally know of a father had a valuable antique grandfather clock he also had two daughters his solution if I die on an even day daughter a gets the clock an odd day and daughter B gets it the daughter who did not get the clock got an equivalent cash award based on the value of the clock I know of the event because I had to service the clock several times over the years an ancestor of mine in the rural UK in the 1700s died and left his farm and everything to his nephew no children with his surviving wife only getting the second best bed and a provision her to receive three pounds of butter per week for the rest of her life we thought this was incredibly mean but we wonder whether this butter was meant as an income I mean who can eat three pounds of butter if I remember my history right the best bed was reserved for the guest room with the second-best bed being put in the master bedroom chances are the me he was leaving her the bed they had used for most if not all of their marriage traditionally speaking the best of everything would go to the children or in this case presumably the nephew while the widow would get the second-best of everything as well as this a good bed would be equal in value to that of a small house though this was mainly for the prosperous citizens as for the butter I'd have to go with her having to use it as a for of income saw someone's moms will get we to them her ex-lover got all of her money and she gave her mansion to her son and gave her daughter nothing and said she was a disappointment and a mistake the kicker was though the kids were twins one of my college buddies dad died from cancer in our second year it wasn't a sudden death he had been battling it for a couple years when my friend came back to school he casually mentioned that his dad left him and his sister seven million dollars each turns out his dad had hit the lottery before my friend was born invested put all the money away to help pay for college high school his mom got a nice chunk of change also he grew up thinking they were just ordinary middle-class family we had a glorious third and fourth year of college thanks to my loaded friend edit he didn't know his dad won the lottery but it was never mentioned to him or his sister that it was a lot of money I'm not a lawyer but my family has an odd story involving a will several generations back a woman along with her brothers in our family inherited a huge sum of money from her father oil money in Oklahoma at the time women were allowed to inherit property assets of single but all assets would have been transferred to her husband if she married she wasn't too happy about the situation and in protest never took a husband she had a few friends over the course of her life and lived a very comfortable life until dying of old age at which time her estate was divided amongst all of the female descendants in the family PL DNR my great great great aunt if something was a badass feminist b tch edit typos I'm late by maybe my father is an heir to the Procter & Gamble Company just so we are clear I am NOT rich anyway my grandfather was adopted with his brother by two spinster sisters part of the PNG family had an elevator in his house the whole nine yards my grandfather went to the war was part of the Battle of the Bulge and came back completely shell-shocked he began drinking and partying etc when the sisters died everything was left to his brother assuming my grandfather would drink away the money my grandfather was left a small general store to support his family a small home and a car he cleaned up his act and sought counseling when they figured out PTSD and his brother gave him nothing and never spoke to him after he was better the brother once purposely crossed the street so he would not have to speak to my father his nephew tons one client left a specific gift of 10k dollars to one son and left him out of the post Rights Division of the residual estate which was sizable at the time the will was drafted this was intended as a serious disinheritance which he apparently talked about all the time to make the disfavored son feel bad however by the time he died he had a serious reversal of fortune and his estate was about 10k dollars so he effectively disinherited the good children and left the blacksheep everything the bad kid appeared very poor compared to the others and the look of grateful surprise on the poor kids face was almost as priceless as the shock on the others who thought they were getting rich I heard this from another lawyer rich old lady leaves her entire sizable estate in a trust for the care and maintenance of a dog as long as the dog shall live on the dog's death the trust paid out in full to the son apparently the Sun had Rover put down the day after the funeral and presented a demand to the trustee the very next day for the trust payout she should have seen that one coming my mom's father left her and her three sisters $1 out of spite $1 just don't leave anything you duck in D CK edit my grandfather was very well off from being a successful insurance salesman he left his wife and four daughters to start a new life with another woman and her daughter's way before I was born leaving a token amount to the person is some sort of legal thing Jay to the effect that the disinherited or cheated person can't say they were forgotten or overlooked they weren't overlooked they got a dollar so it would be harder to contest [Music]

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Id: 9g7GPMUhjp8

Length: 19min 50sec (1190 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 24 2020