post-death - the house

it's been 5 months since my mum's passing and it looked like there'll be a closure to the issue of the house she left behind finally. but regretfully, things have gotten as messy as it possibly could. then again, it didn't come as a surprise.

it all started before my dad passed away in 2008. back then, i had told him to will it to my brother. i had anticipated problems with the issue of inheritance from the trend of how i see my brother manage my parent's assets. and to make it worst, my dad had this habit of being inconsistent in his communications and liked to take sides, depending on who's in his good books at that particular point in time. so in front of my brother, he would tell my brother that he would inherit the house when he passed on, and in front of me, he would tell me it belonged to me. i had known this habit of my dad and had advised him that he should just will it to my brother. as for the reasons why my sisters were not in the equation, it was simply because my dad's mindset was that of a typical traditional chinese man - daughters are married out and thus no longer are entitled to any inheritance. it was also fortunate that my sisters did not ask for it. my dad eventually left without a will and the house was inherited by my mum according to local laws.

when my mum was alive, i had asked my brother to help my mum make a will and that it should state that he should be the sole beneficiary of the house. i did not ask further after saying this and i only found out about the real existence of this will after my mum died. it all happened when my brother approached me about a month after her death and talked to me about taking over this house from him.  i told him i will check about the local laws about inheritance and get back to him. he wanted to pass the will to me but i did not take it. i reckoned it will be less of a liability for me if he were to keep the will himself. nonetheless, he passed the hub's letter (that stated the need for him to take over the house) to me and asked me to engage a lawyer to "sort it out and that he will simply sign the documents when needed" (despite him being the executor). that was what i did. i found out that the local laws state that the beneficiary would have to sell the house if he/ she owns a hdb flat. the beneficiary would only be able to inherit the flat if he/ she owns a private property and that he/ she would have to stay in the house. this is where all the trouble began.

my brother currently owns a hdb flat while i own a private property. and he didn't want to sell house as he felt it was of good location and could appreciate further in the years to come. and in the meantime, he wanted to use it to obtain passive income by renting it out. when i told him about the local laws, he said that i could be a ghost resident instead, i.e., take over the house, then shift some of my stuff in but not stay there. and if hdb were to conduct spot checks, i should just get the tenant to lie to them that it is owner-occupied. this, according to him, was what "many of his friends are doing and i should not be so stupid as to be adhere to the govenrment's ruling so rigidly". he got angry when i suggested moving in and instead rent out my current house. he accused me of not being co-operative and after that, he refused to talk to me. it was at that point that i thought it would be easier to just let him decide how to deal with the house and not involve me. to me, i was not about to allow him to use my name to break the law.

cut the long story short, after my silence and after the dog died, he eventually decided to sell off his current house and move in to my parent's house. how the dogs death got intertwined into this whole affair... read on in future entries.