Personal Property: How to Divide Up Your Stuff
One of the biggest problems in winding up estates is the “stuff”—all the furniture, garage contents, collections, family photos, and so forth. It is a time-consuming job, and if there are multiple heirs, disagreements and hard feelings can create long-lasting family problems. I have had to litigate personal property divisions because people can get stubborn over items that have seemingly little cash value. A couple of examples:Dad died. Mom had predeceased him. The two children did not get along at all. The primary problem was the family photos. They were in two cardboard boxes in the possession of the son. He was willing to give his sister some of them, but only the few that he chose. She wanted half and wanted her choice. After lots of fruitless negotiation, I finally brought it in front of a judge. I explained my client’s thinking, and the other attorney reiterated that of his client. Being a judge can sometimes be simple. He did the King Solomon solution. His words, which caused the siblings to decide to solve the problem themselves, were as follows:
