Second Marriage Issues – Part 3

My past two blog posts have focused on second marriages.  Because spouses in such marriages more often than not have different heirs they wish to leave their assets to, closer attention needs to be paid when putting together an estate plan.  Last week I told you about Husband and Wife in a second marriage.  Wife came to the marriage with a home.  She added Husband’s name to the deed but also added her children from her first marriage as co-owners as well.

Wife had passed away when the matter came to my office.  There was some dispute between Husband and Wife’s children as to the reason for adding Husband to the deed.  Husband said it was to insure that he would always have a place to live if Wife died first.  Wife’s children claimed that they were added because their mom wanted to pass the property to them after she and Husband died.

Seemed like a reasonable solution, but it was based on an important premise.  Everyone presumed that Husband would remain in the home as long as he lived.  In today’s world of longer life spans, however, that is often not the case.  Sure enough, Husband’s health deteriorated and he needed to move to a long term care facility. 

While Husband had some savings, the cost of care is quite expensive.  He would need to sell the home and use his share of the proceeds towards his care.  Even with those funds, it was still possible that he might outlive his money and need to apply for Medicaid.

When he told Wife’s children of his plan, that’s when problems arose.  They insisted that 100% of the home was intended to go to them and that Husband should sign over the deed to them.  They refused to list the property for sale jointly.

Next week I’ll tell you what happened next.