The father of three in Oklahoma sadly passed away unexpectedly, leaving behind quite a fortune, including around $800K in savings. However, he did not have a will, and his wife of two years from Thailand plans to sell all his things for disposable money. The children disagree, naturally, but she likely gets some of the wealth due to legalities. What makes matters even more complicated is that she doesn’t even speak English. Anxious about everything, one of the children posted about the legal nightmare on Reddit to ask for advice.
According to the r/legaladvice post, the family spoke with an attorney who suggested they should go through probate, but the state law says that “estate acquired prior to his marriage are divided between his children.” As for his retirement fund, the beneficiaries are listed, with his Thai wife receiving 70%, while each of his three kids gets 10%. “There is a truck, car, motorcycle, tools, guns, old jewelry at his home. We think she should need to buy the car from [the] estate and not sell any guns or tools?” OP anxiously remarks in their post.
The top commenter claims that “nothing should be done until the estate is settled,” meaning that everything needs to go through probate to determine how the assets will be distributed between the family members. Since there’s conflict on top of a lack of a will, things will undoubtedly get messy for the Oklahoma children. As for how they will deal with the wife who doesn’t speak English, an interpreter might need to get involved, as smartphone app translating might not be sufficient for legal discussion.
One of the best pieces of advice from the post’s comments, albeit rather obvious, is, “You need a local lawyer. This is far too complex and risky for Reddit’s pay grade.” “IMHO this is lawyer time……it’s gonna get ugly…..” seconds another. Unfortunately, it sounds like the child who made the post is a bit immature in how things should work, especially in legal matters. Their response says it all: “Why too complex? What is the risk?” This reply, along with several others, such as “I fail to see the relevance of their marriage certificate,” has garnered hundreds of downvotes. Needless to say, a lawyer is most certainly necessary to sort out this headache of a situation.
“See this is exactly why I’m spending all my money before I go, I’d hate to see my family fighting over it 😕,” a user states. Although the passing of the Oklahoma father is tragic, this story is a good reminder that having a will is very important, especially when there’s quite a bit of wealth that will be left behind.
