Q: I am a missionary in the Philippines. My father died in 2011 and my brother took care of everything. I was not told if
Your first box only has one line-...there was a will or not. Then my brother died in 2016. I just found out through New York State that my father is owed money from a bank acct. The man could not tell me how much but did say it was more that $1,000.
It seems I need uthorization from the probate court to collect the money. Of course if it is too expensive to recover it would not be worth it.
Any ideas?
A: Do you know if your brother brought an estate proceeding for your father? If not, you would need to petition the court for the power to discover and secure assets including the bank account. If you do it yourself it would only cost a few hundred dollars. If you hire an attorney it could cost about $1,000 to $1,500.
A: You can get voluntary letters for $1 to collect unclaimed funds if the will was not filed and there is no estate. Plus our legal fee of $1000. We can then apply to collect it. This is always an issue with unclaimed funds. You never know what there is. If there was an estate, and you need successor letters due to your brother's death, then the fee will be more. If your brother had an estate then his fiduciary can collect it by filing certain papers.
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