Need online tool to help with distributing parents' belongings
My mother and father have both passed away, and myself and my three brothers are beginning to figure out how we will distribute our parents' belongings. We live in three different states, spread around the country. I am wondering if people know about an online computer tool that will help us use photos to identify the possessions and then have a computer-based discussion about who would like each item. If you don't know about this, are people aware of support organizations that help adult children manage these aspects of parents' death, estate resolution, etc.? Thank you.
Dec 14, 2017
Parent Replies
AARP.org has some tools online around estate planning (although you'd have to adapt for this situation). In our family, there was lots of discussion of what to do with all "mom's stuff" but until my spouse and his sister organized their calendars to both be there (at their childhood home in a third city) at the same weekend with a game plan, nothing happened. I would suggest trying to schedule just you and your siblings (no spouses, strong teenage sons OK!) for 2-3 days, with the goal of inventorying everything. Leave it at that for now (not positing it as the "take what you want" weekend) and you may get more cooperation in a good spirit. Good luck, this is not a fun part of family life. (Hopefully I'm just projecting!!)
My Mom is low tech so we didn't get this to work. For my Gma's household items I suggested she make a Google doc (very easy for all to access & simutaneously update). My focus was more to help my Mom who lives in same town as my Grandmother. I thought my Mom could list some of the weird things at my Gma's house (old oxygen tank from Gpa, very hazardous insecticides, etc) and then my Uncle (very social & web savvy but lives out of town) could make calls and do research to help her find places to get rid of these items. He would then add details of his research and organization contact info in the Google doc.
Per other suggestion, getting together is very helpful. Some people have eye for what should go to Goodwill vs. Estate Sale and some do not. Also, we are finding it very interesting what's special to someone vs. others. My cousin wanted some gong that my Gma used to call people to dinner. My Gma never used that w/ us and I barely knew it existed.