Legal Question in Wills and Trusts in Pennsylvania

Re: contesting distribution from trust in a will

First, I'm not sure from your question in which State your mother died. I am assuming it is Virginia, so that Virginia law applies, but if it is not, then you need advice from a PA lawyer. Second, you raise a lot of good questions, although I think you base the questions on some misunderstandings of the will (or we don't have the information we need here). In other words, you raise good questions but, I think, for the wrong reasons from the will. For example, "per stirpes" should NOT necessarily means what you suggest. There could be some other part of the will that affects your spouse and stepchildren, but "per stirpes" by itself would have no effect on this one way or the other. In terms of the validity of the will saying that you should get $10,000 per year, if that is clearly what the will says, it would be very hard to overturn that. I think you would be better off exploring "factoring" or advances on the annual payments. I know of a company for doing that if you want to contact me. That is, a financial company would "buy" your right to receive future payments, assuming they are satisfied that the trust is good for the money. You would get the cash now. Since they won't know how long you will live, they would probably do it for only a few years into the future.

Re: contesting distribution from trust in a will

You can contest the validity of a Will, or any trust created by the Will, if there was undue influence used by this trust officer. Although you could file the papers yourself, I would not recommend it. Due to the complexities of a Will contest, an attorney should be used to fight this issue in Court. Please contact me at the address or numbers listed below if we can be of any further assistance.