Do you trust your relatives to take title to property that you need in order to support yourself when you are getting along in years?
All of us would like to think so.
Many of us do.
But what if we were wrong?
Even the closest relatives may be placed in situations where assets that were entrusted to relatives were lost. The typical example, and one I saw today, involved a elderly woman who had never married, and who accumulated a substantial amount of money and several properties. She placed the funds in two joint accounts with two nieces, with the proviso that they could have the money when she passed on. The real properties somehow turned up titled only in the nieces’ names.
The typical situation:
- The relative used the money.
- The relative’s reason for using the really doesn’t matter. True, the relative who removed the funds without consent may be guilty of a criminal offense of theft, but oftentimes because the funds were jointly held, the police will not charge the case due to the fact that the person who converted the funds had the legal (although not moral) right to withdraw the entire account.
- Sometimes, the relative acted innocently at first, as in, I will borrow the money and return it within two weeks. Two weeks later, the relative doesn’t have the money, and cannot ever seem to catch up enough to repay the “loan.”
- Sometimes, another entity, like the IRS has seized the funds due to a tax lien owed by the relative. While the relative did not intend to lose the money, the fact remains the funds are gone and no longer usable by the victim or recoverable from the relative.
In each of the these situations, the relative has varying degrees of culpability. But the results are the same for the victim. She is the loser in any case.
The lesson: Play it safe. Don’t trust a relative. For the relative: Don’t put yourself in the position of causing a loved one to lose. Don’t take title to the money.
