Forbes:  “Unlike financial assets, which can generally be divided easily amongst heirs, tangible personal property is unique. And the complexity of distributing a lifetime’s worth of possessions is something that many people overlook. Families have been torn apart over everything from ownership of a valuable painting, the grandfather clock and the gun collection, to who gets Mama’s recipe box. Sometimes the object in question is an item of substantial material value, but just as often, it seems, the appeal is purely sentimental. People get emotionally attached to objects that symbolize the person they are mourning.  Discussing these issues while parents are still alive is far preferable to letting children duke it out for themselves later.”