Cathey Family Farm LLC (a.k.a. Plan B)

(Last changed 5/1/2019. Obsolete as of 2022, see Plan C)

Notes on issues related to setting up an LLC so that the Farm can be preserved, for a time at least, as a single parcel. (This is Plan B, Plan A was spelled out in the Will and remains an option if Plan B should prove unworkable.)

Timeframe

We're thinking 10–15 years. When we're all retired but while we're all still young enough to get some enjoyment from the inheritance. None of the grandchildren have any aptitude for or interest in being a farmer, so preserving the Farm as a family farm beyond this time is not a consideration.

Goals

The preservation of the Farm as a single parcel, for eventual sale for more than could be gotten for 5 20-acre parcels.
- Ideally the Farm would remain intact in some form at that time, rather than serving as the site for Turkey Hill Tract Homes.
- One assumes that if five (or more) parcels were more attractive at that time, we'd still be able to implement Plan A, in some form.
  - Or even, develop it ourselves. Grotesque, but if its fate is to be chopped into hash anyway, why should other people get the big profits?
Minimize the difficulties in keeping our Ag designation with the County.

Plan

Incorporate, and continue to run the Farm pretty much as before for the duration. But without cattle, which are high-maintenance and low-profit. Steve to be the on-site farm manager, cultivating a boutique hay clientele.

That's the easy part, it's in the details where things get messy...

Shares in LLC

Thirds-ies
- Preferable.
- Might not be viable if the house cannot be separated from the Farm.
  - Can we pretend the house is separable, even if it is not currently so? It might be separable at the end, when it would actually matter.
Market value at time of incorporation.
- Steve has greater than 50% ownership in Farm.
  - Can't be outvoted.
  - Would get 50%+ of eventual profits, even if land values rocketed up and house value went down due to fire or neglect.
- The house is then a Farm asset. Improvements and maintenance would then be subject to voting, etc. Also see Rabid Pigeon Peck below.

Rabid Pigeon Peck

If the Farm were successfully sued, in excess of insurance coverage, all its assets could be subject to a forced sale. Because of the LLC, no personal assets of its owners could be attached. However, if the house is part of the Farm, then Steve would end up homeless.

Ideally the house is not part of the Farm, but current zoning regulations prohibit the usual house-and-an-acre exclusion, which would ensure that he had a place to live in the worst case. If we're forced to exclude from the Farm the entire 20 acres the house is on, then Steve's share of the remainder is below that of the other brothers', and his parcel then becomes vulnerable to County bullshit regarding Ag-use thresholds.

Spouses

Per Dad's (and Grandma's) wishes, spouses are not owners/voters. Thus divorce, for example, is a non-issue.

Must avoid Community Property pollution, care will need to be taken if funds must ever be put into the Farm for any reason. Does spousal sign-off at incorporation time prevent this?

Pets

By this I mean Steve's cattle. They both consume hay, and prevent part of the land from being hayed due to pasturage requirements. They also require working fences. From the Farm's perspective they are a liability. Their costs should not be borne by the Farm, and in fact should come out of Steve's pocket.

If they are part of the Farm, necessary (perhaps) to keep the wooded portion in Ag use, then they should be formally part of Farm assets, to be managed (and shared) like anything else.

Death/Inheritance

If a Party dies...

Withdrawal

If one party wishes to withdraw early, due to retirement or financial need, the other party(-ies) can...

Jackpot

At any time a sufficiently-attractive offer for the entire enchilada is on the table, the owners sell and split the proceeds equally. Walk away, and never look back. Steve moves, takes his crap with him. (Or not, his option. But he moves, regardless, unless he can come to terms with the new owner.)

Exit

Possibilities at that time:

Single-parcel sale, of everything. 100-acre estate.
- Staging by cousin Scott or equivalent?
- Toy vinyard and horse paddock? Etc.
Single-parcel sale of everything, to developer.
- Existing infrastructure a liability, not asset.
Steve keeps house. 80–99 acres of land sold depending on zoning, etc.
- Single-parcel sale of land. Probably to developer rather than farmer.
- Divide into minimum-sized parcels, sell individually.
Develop it ourselves. Steve keeps house, or not. Profits from land shared equally.
- Painful, slow.
- Profitable? Or Pitfall?

Jim's Perfect Plan

Basically business as usual, with a payout for everybody at the end. Can this be done?

House and 1 acre excluded in some legal way, leaving 99 acres of Farm.
99 acres of asset split 3 ways, sons have equal ownership in Farm.
Some portion of Dad's funding retained to seed the Farm bank account. Taxes and upkeep paid for out of this account. This account divided evenly at Exit.
Hay (or other non-livestock) crop(s) pay taxes, upkeep. Keeps County Ag designation.
Steve 'hired' as Farm manager out of Farm profits.
Steve's farm equipment is maintained at Farm expense (for parts), but its capital value not part of the Farm. (Steve's labor not considered.)
Farm profits in excess of this, if any (highly unlikely) deposited in Farm bank account.
Early exit scenarios all considered and resolved. Legalese, etc.
At any time an offer of $9 million or more is on the table, we sell and split the proceeds 3 ways. Walk away, and never look back.
At Exit, if Steve's house is part of the sale, he gets the house's then-current value off the top of the profits. If not, he keeps the house and whatever part of the land must go with it at that time, and a proportionately lesser share of the profits since part of his 33-acre share is being withdrawn from the Farm.
Keep in mind that a 100-acre estate might be far more attractive than a 99-acre parcel with somebody else's house squatting in the middle of it. The house might need to be part of the sale in order to get the sale to happen at all, even if they don't actually want the house. (They could even be planning to raze the house for their helipad or Pony Pavilion, in which case the house's value wouldn't actually factor in to the sale at all, from their point of view. Would Steve then even be entitled to an off-the-top portion? [Yes, he's giving up something of value in exchange, regardless of what they'd do with it.])

Steve's Perfect Plan

Gene's Perfect Plan

Plan C (Plan A, Revisited)

(Last changed 7/23/2022.)

It has become clear that nobody involved has the aptitude or interest in Plan B (above). Steve has expressed, on multiple occasions, his intention of living the rest of his life in the house he has inherited, farming what he can. The Jackpot/Exit scenario in Plan B becomes impossible.

OK, back to Plan A. Sort of. Dad's Will called for the farm (Clark county) to be split into five equal-sized parcels: one each to his three sons, one held in common containing the well and barn, and another one held in common to be sold if taxes need to be paid. No accounting was to be made for any relative value difference among the parcels, and especially no accounting for the timber was to be made. This plan was conceived with the mindset that part of the farm would have to be sold to pay taxes, but that is currently not the case. (State law at the time of Dad's passing exempts estates of $2.1M or less from death duties, and the federal threshold is higher. The appraised value of the Estate was less than this. So, no punitive tax load.) Also, this plan comes with the huge headache that would be managing the commonly-held assets on an ongoing basis, a potential minefield of conflict and dissention that lasts 'forever'.

The three beneficiaries have agreed that a clean three-way split is more to their liking, as there is no real necessity for five parcels other than that it provides the (current) maximum number of subdivisions. Neither Jim nor Gene need access to the barn; Gene does not need access to the well; Steve, sooner or later, will need his own well anyway. Moreover, we have all agreed to the rough plan that Gene penciled out, where each son gets his original parcel plus 1/3 of the 2/5 common portion. So long as there is no opposition among the beneficiaries, we can do this instead. (Otherwise I execute the will exactly as written. [Plan A.])

Jim gets some additional timbered land, and the well. (And, presumably, its water right.)
Steve gets some additional cleared land, and the barn. (He already inherited all its contents, and the house.)
Gene gets some additional cleared land, and some additional timbered land.

Gene's plan basically carves the house and 1 acre off of the 100-acre parcel, and divides the remaining 99 acres three ways. (This is more of a conceptual thing than a necessity, especially now that Plan B is off the table. Three equal-sized pieces also works.) Notable features of the three proposed parcels:

Jim

Jim's parcel (A) to the West is the most varied, and has excellent access to the road bounding the entire North side of the original 100-acre parcel, substantial cleared land, the well, and some timber. It contains the Lyons homestead house site.

Steve

Steve's parcel (B) to the East has the house and barn, substantial cleared land, and all developed assets such as the orchard, vineyard, greenhouse, garden, driveway, power. It is possibly 1 acre larger than the other two parcels, and has excellent road access. It has negligible timber.

Gene

Gene's parcel (C) to the South has a building site with a spectacular view, and considerable assets in timber. It has some cleared land. It does not have good road access, except as mentioned below.

Ignoring road-access issues for Gene, the equal-thirds parcel layout would be:

       North	   
+=====+===========+
|     |           |
|     |           |
|     |     B     |
|     |           |
|     |           |
|  A  +-----------+
|     |           |
|     |           |
|     |     C     |
|     |           |
|     |           |
+-----+-----------+

Because Gene does not trust Steve's likely beneficiaries, he does not want a mere easement to the road. Because Steve does not want additional traffic on his driveway (which is extremely close to the house), especially if Gene should sell his parcel, he also does not want the most natural easement: access to the existing driveway, which already makes it almost all of the way to Gene's parcel. In response, the plan has Gene's parcel include a strip of land out to the road, located between Jim's and Steve's parcels and away from the house, making his the only parcel that is not strictly rectangular. (The other easement possibility, down the East side of Steve's parcel, is not practical due to the topography.) The boundaries between Steve's and Gene's parcels are adjusted accordingly to accommodate this strip; there is no effect on Jim's parcel. Steve's parcel remains rectangular but gets a little narrower in the East-West dimension, and a little deeper in the North-South dimension. Gene's parcel ends up resembling the little flag stuck into a club sandwich: largely rectangular but with a little stick poking out one side to the road. Gene is willing to 'buy' part of Steve's parcel for the road access, in exchange for less of the residual estate funds, if that should be more desirable to Steve.

The rough appearance of the three parcels is, then:

       North                      North
+=====+=+=========+        +=====+=+=========+
|     | |         |        |     | |         |
|     | |         |        |     | |         |
|     | |    B    |        |     | |    B    |
|     | |         |        |     | |  (+ $$) |
|     | |         |        |     | |         |
|  A  | |         |   OR   |  A  | +---------+
|     | +---------+        |     |           |
|     |           |        |     |           |
|     |           |        |     |     C     |
|     |     C     |        |     |   (- $$)  |
|     |           |        |     |           |
+-----+-----------+        +-----+-----------+

(The nasty ASCII sketches are not to scale, and are meant only to illustrate the rough shapes and orientations of the parcels.)

Other issues:

Family lore has it that Dad might not actually have been the owner of the property, but merely its trustee. (Grandma was a bit nutty and had some rather strong ideas about protecting her grandsons' legacy from Predatory Females. Mom, in other words, and the irony is not lost on us given how things turned out.) This needs to be checked out. It was talked about, but I've never seen any paperwork to support this.
The parcels must continue to reside in land-use, else we likely cannot afford to keep them.
Steve needs continued access to the well, at least for awhile. He (or his successor) is expected to drill his own well at some point.
Easement through Gene's strip, so that Steve can continue to farm Jim's parcel in the event that Gene sells his parcel.
Original property's boundary is North of the road. The road itself is on an easement entirely on our property, it was not shared equally with the parcel to the North, unlike the usual practice.

The intent is that the farm continue operation as before, as much as is possible, until such time as somebody changes his mind, sells, or dies. Beyond, even.

What I want out of the lawyer:

Subdivision of the 100 acres, or at least advice on doing this. We want a physical survey, with stakes in the ground, etc. My intent is to drive T-posts in at the corners and strategically across the straights, to make the parcel boundaries clear to all concerned parties.
Instructions and advice on preserving land use classification of the resulting parcels.
Water right preservation on Parcel A. Anything required to keep it active?
Easement across Parcel C's strip, for farming purposes.
Conveyance of the three parcels.
Conveyance of Dad's two additional properties (cabin [Pacific county], swamp [Lewis county]), to Jim and Gene as specified in the Will.
Lease of use of Parcel A's well to Steve. $1/year plus other valuable consideration: Steve to maintain well (including well house, pump, pipes, power supply, etc.) so long as he's using it, no obligation thereafter. No liability to Jim beyond returning the $1 if the well should fail or otherwise be found unsuitable. Jim, or his successors, is under no obligation to provide well access to Steve, or any of Steve's successors. Steve under no obligation to provide power to the well if he is not using it.
Lease of use of Parcel A to Steve, for farming. $1/year plus other valuable consideration: Steve to pay taxes out of farming proceeds, and keeping it in land-use classification.
Lease of use of Parcel C to Steve, for farming. Ditto.
Whatever can be done to minimize liability for the owners of Parcels A and C due to farming activity. Is leasing sufficient? Do we need an LLC? More than one?

Letter to Prospective Lawyer

I am the executor of my late father's (George Cathey) estate. He had three beneficiaries, his sons: Jim (myself), Steve, and Gene. George passed in 2018, and this has been dragging out long enough. (COVID certainly did not help hurry this along.) We were reluctant to divide up the 100-acre farm in Clark county, partly because we did not then really know what we wanted to do with it, and partly because it is such an irrevocable step. I live in Spokane, the other two brothers are residents in Clark county.

I already have the death certificates and the Letters Testamentary, this was pushed through by my father's own attorney, as her last act on his behalf. There are no conflicts among the beneficiaries, we are all in agreement with what is to come.

We have determined that we shall divide the farm into three parcels, A, B, and C, one each for the sons named above. Steve will continue to farm all parcels for the forseeable future, as he has been since even before Dad's passing; the house and barn are on Parcel B. This keeps the land in the land-use classification, meaning we can afford to keep it. The intent is that the farm continue operation as before, as much as is possible, until such time as somebody changes his mind, sells, or dies. Beyond, even.

What I need is help taking care of the real estate. Mostly rural. I can do everything else that is not already done. (The bank accounts and other investments I have left 'til last, once all other expenses and accommodations have been taken care of, so that any final rebalancing can occur.)

What I want out of the lawyer:

Family lore has it that Dad might not actually have been the owner of the property, but merely its trustee. (Grandma was a bit nutty and had some rather strong ideas about protecting her grandsons' legacy from Predatory Females. Mom, in other words.) This needs to be checked out. It was talked about, but I've never seen any paperwork to support this.
Subdivision of the 100 acres into thirds, or at least advice on doing this. We want a physical survey, with stakes in the ground, etc. My intent is to drive T-posts in at the corners and strategically across the straights, to make the parcel boundaries clear to all concerned parties.
Instructions and advice on preserving land use classification of the resulting parcels.
Water right preservation on Parcel A. Anything required to keep it active?
Easement across Parcel C, for farming purposes.
Conveyance of the three parcels.
Conveyance of Dad's two additional properties (cabin [Pacific county], swamp [Lewis county]), to Jim and Gene as specified in the Will.
Lease of use of Parcel A's well to Steve. $1/year plus other valuable consideration: Steve to maintain well (including well house, pump, pipes, power supply, etc.) so long as he's using it, no obligation thereafter. No liability to Jim beyond returning the $1 if the well should fail or otherwise be found unsuitable.
Lease of use of Parcel A to Steve, for farming. $1/year plus other valuable consideration: Steve to pay taxes out of farming proceeds, and keeping it in land-use classification.
Lease of use of Parcel C to Steve, for farming. Ditto.
Whatever can be done to minimize liability for the owners of Parcels A and C due to farming activity. Is leasing sufficient? Do we need an LLC? More than one?

Further details can be provided if this looks like something you might be interested in.

I sent the above to: https://lawyers.justia.com/lawyer/earl-william-jackson-jr-815895 and https://lawyers.justia.com/lawyer/bonnie-marino-blair-830044 on Wednesday, July 20, 2022.

Surveyors, 2023

Barbieri & Associates Inc
Located in: Collins Plaza LLC, Land surveyor in Hazel Dell
Address: 7017 NE Hwy 99 # 204, Vancouver, WA 98665
Phone: (360) 695-1001
Contacted Tuesday, May 23, 2023, left message.
AKS Engineering & Forestry
Located in: Pac1 Center, Civil engineer in Orchards
Address: 9600 NE 126th Ave #2520, Vancouver, WA 98682
Phone: (360) 882-0419
Contacted Tuesday, May 23, 2023. John Meier, in office. (Field surveyor Jim Hannon.) $5-8k? They expect it to be simple, as it's above parcel minimum.

Property address: 1501 NW 379th St. La Center. 100 acres, all that remains of the original 160-acre Lyons homestead.

We have come up with a division plan that satisfies both the Will and the three beneficiaries. Notable features of the three proposed equal-area parcels, listed in beneficiary birth order:

Jim

Jim's parcel (A) to the West is the most varied, and has excellent access to the road bounding the entire North side of the original 100-acre parcel, substantial cleared land, the well and its water right, and some timber. It contains the Lyons homestead house site.

Steve

Steve's parcel (B) to the East has the house and barn, substantial cleared land, and all developed assets such as the orchard, vineyard, greenhouse, garden, driveway, power. It also has excellent road access. It has negligible timber.

Gene

Gene's parcel (C) to the South has a building site with a spectacular view, and considerable assets in timber. It has some cleared land. It does not have good road access, except as mentioned below.

(The nasty ASCII sketches are not to scale, and are meant only to illustrate the rough shapes and orientations of the parcels.)

Ignoring road-access issues for Gene, the equal-thirds parcel layout would be:

       North	   
+=====+===========+
|     |           |
|     |           |
|     |     B     |
|     |           |
|     |           |
|  A  +-----------+
|     |           |
|     |           |
|     |     C     |
|     |           |
|     |           |
+-----+-----------+

Because Gene does not trust Steve's likely beneficiaries, he does not want a mere easement to the road. Because Steve does not want additional traffic on his driveway (which is extremely close to the house), especially if Gene should sell his parcel, he also does not want the most natural easement: access to the existing driveway, which already makes it almost all of the way to Gene's parcel. In response, the plan has Gene's parcel include a strip of land out to the road, located between Jim's and Steve's parcels and away from the house, making his the only parcel that is not strictly rectangular. (The other easement possibility, down the East side of Steve's parcel, is not practical due to the topography.) The boundaries between Steve's and Gene's parcels are adjusted accordingly to accommodate this strip; there is no effect on Jim's parcel. Steve's parcel remains rectangular but gets a little narrower in the East-West dimension, and a little deeper in the North-South dimension. Gene's parcel ends up resembling a mailbox flag, with the stick going out to the road.

Due to the topography where the three parcels meet, some boundary modification in that area might be necessary in order to make a driveway to Gene's parcel practical.

The rough appearance of the three parcels is, then:

       North
+=====+=+=========+
|     | |         |
|     | |         |
|     | |    B    |
|     | |         |
|     | |         |
|  A  | |         |
|     | +---------+
|     |           |
|     |           |
|     |     C     |
|     |           |
+-----+-----------+

Other issues:

Family lore has it that Dad might not actually have been the owner of the property, but merely its trustee. This needs to be checked out. It was talked about, but I've never seen any paperwork to support this.
The parcels must continue to reside in land-use, else we likely cannot afford to keep them.
Steve needs continued access to the well, at least for awhile. He (or his successor) is expected to drill his own well at some point.
Easement through Gene's strip, so that Steve can continue to farm Jim's parcel in the event that Gene sells his parcel.
Original property's boundary is North of the road. The road itself is on an easement entirely on our property, it was not shared equally with the parcel to the North, unlike the usual practice.

The intent is that the farm continue operation as before, as much as is possible, until such time as somebody changes his mind, sells, or dies. Beyond, even.

Talked to Jim Hannon, Thursday, May 25, 2023 at 2PM. 1) field survey, corners and area. 2) Check barn/driveway for clearance 3) Check road centerline 4) Approximate layout 5) Make Exhibit map, take to Attorney. Declar. of exempt division 6) Set corner monuments, file county paperwork, etc. Need to figure out deed. Talk to title company? Attorney? Mark Erikson? Erikson and Associates, PLLC. (360) 696-1012 (Real-estate, see:) Landerholm: Randy Grove (360) 696-3312 (Grove's assistant is Lisa)

Friday, June 23, 2023

Hannon got back to me, with $18,000 estimate.

I accounted for 3 days to perform the initial fieldwork and another 2 days to set property corners. I'm hoping that your neighbors to the south would potentially let us set GPS points near your south line which we could use for our traverse along your south line which will be much more efficient than starting in your field to the north and making a traverse loop.

The title of the property is still in Grandparents' names. (Jim/Marian) So that'll need clearing up.

Wednesday, July 19, 2023

Tony @ Victory Capital funds (USAA mutual fund successor) says Dad had stuff there. (But not the RNQ-056243 Individual account I had called on.) Estate Transition team: (866) 984-4646 8AM-6PM CT, M-F.

Sent death certificate to victorycapitalinvest@vcm.com They say to call after 5-7 business days.

Called National Financial Services, LLC. (800) 801-9942 about RNQ-056243
Will need a snail-mail exchange of paperwork to arrange for transfer. They E-mailed instructions to follow.

Called Clark Co. clerk's office: (564) 397-2292 regarding a fresh copy of Letters Testementary. Clerk's office said they don't expire. (As I thought, also.)

Have to re-petition the court, essentially starting over. They suggested (564) 397-2268 law library, helpers? Time to call Janna again? I left a message on Janna's phone.

Tuesday, August 1, 2023

Letter from Victory Funds: RefID 11484575 (800) 235-8396, help with transition.

Wednesday, August 2, 2023

EIN Assigned: 93-6580200
Legal Name: GEORGE E CATHEY ESTATE

Monday, September 18, 2023

Called BofA's Estate Transition Team, (888) 689-4464, account #180918DP0001900, and Ashley said that the papers I'd uploaded last week (or was it the week before?) from the bank branch had only just today been submitted to Legal for determination. She said to give them 5-7 business days, and then to call again. (This to save a trip to the bank if things were still not OK. The account has to be opened at the bank, but until the home office says OK they will not do so.)

Monday, September 18, 2023

Amela Caluk of BofA's Estate Transition Team in Phoenix called, and asked me to send a photograph of the papers I had that had my name on them and not Barbara Harrington. (The white-outed ones.) OK, I can do that. I took a photograph with my iPhone and ran it through ImageMagick to clean it up, and reduce its size for e-mailing:

convert -type grayscale -threshold 25% /tmp/IMG_1626.jpg /tmp/lt.jpg

and sent it to her. Contact info:

Amela Caluk
VP, Operations Manager
Estate Servicing Operations
Bank of America
T 602.379.8815 M 480.826.6343
amela.caluk@bofa.com

Friday, September 22, 2023

Amela Caluk (of BofA's Estate dept.) called, and said she was willing to personally make the determination that it was OK to get dad's estate set up. She's contacting the local bank branch, and said I'd hear from her by EOD Monday, assuming John Zins at the local branch got back to her.

Good news, if it works out!

Wednesday, September 27, 2023

Amela (BofA Estate Servicing) called again, to clarify the situation. What she is able and willing to do, based on the paperwork she's seen and the current situation, is cut a check to an established estate account, closing out dad's regular BofA account. This is separate from the (current) problem of establishing an estate account at BofA, which is a different department entirely.

She believes the current problem is that there are two actual court documents that I got: The 'Letters Testamentary) (1 page) dated 2018, and a 'Certificate of Transcript and Recording' (1 page), two copies dated 2018, 2023. The 2023 Transcript, the only one new enough for them to use, refers to a 2020 Letter, which I don't have. The copy I personally picked up at the Clark County courthouse last month was two pages: the first a copy of the 2018 Letter, and the second a newly-created Transcript, dated 2023, referring to a 2020 Letter. Could this have been a mistake by the clerk?

I'm leaning towards the latter. I went there in person, and paid $5 for two pages that appear relatively unrelated? Gotta be a mistake.

Upon reflection I called the courthouse and talked to the clerk's office. The handwritten May 8, 2020 date on the second page is completely spurious, and looks like a mistake made by the deputy clerk I was dealing with, in person, at the time. No date associated with this case is any of May, or 8, or 2020. (Had I noticed/suspected it could have been cleared up right then and there. But... who knew?) It should have been October 19, 2018—the date of the original filing.

But it gets even worse. The court, on its own, decided in September that the estate is now closed, due to 'inactivity' (and getting a freshly-dated copy of the Letters clearly doesn't count as activity) so I cannot even get a reprint. Not without a new petition to the court re-opening the estate.

So, either the other bank will allow me to open an estate account based on their prior acceptance of my paperwork, or there will be a (probably lengthy, and expensive) delay.

Argh! Cluster fuckage to the max! I called Janna, and she's willing to do the necessaries. If I don't hear from her before the end of next week (Oct 6) I should call back.

Capsule summary, so far:

Bank (BofA) simply refuses to do business until all the paperwork is perfect.
Janna (actually her assistant) screwed up the original paperwork, and a "Barbara Harrington" was on it instead of my name, in one place. That caused bank to go into 'extra scrutiny' mode.
Bank refuses to consider any paper that's more than 1 year old, in spite of the fact that these things don't expire. So, two strikes.
I picked up a fresh copy in July, for the Bank. (Still has "Barbara" on it, of course.)
Bank, after much calling and such, has decided that it can overlook the Barbara name. Maybe. Because my name is also on there. But not the dates.
The deputy clerk screwed up, and put a bogus date on this fresh copy, thus ensuring that the picky Bank wouldn't like it anyway. Not noticed until now, of course.
In September the court, on its own in a fit of housecleaning frenzy, decided to close dad's estate as 'inactive'. (Getting a fresh copy clearly doesn't count as activity.) It is now no longer possible to get a fresh copy (minus errors) of the paperwork I need. You (lawyer) have to file a petition with the court to re-open the estate.
Janna has agreed to re-file, but it will take some time.