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How to emotionally deal with the estate of your parents

Posted by julihannah68 @julihannah68, May 30, 2023

I lost my mother in 1984, my father in 2018 and my stepmom in 2021. My brother and I are the oldest in our family (not extended) and along with my adult nephew, we are facing the cleaning out the house and selling it. He and my nephew seemingly have no emotional interest in the contents, but it's been very difficult letting go. I struggled as an adult with the loss of my mom but my dad's death was very brutal on me. Any suggestions as to how to navigate through this phase of life? I'm 55 and my brother is 4 years older.

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julihannah68 | @julihannah68 | Jun 11, 2023
In reply to @roch "I have been through the massive process of settling estates, my mother and recently my sister...." + (show)
@roch

I have been through the massive process of settling estates, my mother and recently my sister. Both were hoards and no organization to items.

Some days were better than others, and like your family, some were very attached emotional and others would but everything in dumpster if I let them.

As you, both saved every piece of paper. My approach was:
- Sort by category, taxes, financial, pension, SS, insurance, vehicles, utility, house, medical, etc….
- Think about what might be needed for probate
- Once have in category, attack the most important first and sort again by type (company) and then by date.
- Keep tax info, it is very helpful to determine where they had investments, etc…
- The financial and insurance info will help find out if have any accounts did not know about
- Some less important, I put in box to go thru at later date.

As far as non - paper items, some family members fought over items, then few years later they had disposed of or did not care anymore.
- We took turns picking items we wanted
- Whatever was less was disposed of or donated

It is seems overwhelming at times, you just have to take your time.

Laurie

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Thank you!! Fortunately, the will has been probated and at this time, I'm going through junk drawers to start with and then going to closets next. My "aunt" has legal right to go through and take what she wants but I honestly cannot imagine her - or anyone - wanting to take it all because it's so much and she'd have to hire people to get it out, trucks and said people to take it to somewhere she'd have to rent to store it. And it'd have to be a big place too. She don't need it, but she's proven to be quite greedy so who knows what she'll do. So I'm getting our photos and some personal stuff out before she comes in.
After that, we will definitely be having a sale and donating some as well as just giving things like furniture to family or whoever can use it.
I do know that I am going to try and prevent my kids from ever having to deal with so much stuff but I know it's not possible to make it easy. It's part of life for all of us and I just hope they are older when they have to do it.

REPLY
julihannah68 | @julihannah68 | Jun 11, 2023
In reply to @flow "I am very sorry for your loss and the heavy emotional toll it takes. My husband..." + (show)
@flow

I am very sorry for your loss and the heavy emotional toll it takes. My husband I went through this a number of years ago. We went through everything, thought hard about we wished to keep and gave that opportunity to other family members and friends. When we felt sure we had finished that step we contacted a local estate sale company who charges a flat % of everything they can then sell. They come into the house, organize the contents for sale after researching any antiques, collectible etc. This company had over 5000 followers online in our rural, small town region. You can be there, or not the day of the sale, as you wish. At end of sale they keep 20-30% of the total and the family receives the rest. They advertise long before items for sake. They dispose of items that don’t sell, with us able to pre designate our choices for disposable. It was a blessing for us to be able handle it this way. We kept what we wished and the rest went to others who who could use it or wished it. It let us focus on healing rather than estate details.

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Thank you, we have considered that for sure, but I wouldn't mind doing that myself. I enjoy doing it and my daughter does too and I got plenty of people who would love to help out too. It will depend on what we have left by the time we get to that point too.

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