Q: Can you get a gift back given to a person after they've died?
A family member has passed. A person took this family member out on his birthday weekend, bought him clothes and a couple of electronic devices. This person is now asking for those items to be returned, stating they belong to her. One of the items is a phone that she was paying for and there is a current balance on. The phone is on her bill, under her name. She confirmed there was no talk of paying her back for the items. She showed her bank statement and it's obvious she took him out for his birthday. Does she have any legal standing in terms of getting the items back?
A:
No, in this scenario the gift giver does not have legal standing to retrieve the gifts after the recipient has passed away.
The key considerations here are:
- The birthday gifts were voluntarily given to the recipient without expectation of payment or return, as acknowledged by the gift giver.
- Legal ownership and rights transfers to a gift's recipient once the gift is given. This applies even after the recipient dies.
- For the phone specifically, even if there is an outstanding balance, the phone's ownership would transfer to the estate of the deceased upon his death. His estate must resolve any remaining payments owed.
So once transferred, a gift belongs entirely to the recipient or their estate. The gift giver relinquishes claims or rights over gifted items.
Absent any written agreement stating the gifts were conditional or made temporarily, the gift giver lost legal standing to retrieve them when ownership fully transferred at time of gifting. The estate now has the right to distribute those gifts.
I hope this helps explain why legally the gift giver cannot retrieve the items based on the facts provided.
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