Oldtimr

My parents made my two brothers and I co-executors. It was our job to dissolve and disperse the estate. My mother was in a nursing home when she died so we had to reimburse the state for the medicaid they paid after her savings ran out. We sold everything in the house and garage we could sell at a big garage sale except for the nice furniture and some collectables that we put in a consignment shop to sell. What we could not sell or what we didn't want was thrown out. That was the hard part, throwing away your parents belongings. it just seemed wrong. We put the house up for sale and sold it pretty quickly. We did hire the lawyer that did my parents will, to the probate the will at the courthouse and to make sure any outstanding bills they may have had got paid, they didn't have any, my parents were sticklers about not having debt. You must advertise in the local papers asking for anyone that may be owed money to contact the lawyer, they have so many days to speak up or the meter runs out. Once that happens the executor divides what is left of the estate according to the will. in our case it was to be evenly dived between the 3 sons after we paid the lawyer. We didn't get much, we didn't expect to. I would advise having a lawyer to probate the will and take care of the paper work rather than stumble around trying to do it yourself. It is not fun, and I pity anyone who has to deal with an intestate estate because there was no will. We made my daughter our executor, you can use a lawyer but it will cost your heirs money, I think it is better to name someone you trust, after they agree to do it, and then they can use a lawyer for certain things and do dome themselves.