sparkly wrote:spiderbee wrote:Dear Wazuans,
I need some help. I come from a family of 9 kids (4 boys & 5 girls) and I am the 8th born. My dad passed away when i was very small and was raised by my mom. Fast forward, she gave me a call recently and told me that she wants to leave me in charge of the family estate. we have 4 parcels of land in one of Kenya's upcoming towns. Two of these have rental houses while one has our family home which we grew up, one is idle. When I asked her the reason for her decision, she said she is really disapointed with my brothers who have not been helping her. A number of occassions she has been unwell and I have always rallied my sisters to contribute money for whatever needs she has. There has been a number of occassions (details i dont want to delve into), which my bros have been unresponsive to family matters but I am afraid that her decision may lead to a further drift in our family. Any advise and / any reference to a good family lawyer will be really appreciated.
@spiderbee you have been given a huge responsibility and you will need a lot of maturity to pull it off. From your writing I presume you are one of the sisters.
The alternatives available are as follows:
1. Inter vivos gifting - Your mom can devide the property while still alive.
2. Will- She can write a will on how the property will be devided after passing on.
3. intestate - you can just wait for her to pass then administer the estate after she is gone.
Some of the things to bear in mind-
1. The constitution gives equal rights of inheritance among children.
2.
The kenyan laws also recognizes African customary particularly the doctrine of some members of the family holding family lands in trust for present and future generations. Your priority would be to try and get your mother to share out the family properties fairly when still alive, respecting the constitution and customary laws.
This will need goodwill and co-operation among the siblings.
A word of caution, do not attempt to disinherit any of the siblings even those who have not been helping your mother because if you do so, you will never know peace.
Thank you all for the wonderful advise, after considering and much deliberation, I spoke to her and we agreed to call a family meeting just to try and iron out issues.
@Sparkly, the 2nd option you have given above seems like what she would desire. I am thinking of talking to her to put it in trust and choose atleast 3 of us to be in charge. Her main fear is that my bros may misuse these properties and even sell them out, She is quite advanced in age and has grandchildren and great grandchildren whom she wants to also benefit as she tells me she sees great potential in them. She had written a will, but now she says she has a change of mind on how to distribute the property.
She is very wise, I do consult her alot, right now as @Mainat puts it, she is emotional and I am hoping she will have calmed down when we will have this meeting.
I do appreciate this rich advice from all who've contributed
as I work out the best way forward on how to bring a win win for all.