created.
STEP 5: CREATE AN INFORMAL DOWNSIZING BUSINESS
I’m assuming that at this point, your family has followed your parents’ will or other legal documents that directed where any specific belongings should go. The rest of the steps now deal with the remaining possessions that are available for you to divide with your parents’ other heirs.
You’ll have two types of belongings to distribute:
“Treasures,” which are the irreplaceable items that recall memories of your family’s “bests, mosts, and greatests.”
“Worthy” possessions that have more practical or monetary value than sentimental value. These are the power tools, sewing machines, furniture, clothes, and other useful objects in the “material convoy” that trailed behind your parents during their lives.
To keep it simple, I’m going to use the term “siblings” from now on to mean “everyone who gets a portion of your parents’ belongings.” But it’s possible that your parents have left one or more of your siblings out of the will or declared that some other person should also receive items, such as one of your aunts, uncles, or cousins, or even a nonfamily member.
So the rest of the downsizing process may only involve you and your siblings. But include anyone else who should play a role, as your parents requested.
Your next task is to create a type of “family business” devoted to downsizing. This business doesn’t have its own office. It doesn’t require you to suspend your family relationships. But it does entail using a deliberate, well-organized, and professional approach for the task at hand.
You and your siblings have an important job that needs to be done efficiently and effectively, without excessive emotion derailing the process (in other words, in a businesslike manner!).
Without some type of formalized structure for your downsizing, the process can turn into a free-for-all that leads to hurt feelings, resentment, financial losses, and missing treasures. “What do you mean you just threw it away? Who said you could keep this? That’s not fair, and if Mom were here, I know she’d tell you so!”
Sticking to the following rules will help your family sail through this event on calm and peaceful waters.
1. Decide on stakeholders. Define exactly who gets to play a role in the downsizing process. Your parents’ will or trust should specify who gets a cut of your parents’ estate, but it likely won’t list who will receive every single item in the home, or who should come together to help clear out the house.
Determine whether siblings’ spouses will have a say in these decisions. I can envision scenarios where this would work just fine. But in many cases, like large families that already have a lot of participants or families in which brothers- and sisters-in-law are kept a little distant from family decisions, giving spouses a vote on the downsizing might create dissent.
This is your group’s call, but I would suggest not giving spouses decision-making power. Doing so adds handfuls of extra pieces to the puzzle you’re trying to solve.
It may be difficult for you to insist that the decisions only involve blood relatives, but this request may prevent later conflict. Decide what’s best for the downsizing project, not what’s easiest in the face of strong personalities and emotional sensitivities.
2. Hold a first meeting. This meeting will determine the tone of the whole downsizing process. Begin by setting a reasonable time and place for the first meeting so everyone can attend (or participate remotely by phone or Skype if they can’t join in person). Have a clear agenda and make sure that everyone has a say in the proceedings. Start agreeing upon outcomes you want to achieve from the downsizing, the action steps that the downsizing will require, and the language that’s to be used whenever conflict might arise. Remember: Treat this as you would a business.
3. Set up ground rules and timelines. Siblings can use different options for dividing treasures (I’ll provide them later in this chapter) and turning worthy items with value into cash (also in this chapter). Decide on the strategies that you’re going to use in the downsizing process.
For example, do you want to sell everything that the siblings don’t want to keep, even though this requires more work? Or do you want to donate all the belongings of value, which is easier and more altruistic, but potentially less lucrative? (You won’t get cash up front, though you may reap tax benefits later.)
Also agree on a timeline. Make sure everyone knows when the downsizing should be completed. All the participants also need to know when other