Legal Question in Wills and Trusts in New Jersey
hi,
This question is how to be able to represent my mother's estate or interests? in debt lawsuits. This is in New Jersey. My mother passed in april 2010 with no will.
Her house was in a revocable trust. I became successor trustee (my brother resigned) and distributed the house/property to 3 of my 5 siblings who were the beneficiaries via quitclaim deed in june 2010. I dont know if this is a fraudulent transfer.
My mother has 2 default money judgments dated 11-2009 for 10K and 3-2010 for 15K and a pending debt lawsuit filed 3-2010 for 40K. I am going to try and vacate the default judgments and
defend the pending lawsuit- I will have to do pro se and I have never done before.
I called the courthouse, and the pending lawsuit is either going to be amended or refiled because I notified the court and the plainfiff's attorney in may 2010, via certified rr letter, that my mother had passed. I also notified them that her estate had no assets and at this time there was no
administrator of the estate.
I went to the surrogate's office of monmouth county, NJ. Discussed situation with info given above. No will, no assets, no probatable estate apparently. They had situation for becoming administrator when no spouse, just kin, and estate less than 10K but they said I could not do this for what I
wanted to do ???? They thought they could come up with special "form" to do something along the lines of narrowly defined administrator for special purposes of litigation as defendant in lawsuit against my mother, now her estate. After a week they decided they could not legally do anything for me- they scoured the nj statutes under title 3b.
They said I should call the superior court and ask them what to do and suggested I ask them how to become an "administrator ad litem" and get a "verified complaint"- i looked these things up and I am confused and dont know why this is so complicated.
Before calling the court, I was hoping someone here could ease the confusion and point me in the right direction. I looked on the internet and I could not figure out for the life of me how/if/why I could become "administrator ad litem" in NJ ---- guardian ad litem is done in surrogate "court" but this
"administrator ad litem"- i am totaly lost.
I would appreciate any,any tidbit of advice.
thanks a lot,
mike
3 Answers from Attorneys
I don't entirely understand your question.
If there is no will why not just qualify as Administrator for the estate. Its done every day for estates both large and small. Also, it seems very strange to me that there would be no will... if your mother created a living trust she would normally have a simple 'pour-over' will too.
As to the creditor issues, I would need to review the trust and have more factual information to provide an answer, but if your mother had a typical living trust which she created for herself with her own assets, those assets are part of her taxable estate, and are subject to the claims of her creditors. Therefore, the house transfer you made via quitclaim deed seems very suspect [especially if you knew about the judgments].
You are too far away for me to assist you, sorry. You really need a good lawyer to assist you, this is a complex mess, and your mother's house is on the line. Go get a lawyer to help.
Based on your scenerio, my question to you is why bother? If the judgments were entered after the property was transferred to the trust and the estate has no other assets, there is no reason to defend the lawsuits. Any judgment would be on paper only with no assets to go after.
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