I hope this is helpful. The short answer is YES, you will get an equal share with the rest of your siblings on most assets. Your mother will get half of the value of the house. If you have any money saved in your name you will get that as well.

My husband has substantial assets and is in poor health but refuses to make out a will. He has three grown children, and I have two, both of us from a previous marriage. If he should die, what are my legal rights as his second wife?

A. For starters, how much you will inherit depends on what type of assets your husband owns.

Certain assets pass to named beneficiaries. These types of assets are sometimes called "nonprobate property" and include life insurance, annuities, IRAs, pensions, joint accounts held with rights of survivorship, and payable on death accounts. If you are the person he has named as the beneficiary on any of these types of properties, then that money will be yours when he dies.

Even if you are not the beneficiary of your husband's nonprobate property, you still may be entitled to half by virtue of Texas' community property laws. For example, if a life insurance policy on your husband's life is payable to his three children, you may own a one-half interest in the proceeds because the premiums were paid with community property funds. After his death, you could claim your husband made a fraudulent gift of your community property half to the named beneficiaries.

If your husband dies without a will, all of his other assets, called "probate property," will pass according to state law as follows: his one-half interest in your community property will pass to his three children. This means if the two of you own a home together, you probably will end up co-owning the home with his three children. However, as the surviving spouse, you would have homestead rights in your residence. This means even if his one-half community property interest passes to his three children, you would still have the right to live there rent free for the rest of your life.

Any real estate he owned prior to your marriage or that he inherited or received as a gift during your marriage will generally pass to his three children, but you would be entitled to one-third of it. You also would inherit one-third of your husband's separate personal property -- such as cars, furniture, clothing and the like -- and the remaining two-thirds would pass to his three children equally, two-ninths to each.

If you and your husband do not own a residence, you will be entitled to $15,000 instead. You could also claim up to $30,000 worth of your husband's personal items, such as a car, clothing and furniture, or take $5,000 in lieu of specific personal items.

You might also be entitled to a family allowance in an amount necessary for your support and maintenance for one year. How much you could get depends on the extent of your own property, and you would be required to show the court that you do not have enough money to support yourself during the first year after his death.

As you can tell, if your husband dies without a will and without having planned his estate, he will be leaving a huge mess for his family. Figuring out who inherits what often takes teams of attorneys, and that translates into a huge -- and unnecessary -- expense. Your husband would be wise to consult an attorney to structure his estate plan and to minimize the hassles of probate.
Source(s):
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/lipman/755792.html

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