hardship help?

Question

My father recently passed.He had alot of bills.Because of a person at the funeral home didnt get the death certificate in time we were foreclosed on and had to pay all life insurance to mortgage company.now we cant afford a headstone.is the funeral home at fault for telling me they ordered the certificate and didnt till it was to late?it was the late part that that caused all hell to break loose.I told life insurance company it was on the way when it wasnt.due to clarical error. 12,000 dollars worth.is there a case against them?

No i dont hold mortgage,or pay the billls.My father left us the home.He was the primary bill payer.No free lunch here just a question on an error.

Please be grown up when answering this.

Answer 1

It is inconceivable that there could be a foreclosure solely because of a delay in issuing a death certificate. Furthermore, you could have gone to the Department of Health (or other authority that issues the certificate) and walked the documents from place to place (i.e., if your state requires the burial (or cremation) information on the certificate, you could have collected the paperwork from the funeral director and submitted it yourself. Once the attending physician and/or medical examiner has(have) signed off, the rest is administrative detail.

(Indeed, a few years ago a funeral director wrote the wrong city name on a death certificate; if true the information would have required probate in a different county. The court accepted that this was an error; I went to the Bureau of Vital Statistics and they saw the error too (the street crosses the county line) and reissued the certificates. It took me weeks to get an apology from the funeral director, and he did that only because I threatened to embarrass him publicly. But that's another story.)

Foreclosure is a lengthy process. Had you kept the mortgagee bank informed -- unless they are Countrywide or another bottom-feeding, sub-par lender -- they would have worked with you on this. As would the insurance company.

It seems to me that you slept while Rome burned, so to speak. You can't blame others for doing nothing when you don't engage in self-help.

Sorry: I'm always sympathetic when people are abused by public authority and by financial institutions and such. But this isn't that.

Answer 2

There is a significant chance that the doctor who signed the death certificate took his good old time signing, as this is very, very common among doctors, therefore holding up the initial registration of the death certificate (this just happened to me last week). So before you place blame and want to sue, find out the reasoning behind so you aren't blaming the wrong person.
Also, you don't have a leg to stand on as far as a court case. Foreclosures takes months and months, therefore you story doesn't quite add up unless the foreclosure proceedings began before death.

Answer 3

Unfortunately, there isn't any excuse for not paying bills. Not even death. Foreclosures don't happen in a matter of one month. That's something property owners see coming months in advance. The bills should have been paid until the insurance claim was paid.

You can still contact a lawyer, but don't be surprised if it's hard to find one willing to take a case for 12K. You may end up having to hand over your award... maybe more in legal fees.

Answer 4

Hey, you could have gotten the death certificate from the county clerk. No there is not a case against the f/home. Take some responsibility here & stop trying to lay the blame on someone else. You screwed up; admit it.