Beneficiaries to accounts
Terry, I just finished reading your column in today’s Orlando Sentinel about making sure you have named beneficiaries on all your accounts. I have a slight problem with that. A close friend of mine passed away 18 months ago. He had no children. He did not trust his only brother to follow through on his wishes, so he named me his personal representative. Because he had named beneficiaries on all his accounts (mostly his brother and a close female friend) there was no money in the estate to pay any bills. I had to front the money for all his monthly bills that came in along with the lawyer that wrote his will and advised me, to meek sure I followed the law. The only asset he had that put any money in the estate was his house. So I paid everything until the house sold, at which time I was reimbursed. I would suggest you advise people to leave at least one account with money in it for the PR to pay the bills of the estate.
Terry Says
First of all, if there is NO money and no assets in the estate of someone else — you can just tell any creditors and they simply won’t be paid. AND, if you were the representative of the estate, you could have told them all to just WAIT until the house is sold. It was generous but totally unnecessary for you to advance the money to the estate!
An account with a named beneficiary is NOT a part of an estate. It goes directly to the named beneficiary. Creditors have no access to the money.
As for hte lawyer, I don’t know what law he was referring to when he advised you, but as personal representative you had no legal obligation to pay bills for the estate — only to distribute the assets to the creditors when they became available.
