Aretha Franklin’s sons granted real estate as directed by 2014 will found in her couch

A Michigan judge has awarded the late Aretha Franklin’s sons the legendary singer’s real estate, pointing to a handwritten 2014 will that was found in Franklin’s couch after her 2018 death.

The ruling came more than four months after a Michigan jury decided that the will, which was sandwiched between couch cushions in Franklin’s home, was valid. The 2014 document overruled a 2010 will found inside a cabinet in Franklin’s home. Both wills were found around the same time in 2019.

The judge decided that Franklin’s son Kecalf Franklin and his children, the singer’s only grandchildren, will get her main home in Bloomfield Hills, Mich., which was valued at $1.1 million when she died but is worth much more today.

Franklin’s son Ted White II was willed a property in Detroit; that house already was sold for $300,000, and White will get the proceeds. A third son, Edward Franklin, was awarded another property.

Music

Trial will decide which of Aretha Franklin’s two handwritten wills is the correct one

Aretha Franklin left behind two handwritten wills when she died in 2018. Now, as her sons duel over which is correct, the case heads to trial.

July 7, 2023

A fourth property owned by the “I Say a Little Prayer” artist was not mentioned in the will and will be sold. The profits will be split among Franklin’s four sons, including the eldest, Clarence Franklin, who was not involved in the will dispute.

“This was a significant step forward. We’ve narrowed the remaining issues,” Charles McKelvie, an attorney for Kecalf Franklin, told the Associated Press.

The 2010 will listed White and Franklin’s niece, Sabrina Owens, as co-executors of the estate. It also said Kecalf Franklin and Edward Franklin “must take business classes and get a certificate or a degree” to benefit from the estate.

Leading up to the trial, Kurt Olson, an attorney for White, defended the 2010 will, telling the AP that the document had been notarized and signed, while the later version was “merely a draft.”

“If this document were intended to be a will there would have been more care than putting it in a spiral notebook under a couch cushion,” Olson said.

The 2014 will, which prevailed in court, does not mention such requirements for Kecalf and Edward.

When the “Respect” singer died five years ago, family members believed she had not left a will to dictate how her estate would be managed. Franklin’s four children expected to share her assets evenly, in line with Michigan law if an individual dies without a will or a spouse.

In 2019, however, Owens scoured Franklin’s home and found the two handwritten wills, which were full of scribbles and passages that were difficult to decipher. While both wills agreed that the singer’s sons would share the proceeds of their mother’s estate, such as ongoing earnings from her recordings, they differed on who would serve as executors, pitting her children against one another.

Owens had served as the executor of the estate immediately after the “Chain of Fools” singer’s death. She quit in 2020 in an effort to “calm the rift in my family,” the Detroit Free Press reported.

Since then, Franklin’s estate managers have been paying bills, settling millions in tax debts with the Internal Revenue Service and generating income through music royalties and other intellectual property. The will, however, remained contested among the family.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.