Q: My step dad died last year. He left no will and no beneficiary.

A: What is missing here is information as to whether your mother was alive and married to your step father at the time of his death. If she was, she would have been his intestate beneficiary along with your step-siblings, under Oregon's intestate law. You wouldn't have been included because your mother is the only one who takes a share for your side of the family.

Now if your mother had already died, technically the marriage ended at her death and you and your side of the family no longer qualify as step children. So under Oregon's intestate law there would be no rights as former step children who are no longer step children.

But there are other ways to transfer property upon death. If your step father listed people by name as beneficiaries on his life insurance policy, then they get a share of the insurance because they were named as beneficiaries regardless of their family relationship. Similarly one can name any person as a beneficiary on a retirement account. One can also list people on the title to a house so they inherit when the original owner dies. These are all ways to transfer property other then by a Will.

It is also possible that the biological children were the heirs but they then choose to gift property to some of the former step children. So it wasn't transferred due to your step father's death, but rather was done by a gift.

The only way to figure this out if that is what you want to do is to make an appointment with a lawyer and discuss the situation in detail and the lawyer can look up the Oregon law and compare the facts as you know them to the law and then tell you what happened and if it was legally correct.

The reality may be that your step father, although well intentioned, didn't understand how important it would be to have a Will and by not executing a Will, left his property to pass in ways other then what he truly wanted. This, unfortunately, happens a lot.