Family is complicated. Family Trees are really complicated. At The Probate Pro, many of the Family Trees that we create look more like forests. Try drawing this Family Tree– John dies leaving a brother, half-sister, and a nephew from a pre-deceased step-sister. Not so easy…
Much of the Family Tree terminology is confusing. If Jane marries your mother’s uncle Ralph, what should you call her? If your father’s cousin’s son just had a baby boy, how should you two be introduced? Why are some cousins once-removed?
In the hilarious Mel Brooks movie, Spaceballs, a funny exchange occurs between Dark Helmet and Lone Starr:
Dark Helmet: Before you die there is something you should know about us, Lone Star.
Lone Starr: What?
Dark Helmet: I am your father’s brother’s nephew’s cousin’s former roommate.
Lone Starr: What’s that make us?
Dark Helmet: Absolutely nothing!
To help clarify how everyone in your complicated family is related, The Probate Pro provides this handy Family Tree chart.
With every new file, The Probate Pro creates a Family Tree to assist in understanding the decedent’s unique family. When there is no Last Will and Testament, Michigan’s intestacy law governs. The statute dictates which family members receive an inheritance based on the relationship level to the person that died. As you would expect, this statute could make your head spin.
MCL 700.2103 states:
Any part of the intestate estate that does not pass to the decedent’s surviving spouse under section 2102, or the entire intestate estate if there is no surviving spouse, passes in the following order to the following individuals who survive the decedent:
(a) The decedent’s descendants by representation.
(b) If there is no surviving descendant, the decedent’s parents equally if both survive or to the surviving parent.
(c) If there is no surviving descendant or parent, the descendants of the decedent’s parents or of either of them by representation.
(d) If there is no surviving descendant, parent, or descendant of a parent, but the decedent is survived by 1 or more grandparents or descendants of grandparents, 1/2 of the estate passes to the decedent’s paternal grandparents equally if both survive, or to the surviving paternal grandparent, or to the descendants of the decedent’s paternal grandparents or either of them if both are deceased, the descendants taking by representation; and the other 1/2 passes to the decedent’s maternal relatives in the same manner. If there is no surviving grandparent or descendant of a grandparent on either the paternal or the maternal side, the entire estate passes to the decedent’s relatives on the other side in the same manner as the 1/2.
Got it?
Probably not.
But, we do.