Signatures needed to set up estate?

[maneki]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? I live in Colorado, mother lived and died in Maine

I recently had another thread in here asking if I could get a copy of my mother's will. Thank you for all the help I received there. After much internal debate, and long conversations with my husband and friends, I decided that honestly it wasn't worth dragging everything on longer for. The whole situation of dealing with that side of the family was a mess and I felt I should just move on myself and let it go. So I never called to try and get a copy of the will. Well now my cousin is asking for my signature on something but I am reluctant to sign things I'm unfamiliar with.

She sent me a message that says: "Hi. So I am working with [our uncle] on finishing up Nannie's final paperwork. Bills, canceling accounts and all that stuff. I have to set up a formal Estate through the state of Maine because one of her life insurance checks (the one that was left to cover final expenses) didn't have a true beneficiary listed. It just says final expenses. I just got off the phone with Probate and I need you, [my sister] and my brother to sign off letting me set up the Estate. Sucks that I even have to do it for a check that is going right to the funeral home and to pay her credit card bills. If you don't have a problem with it I can email you the form to sign and you can send it back to me. Then when I go up to Maine in a few weeks to pick up the rest of her stuff I can file it with the court up there. I have to actually go there to do it too. They wont let me mail, email or fax the forms. Let me know you email address that I can send the form to. Thank You"

I gave her my email to send me the form so I can read over it but I don't have it yet. Is this actually a thing? Would she need all these signatures for this check? Could this come back on me in any negative way if I sign this? If I've actually been disinherited, which I was led to believe I was, would she even need my signature anymore?

I'm so tired of this whole thing but I don't want to sign something that could possibly screw me over in the future in some way.

 

[maneki]

My cousin just emailed a copy of my mom's will. It was handwritten and no where does it say anything about disinheriting me. Only mentions that she is making my cousin, Amanda, her beneficiary. Nothing else is mentioned.

It says (I have removed personal details):
May 1, 2015
This will be my last will - it is to supercede any written prior to this date. I am handwriting this so there will be no doubt that these are my wishes.
[Cousin's name] (my granddaughter) will be my beneficiary. Anything I possess will go to her - this includes my share of [address of the house she owned with my aunt]. It was always our Mother's wish that the house always stay within the family. Since my daughter [name] (now deceased) was the oldest grandchild - my share of the house will be passed down through her daughter.
If [cousin] needs any help with this - my brother [name] has offered to advise her.

[Mom's Signature]
Two Witnesses

So... now what? I don't appear to have been actually disinherited at all. At least not as I understand it. Doesn't this mean a portion of her estate should go to me after all? Or since she specifically named my cousin does it all go to her, no matter what? I don't have money for a lawyer upfront, and since my mom lived and died in Maine, and I'm in Colorado, it's not like I can just hop on over to handle things in person.

 

[maneki]

I was able to find a Maine attorney to give me a consultation so I'm getting this figured out. Thank you.

 

[Dandy Don]

This appears to be a smaller estate. Does the will ever mention the specific value of any assets in the the estate that Amanda will be getting?
Since there appears to be no specific clause that disinherits you, you should ask your attorney if you have the right to contest this will. Not that you would actually go ahead and do it, just theoretically.

 

[maneki]

She mentions that she's leaving everything to my cousin and that it includes her share of the house she and my aunt owned in Maine. She had always told me that I would inherit the house to then pass on to my oldest daughter when I died. The lawyer I'm consulting with has basically said I can contest the will, but I need to decide if there's enough in it for me to make it worth the money of hiring a lawyer. Aside from the house I can't get any straight answers from that side of the family as to what else is included in my mother's estate. The house alone is very important to me but since it's co-owned by my aunt, who hates me, I really need to decide if it's worth fighting over. As long as my aunt is alive I could never visit the house (well, if I owned part of it I could legally I'm sure, but it would be an extremely uncomfortable situation), and then when she passes away it's going to my cousin who also doesn't like me.

Is there anyway to legally get the family to tell me everything involved in my mother's estate? No paperwork has yet been filed with the probate court.

 

[Dandy Don]

At this point, all you can do is to wait for the smaller estates probate process to play out. When you receive the "form" you are being asked to sign, you can look at the title and discuss with your attorney whether it is a form required by the probate court or something else she is attempting to do outside of the normal probate process. At some point later on she MIGHT be required to report the assets of the estate, unless your mother somehow designated her beneficiary of assets (before she died) that are not included in the will, in which case ownership or title automatically is granted to the aunt.

Out of curiosity, you should look at the property tax or land records/assessor's office online for whatever county the house is located in and see whose names are showing as owners of the property. Value of the home will also be listed there.

 

[maneki]

I got an online consultation with an attorney in Maine and I'm just getting more and more confused honestly. Sounds like the form is simply to appoint my cousin as the personal representative for the estate so she can file the will and open probate (or something like that). He said I also could apply to be the personal representative and it sounds like that was what he was suggesting. I was reading over what's involved in that though and it sounds really complicated. But he said if I renounce my priority to be PR I would lose leverage (I assume in contesting the will after it goes into probate). I'm sure this is all complicated for a reason but I really wish it was easier, though I know my distance isn't exactly making things easier either.

I just tried to do a property search and I didn't find anything. I assume I'm not searching in the right place, or for the right thing. The property is in Han**** county Maine. If you could point me in the right direction for where I need to search I will gladly try again.

 

[Dandy Don]

http://www.han****countydeeds.com/faq.htm

 

[maneki]

Hmm. That is the site I found as well but when I do a search in the town where she lived I find nothing in either my mom's name or my aunt's name. I even checked for my cousin's name, just in case.

Edited: Wait, I take it back. When I search for deeds alone nothing comes up that is listed in my mom's name or my aunt's name, but when I search for my aunt's last name and search "All" then the deed shows up. Weird.

Okay, so it says the Grantor is my great-grandmother and the Grantees are my aunt and my mom. I'm not seeing any property values listed but there's a lot of the page that won't load because Chrome doesn't support the plugin, so I'm downloading Firefox and will try again there. I'll edit this post with what I find.

Edited again: It just shows a scanned copy of the original deed. No property values mentioned anywhere that I can see.

 

[Dandy Don]

Maine's online property records might be different than how other states do it, but see if you can find a website for that particular county in Maine that just deals with paying property tax or looking up property tax bills for different addresses in that county and since the tax is usually based on an assessed value, you might get lucky enough to find it there.