Help with probate (and therefore money!) problem!!

sloughflint

Errata wrote: »

Some useful and helpful points being made. my point is that if in January the grandmother
she may not have had the mental capacity to fully understand what was happening to her money.

The number of older people who's money finishes up in a relatives bank account because they are unable to fully understand their financial affairs and relatives take advantage of this is substantial. It's classed as financial abuse, hence my suggestion that Action on Elder Abuse should be contacted.

I'm completely aware of manipulative money-grabbing relatives. I just think it is wise for OP to be made aware of alternative possibilities to consider too.

If the son was dishonourable, I think OP's biggest difficulty will be the fact that he/she accepted gifts from someone deemed mentally incapable as he/she now feels. At the moment his/her 'loss' stands at £ 13 000. I wonder how much a legal battle would cost?

People reading this thread will hopefully think about repercussions of accepting the role of looking after someone's affairs. They leave themselves vulnerable even if intentions are good without clear record -keeping/ establishing that mental health good enough to make large gifts.

On the subject of mental capacity, there are varying degrees of this. It is wise to seek confirmation from a GP at regular intervals that financial decisions can still be made.

SandC

If you can look at it another way, perhaps your grandmother was unaware that she would receive such a large lump sum on the death of her husband. She might have considered that the pension died with him. Did she have other cash assets of a substantial nature? This is something to consider, remember as has been said above you didn't question at the time whether she was okay to give away these gifts. Plus don't forget that you are all grandchildren (and son great grandchild) - is it not likely that she would have wanted her son to have a little more than grandchildren, especially in light of this windfall she wasn't expecting.

This is just another way of looking at how the situation could be.

floss2

Perhaps your grandmother thought that she was doing what was best? Maybe that was what she had wanted to do with her windfall... after all, I am assuming that you do not know what financial situation your grandparents were in before your grandfather's death.....maybe your uncle had been paying bills / costs / living expenses for them while your grandfather was ill. Some women of that generation did not always know how to do that sort of thing for themselves (unlike us independent ones) so maybe your uncle had been repaid a debt that had built up from keeping things going.

Perhaps you should take a step back & look at it from another angle, to get a more objective view.