Loan to pay off inheritance tax

JaneBee_2

My mother has just died and my sister and I are in the process of sorting out her estate. We will have to pay inheritance tax but as the tax has to be paid before we can access her assets I wondered if anyone had any advice on this. As neither my sister nor I have significant enough reserves to pay this from our own savings I'm assuming we'll have to get a short term loan. I don't know where to start on this - are there specific deals for this kind of thing (we can't be the only ones needing this), do we just approach our bank. I'm assuming it will only be needed for a matter of months and obviously want to ensure as little interest has to be paid as possible. Any advice gratefully received.

dings

Firstly Jane, condolences.

I don't know the answer to your question, but could your solicitor assist you with advice here? That's assuming you have one helping you sort the estate.

Dings

jonesMUFCforever

Is there a property for sale here?
Did your mother's estate consist of any liquid assets such as bank or building society accounts?

If she has accounts you can ask the bank/B soc for funds to be released to pay Inheritance tax - I think they make the cheque out to HMCE (or whoever collects this tax nowadays).
If there is a property involved you can delay paying the inheritance tax until it is sold by coming to an agreement with your solicitor that he will pay the tax from sale proceeds.

Only approach your bank for a loan as a last resort as it will be costly and there will be charges involved which you (the estate) will have to pay.

My condolences.

JaneBee_2

There is a mixture of assets - she did own a house and also has some savings and shares. We're trying to sort out the tax ourselves to avoid paying extra to a solicitor although we'll have to use them for selling the house. I don't think there's going to be enough money in a bank account to pay the inheritance tax with that as I know you can release that money in advance. I suspect it's going to be quite a while before we can sell the house and I understood the inheritance tax had to be sorted in six months. Anyway thanks for your comments and if anyone else has further advice I'd be very grateful.

hardpressed

Could you phone your local tax office and ask them for advice? Sorry can't be more helpful.