I think my mom is the victim of financial abuse being perpetrated by her sibling

Location: California

After the death of my grandparents a few years back, my mom and her siblings all concluded that she and I would live in my grandparents’ old house to keep up with its day-to-day maintenance, and any big expenditures would come out of the estate/trust funds.

That did not happen. Not because the money doesn’t exist, but because the sibling who was left in charge of that just doesn’t want to bother.

So far, my mom has single-handedly (she is 1/6 owner) paid or is in the process of paying around $60,000 for things like:

• a new fence when the old one fell in a storm
• a new furnace when the old one gave out
• new flooring when the old vinyl tore
• new sewer piping when the pipes burst and ruined the bathrooms
• new storage shed when the old one fell apart in a storm
• junk hauling for all the random garbage my grandparents had (incl the shed)
• mold mitigation for the serious problem they had and didn’t notice

She’s put this all on credit cards with outrageous interest rates, taken money from her 401k before she was retired, and borrowed a few thousand dollars from me for these expenses. She is retired and had just gotten out of debt when she moved in, and now she’s on a fixed income and hemorrhaging money. Back in debt, and to an outrageous degree.

Money I’ve lost has been the thousands loaned to my mom and the $1400 because the electrical systems are not up to code and the storms a few years ago killed my computer. I know now to have an uninterruptible power supply, but damn, was that rough. Electrical system is next on the list because a house full of ungrounded plugs with all the energy-heavy appliances of 2025 plugged in is sort of dangerous.

The estate has an executor/power of attorney/whatever who controls the finances. That’s my aunt, mom’s sister. She has to sign everything to get the money (which exists in the hundreds of thousands of dollars) out of the trust accounts to take care of things like this. The executor does not do her job and literally leaves the room to avoid being “pestered” about it.

When the pipe burst and my mom and I needed to stay in hotels because we didn’t have bathrooms or running water to use, the insurance company considered us “renters” and insisted we had to ask the estate for reimbursement (like $1000-ish). My aunt is the person who would have had to approve that and reimburse my mom. She did not and once again vanished when asked for help.

My mom really wants to move out because of what a money suck the house is and the way she knows she ALONE will be saddled with the debt and interest of fixing any problems, but because she is so far in debt now from living here, she lacks the funds to get out. It is beginning to feel like financial or elder abuse, the way the executor is just avoiding any kind of responsibility and knowingly putting my mom in an impossible position (given that she is living on a fixed income and will never be able to work to repay the money + interest). The plan my mom seems to be relying on is that she will be reimbursed by the estate or when the house sells, but I don’t know how to break it to her at almost 70 that she may die before the house ever does sell, given my aunt’s procrastination and her disability.

The deal WAS that the estate would pay for major things (like over $1000). This is not something my mom signed up for. But then again, she didn’t sign a lease or any contract. We relied on my family’s decency.

I can technically spot her the money to move, but it will cost everything I have and, knowing my family’s laziness and DGAF attitude, I will never see it again and it will destroy my ability to buy a home or adopt a child in the future (which is what I’ve been saving for). Two generations may be absolutely screwed over because of one person’s total failure to do her job.

Like… I genuinely worry the executor (70+) will die before anything gets dealt with, and this is not a stipulation in my grandparents’ will so it will create even more chaos. Nobody knows who the responsibility will pass to. My grandma died almost five years ago, and in that time, the executor has done virtually nothing. Has not lifted a finger to help my mom or myself with all the money. It’s incredibly frustrating that my mom and I are both bleeding money and the one person who has the legal authority to help is just NOT doing it.

Idk if this qualifies as any kind of financial exploitation, but it’s destroying her. She’s on the verge of a breakdown. What can I (or we) do?