This column first appeared in the San Antonio Express News and other Hearst Newspapers on November 19, 2018. Making a Will allows you, as owner of the home, to dictate various terms that apply to any inheritance. Your current plan to have the house sold by your Executor has the dual advantages of simplicity and equality. When the house is sold, everyone is treated the same. Your concern, however, is that your daughter isn’t really being treated the same. None of the other chi

This column first appeared in the San Antonio Express News and other Hearst Newspapers on October 12, 2018. Dear Mr. Premack: My mother recently passed in the state of Texas. She did have a life insurance policy of $10k, and she did have a small amount of cash in a bank account. We have used the life insurance for burial. Will we be subject to MERP? How do we find out? – MG Dear Mr. Premack: Is a home mortgage, whether a regular mortgage or reverse mortgage, paid before a MER

This column first appeared in the San Antonio Express News and other Texas Hearst newspapers on August 3, 2018. Dear Mr. Premack: Our parents owned several valuable real estate holdings. They both had poorly written wills, but the wills do identify us as the heirs. When mother died in 2014 her will was not probated by our father. Now our father has died. What course of action are we, the children, allowed under Texas law? – ELC Whenever there are valuable assets, from owning