Dad's Gone - Probate?

[MisterB]

Well my father is in a better place with my mom now. Luckily he kept great financial records and had all his accounts with updated beneficiaries, pod, and his house deed was transfer on death to me and my my sister. I have closed all his financial accounts.

He spent 2 weeks in the hospital seeing various doctors then spent time in a rehab facility..sadly he never made it back home.

I have been paying his house related bills and keeping track of them.

What about the medical bills? Do I let those accumulate and get settled thru probate?
I have contacted an attorney for probate, but seeking some insight on what the process is like?
I am in Ohio.

[billybek]

I don't have any advice for you but I am sorry to hear of your Dad's passing.

[GH85Carrera]

You will need to set up a "Estate account" at a local bank. My credit union will not touch them so I had to go to a regular bank. To set up the account you will have to go to the IRS.gov and get a tax ID number like a business. That is stunningly easy. The IRS web site is something right out of the 21st century and I had a tax id in minutes.

Pay all bills from that account.

I had to show the bank a death certificate and a copy of the letters of testamentary to have access to my dad's bank account.

Call the places that want money. Explain the situation. Nothing happens quickly.

My dad died back in February. I have spent a ton of time on the phone and in person at working through the mess. Hopefully your dad had a will and appointed you the executor. I had many thousands of dollars invested in the process beforre I ever got access to my parents estate. All the bills are paid from that estate. I paid myself back forr all expenses first and then went to work forllowing the wishes of the will.

I am sorry for your loss. It is a difficult time.

Hire an attorney to file the papers with the court. It is possible to do it yourself but that just makes the judge upset. Play by their rules. Dress like a banker for the court date. It makes the judge feel better and a happy judge will be a nice judge.

[Baz]

Mister B - sorry for your loss.

Glen - thanks for your informative post.

Sad times but worse if you are confused about handling the estate.

[Jim Bremner]

Sorry to hear this.

[livi]

Sorry for your loss.

[crustychief]

I am sorry to hear of your dads passing.
Regards,
Sandy

[wdfifteen]

So sorry to hear about your father. I hope his final days were peaceful.

I'm in Ohio and I just finished going through this with my parent's estates. I do not recommend you do anything until you engage an attorney. There is a nightmare of arcane rules that have to be followed and if you screw up it can get very expensive unscrewing it.
Glen described some of the things that you will go through, but I did none of that myself because I hired an attorney right off the bat. I am VERY glad I did.
Suggestions:
1. Hire an attorney
2. Don't pay any bills that won't result in a serious penalty (like having gas or electric service shut off). Send letters to every creditor explaining that the estate is in probate and they will get paid as soon as the process allows. Amazingly, several thousand dollars worth of my parent's medical bills disappeared over the year it took to finish the probate process. They would send a bill, I sent the letter back, 10 months later I called to get a current balance and was told it was zero. Happened with more than one creditor.
3. keep records of everything, mileage, phone bills, etc.
4. make copies of everything

[Por_sha911]

Condolences.

In NC, I had to go to the courthouse with a will that had executors of the estate listed, and jump through a dozen hoops like filing newspaper announcements, mailing letters to creditors, and forms forms forms.

It takes a while.

[RWebb]

I am sorry to hear about this. Maybe all the effort you have to go thru will distract you - it did for me.

Avoid probate if you can. The answers will depend on your state, and the size of the estate itself. For example, Oregon allows someone to settle a small estate without probate and the person doing the work can take a fixed dollar amount for their trouble. Ohio may have a web site that will help you with this.

Everyone should be familiar with TOD accounts at money mgmt. or investment firms. TOD = Transfer on Death and greatly avoids hassles.