ASCERTAINING THE LEGAL DISTRIBUTION OF INTESTATE PROPERTY

摘要

An estate distribution system is described herein for ascertaining the legal distribution of an individual's intestate property through the use of variables created to define single points of data that are described by the appropriate body of laws as being necessary to the determination of the said legal distribution. The system determines and solicits a reduced quantity of said data through the use of a hierarchical arrangement of the created variables, which hierarchical arrangement is ordered upon the basis of priority each variable has in relation to all remaining variables used by the appropriate body of laws. A report is created and delivered to a user that details the legal distribution of the subject intestate property.

主权项

1. A computer-implemented method for automatically determining a distribution of a person's property after death, the method comprising:
receiving a selection of a jurisdiction that includes intestacy laws; determining a set of one or more rules for distributing property of a decedent that dies without a will, wherein the rules are derived from an applicable body of law associated with the selected jurisdiction; receiving an identification of property associated with the decedent; determining one or more facts that modify a distribution of the identified property upon applying the one or more rules, wherein determining one or more facts determines a set of one or more questions to ask a user and prevents asking the user for at least one fact not relevant to determining the distribution; querying the user to request the determined one or more facts; receiving from the user one or more facts in response to the query; automatically determining the distribution of the decedent's property based on the determined body of law, the received identification of property, and the received one or more facts; and providing a report describing the determined distribution, wherein the preceding steps are performed by at least one processor.