Dad Died, Aunt Is Asking Me To Sign Over Rights So She Can Sell Property (or Foreclosure?) Before We’ve Even Seen His Will.

Location: California, between Sacramento and Tahoe.

Some background: Basically I’ve only met my dad a handful of times. I’m 40 years old. My aunt, his sister, convinced him to make a will with a lawyer a few years ago. My aunt and I have had a great relationship in the last 10 years since we connected. She found me online and we’ve spent a lot of time together and bonded (live on opposite sides of the country though, so don’t see each other more than 1-2 times a year). And she’s helped me to have some contact with my dad, who was basically a hermit (no internet, unplugged landline, communicated mostly by written letters in the mail).

Aunt and dad both in their 80s, but my dad was a lifelong alcoholic, in and out of jail, and my aunt has always had her shit together. She owns her house (for 40 years) just down the road from my dad. My grandparents built the house my dad lived in/owned.

I knew my dad had a reverse mortgage on his house and that money would be owed on it by whoever inherited it when he died. During the last year he apparently had squatters living in the house who trashed it.

My dad died last week and my aunt said she’d look for the will and look into the amount owed on the reverse mortgage. I know he gave her power of attorney about a year ago because he was in jail and needed her to deal with the squatters.

She’s just texted me that the amount owed on the reverse mortgage is over 300k and because of the condition of the property it’s not worth fixing or selling, and wants to let the bank take it back through foreclosure. It’s a small 2 bedroom house on 5 acres in California.

She said she’s going to handle all of this and needs me to give her my permission, birthday, SS# etc.

I would normally trust her but this all seems strange, since he’s only died last week and from what she said she doesn’t even know what his will says yet. All I know is that when he made the will a few years ago, he said he was putting me as a beneficiary. The only other beneficiary, to my knowledge, is my half sister.

I will attach a photo of the text in the comments if possible. Does this seem like a reasonable request from my aunt?