04-24-2020, 09:37 PM
This is a fairly long story so hit back anytime yoy want
5 Years ago my Father in Law died, leaving my unmarried Brother in Law living in the house in Vero Beach by himself. On April 9th my wife, his sister, called him and had a 2 hour very pleasant and happy conversation, lots of laughs and pleasant memories. They were known to have LONG conversations. At 3:00 AM April 10, he called 911 complaining that he could not breath. He was told by the 911 operator to unlock the front door, and he dropped the phone and never came back on. Police & fire rescue arrived within 5 minutes, transported him to the ER (3 minutes away) where he was pronounced dead. ME said because he ws being treated for hypertension and the call , declared cause of death was hypertension and heart attack, no autopsy needed. It was not Corona 19 related.
During the day, April 10. I kept getting calls from a number I did not recognize, and the called did not leave a message. I get so many spam calls that I just ignore calls like this. After about 7 or 8 calls, I picked up the phone intending to tell the caller to stop calling, The caller identified himself and told me he was with a funeral home. Then he asked if it was the residence my wife, calling her by name. After more questions and answers, he told me my brother in law had died early that AM
I put Pam on the phone and she was in shock, She recalled the conversation the day before and he mentioned no health problems other than his bad back which he has been struggling with for a couple years and was in the process of getting ready to have it operated on. I’m surprised that the Dr’s who were doing the exams for pre surgery did not find anything. Anyway, my wife told the funeral director that her brother wanted to be cremated, which was eventually done. I received numerous documents from the funeral home and finally a call from the police detective who was on the scene and had the key to the house.
I put my son who lives an hour away in touch with the detective and he retrieved the key and went to the houses. Upon entering he said it was filled with a LOT of dust. He said there was a path thru the dust from the den where Kim (B-in-L) was sleeping on foam pads covered with towels, to the kitchen, even though there was a king-sized bed in the master bedroom. The Master bed and bath were not being used. Apparently after his father died 5 years ago, Kim “shut down.”
Corey (my son) said there were piles upon piles, upon piles of paper, unopened mail and just plain junk mail stacked in Kim’s office. Corey hired a cleaning crew to come in and clean before we even drove over from New Port Richey to Vero. When we arrived there was still piles upon piles of bills, unopened mail, and a lot of papers to sort thru. We have been here for 5 days now and are about ½ way thru just the papers. We got here on Monday, gathered enough information to meet with an attorney who was familiar with Kim as she had prepared his father’s will. Kim did not have a will, not that I think it would have mattered, as Pam is the sole surviving individual in the family.
So we are back sorting thru paper, bills bank accounts, trying to identify outstanding bills and any assets. During this process, we have come across 5 or 6 different life insurance policies that were Her fathers, that we do not think Kim included his father’s estate and may still be active, so the attorney may have to reopen fathers probate case to determine if these assets exist.
Kim had the house and three vehicles, all paid for.
The attorney and her “contacts” have been a godsend. One mam she sent us to purchased all three vehicles and is letting Pam use one of them until she doesn’t need it anymore when we finally go home and come back with 2 vehicles, but Pam is not wanting to drive across the state by herself. We also contacted the real estate broker who the attorney recommended and he came by and told us what we needed to do to fix the house up for sale (minor items like re-mulching gardens around house, pressure washing back porch)
So far we have loaded 10, heavy construction bags filled with paper’s and junk. I’ve ordered a 15-yard dumpster to be delivered next Monday or Tuesday.
Then today (Friday) another miracle happened. An Estate Clearance person who was recommended by the attorney showed up. She told us to continue to clean up the paper’s and then take any personal objects we wanted, but to leave the house and contents as is. Don’t discard anything, even what we consider junk, because “they will buy it” Shen will bring her crew in to organize an estate sale, itemize everything, advertise the sale and then sell everything and clean up after the sale. That means we don’t have to go thru the house and throw away all the knickknacks , electronics ( Kim was an electronics – computer geek and there are closets and several filing cabinets filled with this junk) etc. I mean there are boxes and boxes of movie CD’s and even VHS tapes.
And don’t even get me started on the lack of information available form people working from home for the companies I’ve contacted or tried to contact due to the virus. Talk about frustrating.
5 Years ago my Father in Law died, leaving my unmarried Brother in Law living in the house in Vero Beach by himself. On April 9th my wife, his sister, called him and had a 2 hour very pleasant and happy conversation, lots of laughs and pleasant memories. They were known to have LONG conversations. At 3:00 AM April 10, he called 911 complaining that he could not breath. He was told by the 911 operator to unlock the front door, and he dropped the phone and never came back on. Police & fire rescue arrived within 5 minutes, transported him to the ER (3 minutes away) where he was pronounced dead. ME said because he ws being treated for hypertension and the call , declared cause of death was hypertension and heart attack, no autopsy needed. It was not Corona 19 related.
During the day, April 10. I kept getting calls from a number I did not recognize, and the called did not leave a message. I get so many spam calls that I just ignore calls like this. After about 7 or 8 calls, I picked up the phone intending to tell the caller to stop calling, The caller identified himself and told me he was with a funeral home. Then he asked if it was the residence my wife, calling her by name. After more questions and answers, he told me my brother in law had died early that AM
I put Pam on the phone and she was in shock, She recalled the conversation the day before and he mentioned no health problems other than his bad back which he has been struggling with for a couple years and was in the process of getting ready to have it operated on. I’m surprised that the Dr’s who were doing the exams for pre surgery did not find anything. Anyway, my wife told the funeral director that her brother wanted to be cremated, which was eventually done. I received numerous documents from the funeral home and finally a call from the police detective who was on the scene and had the key to the house.
I put my son who lives an hour away in touch with the detective and he retrieved the key and went to the houses. Upon entering he said it was filled with a LOT of dust. He said there was a path thru the dust from the den where Kim (B-in-L) was sleeping on foam pads covered with towels, to the kitchen, even though there was a king-sized bed in the master bedroom. The Master bed and bath were not being used. Apparently after his father died 5 years ago, Kim “shut down.”
Corey (my son) said there were piles upon piles, upon piles of paper, unopened mail and just plain junk mail stacked in Kim’s office. Corey hired a cleaning crew to come in and clean before we even drove over from New Port Richey to Vero. When we arrived there was still piles upon piles of bills, unopened mail, and a lot of papers to sort thru. We have been here for 5 days now and are about ½ way thru just the papers. We got here on Monday, gathered enough information to meet with an attorney who was familiar with Kim as she had prepared his father’s will. Kim did not have a will, not that I think it would have mattered, as Pam is the sole surviving individual in the family.
So we are back sorting thru paper, bills bank accounts, trying to identify outstanding bills and any assets. During this process, we have come across 5 or 6 different life insurance policies that were Her fathers, that we do not think Kim included his father’s estate and may still be active, so the attorney may have to reopen fathers probate case to determine if these assets exist.
Kim had the house and three vehicles, all paid for.
The attorney and her “contacts” have been a godsend. One mam she sent us to purchased all three vehicles and is letting Pam use one of them until she doesn’t need it anymore when we finally go home and come back with 2 vehicles, but Pam is not wanting to drive across the state by herself. We also contacted the real estate broker who the attorney recommended and he came by and told us what we needed to do to fix the house up for sale (minor items like re-mulching gardens around house, pressure washing back porch)
So far we have loaded 10, heavy construction bags filled with paper’s and junk. I’ve ordered a 15-yard dumpster to be delivered next Monday or Tuesday.
Then today (Friday) another miracle happened. An Estate Clearance person who was recommended by the attorney showed up. She told us to continue to clean up the paper’s and then take any personal objects we wanted, but to leave the house and contents as is. Don’t discard anything, even what we consider junk, because “they will buy it” Shen will bring her crew in to organize an estate sale, itemize everything, advertise the sale and then sell everything and clean up after the sale. That means we don’t have to go thru the house and throw away all the knickknacks , electronics ( Kim was an electronics – computer geek and there are closets and several filing cabinets filled with this junk) etc. I mean there are boxes and boxes of movie CD’s and even VHS tapes.
And don’t even get me started on the lack of information available form people working from home for the companies I’ve contacted or tried to contact due to the virus. Talk about frustrating.
I was wondering who would do such and such. Would anyone be able to figure out this, that and the other. In other words, I think I should organize my mess so it's not so bad on whoever has to resolve everything.