- Jurisdiction
- California
I have two brothers and my mother who are located in Sonoma County (Santa Rosa, CA) and I live in San Diego County. My older brother has power of attorney and is the Successor Trustee since my dad passed away and my mother is incapacitated due to Alzheimer's.
My mom was moved to a memory care facility in Santa Rosa, CA last year after my father passed away. My brother has not communicated with me about my mother's situation other than telling me she was moving to the facility (via text). Since he refused my offer of financial help I assumed he was selling off her assets to pay for her care.
However, I recently learned that my brother offered my oldest son my mother's 1998 minivan. My younger brother is now in possession of my Dad's truck and a few weeks ago they held a garage sale at my mom's house. My oldest son had stopped by to pick something up and discovered the garage sale. According to my son, they gave items away to friends and neighbors for free and were selling items for ridiculously low prices at the garage sale. My son also overheard them saying they were going to have Goodwill out to take what was left and then sell the house. Also, my brothers had already given away a number of things to their family prior to the garage sale. I believe with the cars and some collectibles they have probably given away a substantial amount of money in assets.
I am not certain how much money my mom had/has in the bank, but I think it wasn't any more than $100k and the house is worth around $650k and may have a reverse mortgage or loan attached to it.
I asked my brother for a copy of the power of attorney as well as a copy of any trust or will documents and he has refused to provide them, so I sent him a demand letter requesting a trust accounting as well as a copy of the trust document, giving him 60 days to respond.
As I suspect my brother will not respond to my demand letter I am researching my next steps, which appears to be to file a Petition to Compel Accounting with the courts. I have to believe this is a pretty standard request and something I should be able to file on my own. However, it doesn't look like there is a standard form, so I am hoping to find a template that I might be able to work off of.
Short of that, what should I expect as far as costs to hire a trust attorney to file the petition?
My mom was moved to a memory care facility in Santa Rosa, CA last year after my father passed away. My brother has not communicated with me about my mother's situation other than telling me she was moving to the facility (via text). Since he refused my offer of financial help I assumed he was selling off her assets to pay for her care.
However, I recently learned that my brother offered my oldest son my mother's 1998 minivan. My younger brother is now in possession of my Dad's truck and a few weeks ago they held a garage sale at my mom's house. My oldest son had stopped by to pick something up and discovered the garage sale. According to my son, they gave items away to friends and neighbors for free and were selling items for ridiculously low prices at the garage sale. My son also overheard them saying they were going to have Goodwill out to take what was left and then sell the house. Also, my brothers had already given away a number of things to their family prior to the garage sale. I believe with the cars and some collectibles they have probably given away a substantial amount of money in assets.
I am not certain how much money my mom had/has in the bank, but I think it wasn't any more than $100k and the house is worth around $650k and may have a reverse mortgage or loan attached to it.
I asked my brother for a copy of the power of attorney as well as a copy of any trust or will documents and he has refused to provide them, so I sent him a demand letter requesting a trust accounting as well as a copy of the trust document, giving him 60 days to respond.
As I suspect my brother will not respond to my demand letter I am researching my next steps, which appears to be to file a Petition to Compel Accounting with the courts. I have to believe this is a pretty standard request and something I should be able to file on my own. However, it doesn't look like there is a standard form, so I am hoping to find a template that I might be able to work off of.
Short of that, what should I expect as far as costs to hire a trust attorney to file the petition?
