Will not called for after death?

nad1611

I just need a bit of advice. something was said overthe weekend and it's made us wonder if my father-in-law ever told the Solicitor when his wife died.
The reason we think this is because F-I-L showed us a letter yesterday from 2007 which asked if the said wife wanted her Will still kept at their Vault, she died in 1996. F-I-L was the Executor to her Will and everything came to him anyway, but what might the ramifications be if he didn't inform the Solicitor of her death.

Would he needed to have gone through the usual Probate procedure even if everything came to him. Anyway hoping someone can help. We're going to ask him about it today but just wanted some advance advice.

TonyMMM

There would be no requirement to inform anyone other than the registrar of the death, but he would have needed a signed original will to go to probate. But there are lots of possibilities that could have happened ....

1) A later will was made, with a different solicitor, and the one this solicitor had was out of date and so never used.

2) For some reason, he forgot/ignored the fact that there was a will at all and dealt with it as intestate, obtaining an "adminstration" rather than probate (he may have got everything anyway in those circumstances, but not necessarily).

3) Everything was held jointly anyway, and the remainder of the estate was so small that probate wasn't required (usually under £5k).

Before starting a family argument, you could obtain a copy of the probate and the will that was proved from the Probate Registry .... costs £5.

nad1611

TonyMMM wrote: »

There would be no requirement to inform anyone other than the registrar of the death, but he would have needed a signed original will to go to probate. But there are lots of possibilities that could have happened ....

1) A later will was made, with a different solicitor, and the one this solicitor had was out of date and so never used.

2) For some reason, he forgot/ignored the fact that there was a will at all and dealt with it as intestate, obtaining an "adminstration" rather than probate (he may have got everything anyway in those circumstances, but not necessarily).

3) Everything was held jointly anyway, and the remainder of the estate was so small that probate wasn't required (usually under £5k).

Before starting a family argument, you could obtain a copy of the probate and the will that was proved from the Probate Registry .... costs £5.

Okay as always I should have added these things to the original thread,
1) No later Will was made and we and my F-I-L had copies of the original.

2) Possiblility is that he more than likely didn't know he had to do anything with the Will. There's no possibility of him having applied to anyone as Administrator, he can't do things like that and would definetly have asked for our help as he does with anything important like this.

3) The likelihood is that the estate would have been small as I would imagine everything would have been in his nme anyway.

The whole point is if he didnt inform the Solicitors of the Death, the Will wouldn't have been proved anyway.

At the time of her death my husband and I had three young children, were both working full time and neither of us had any experience of death, we had no idea what was involved and whilst we offered and gave emotional and physical support, when asked F-I-L always said he'd dealt with everything, as executor we didn't have any legal right to see if that was correct or not. We had no reason to believe otherwise, until we experienced the death of a friend ourselves recently and my husband is Executor.We suddenly realised what was involved and started wondering about F-I-L's ability to be an Executor, then found this letter (which of course could have been sent in error), which got us thinking.

Savvy_Sue

nad1611 wrote: »

1) No later Will was made and we and my F-I-L had copies of the original.

But you can't take a copy of a will to probate: you have to have the one and only original, which is presumably at the solicitors.

It does sound as if perhaps FIL has not done anything, but if everything was going to him and all bank accounts were joint accounts I am not sure that this matters greatly. If it would put your mind at rest, why not phone a solicitor with some 'what if' questions?

nad1611

Savvy_Sue wrote: »

But you can't take a copy of a will to probate: you have to have the one and only original, which is presumably at the solicitors.

It does sound as if perhaps FIL has not done anything, but if everything was going to him and all bank accounts were joint accounts I am not sure that this matters greatly. If it would put your mind at rest, why not phone a solicitor with some 'what if' questions?

Thanks Exactly to apply for probate you need the Original and we're presuming because of the letter from the Solicitor that that was never done and if that is the case they probate was never applied for.
He's very difficult to pin down on things and gets in a fluster when you ask things which he doesn't really understand. Hopefully someone might come along and add something otherwise it's going to be a softly softly approach.
The only thing I suppose I'm concerned about is if there are other things he didn't do like cancelling things on her behalf, there might also be accounts in her name that he hasn't accessed etc although unlikely.
Oh well have to just come out and ask him I suppose!

Nicki

Even if your FIL didn't do things by the book, and the very small estate was handled as intestate rather than in accordance with the will, what do you think is to be gained by opening this all up 15 years later?

I really doubt there are undistributed assets around after 15 years, so the best you could really hope to achieve, without causing your FIL a lot of grief and legal trouble, is for him to hand over some of what he currently lives on to you now, or to change his own will to give you a greater share of his estate, assuming he has other intended beneficiaries than just your OH.

However I am really really struggling to understand why you want to open this all up now after so many years, assuming your relationship with your FIL is a good one.

nad1611

Nicki wrote: »

Even if your FIL didn't do things by the book, and the very small estate was handled as intestate rather than in accordance with the will, what do you think is to be gained by opening this all up 15 years later?

I really doubt there are undistributed assets around after 15 years, so the best you could really hope to achieve, without causing your FIL a lot of grief and legal trouble, is for him to hand over some of what he currently lives on to you now, or to change his own will to give you a greater share of his estate, assuming he has other intended beneficiaries than just your OH.

However I am really really struggling to understand why you want to open this all up now after so many years, assuming your relationship with your FIL is a good one.

Hang on a minute where exactly did I say I wanted to open up anything to gain anything it was the avoidance if things I was after, if you read my original thread I simply asked, what the ramifications of his not applying for probate be.

You act as though I'm trying to make trouble for him, quite the opposite. If there are legal ramifications then we'd want to be here for him to help him sort it out now, rather than later when he's even older.
Where did you get the idea of us asking him to hand anything over to us you don't know who his beneficiaries are, we have no need for him to hand anything over, we're certainly not going to get him to change his Will and I'm offended that you'd even suggest it, we're perfectly happy as we are.

Others have taken my thread exactly in the tone that I meant it. I simply wanted to know if there's anything we should do to avoid problems later on if that's opening things up then it's only in an effort to abide by the Law, I don't see anything wrong in that, we have a very good relatioship with my F-I-L but he's not quite what he was, it was a genuine innocent question.

Nicki

That's fine, but if nothing has happened after 15 years, why would you think that anything now will, unless and until you decide to open this can of worms?

If you have no motives other than to do the best by your FIL, then the only good advice is to let sleeping dogs lie. If any issues are likely to arise at all (which is IMHO very unlikely anyway) the most obvious time will be on FIL's death, in which case you can as easily deal with them then as now, with the added benefit of being sure not to bring any legal ramifications down on his head.

The only things which could be achieved by "abiding by the law" as you put it are either that some assets under MIL's estate could be redistributed, or that FIL be prosecuted for fraudulently concealing a will and benefitting on an intestacy. If you don't want either outcome, do nothing at all. But there is no point in getting offended with someone pointing out that this will be the result of opening things up again now and protesting that wasn't your intention. What other outcomes did you think there might be when you posed your original question?

nad1611

You're completely missing my point. My point is to find out if there are any potential problems with this if this situation has occurred. What I then do about it is another story, I do realise it is a can of worms once opened but I'd like to know what's in the can before I open it..
I will and reserve the right to be offended by someone who thinks they know my intentions and brings situations into the thread that have no bearing on it and are suggestive.
I was not offended by your opinion concerning what you think the outcome might be. I'm quite able to imagine what might happen if there are legal problems.
Personally I would prefer not to leave it until my F-I-L dies we'll be grieving enough without then having anything else to sort out. We are in a much stronger state of mind at present to deal with something like this (and it would be us who deals with it) than at the time of his death, there's enough to do without adding to the prob;lem.
My F-I-L did not purposely conceal the Will that's my whole point I just don't know if he realised exactly what he should have done. I'm pretty sure he wouldn't be prosecuted but I simply want to know what the Law would say in this situation, if you don't know then you've contributed what you have.But I doubt you have any legal clout, to advise doing nothing if we know something.
By the way what other motive could I possibly have, just out of interest?

nad1611

Nicki wrote: »

. What other outcomes did you think there might be when you posed your original question?

That's the whole point of the thread I don't know!!

Nicki

OK then, if you are POSITIVE that FIL did not know about the will, rather than not understanding that he needed to abide by it, or choosing not to abide by it because it was too much hassle, then nothing will now happen. The estate will have been dealt with as though MIL was intestate and as it was small, probably didn't need formal probate. There is a strict time limit to produce a previously lost will after the estate has been settled and even if FIL found out the will was in existence in 2007, it was by then too late to reopen the estate.

Where it gets tricky though, and why I am telling you to leave things be, is that if FIL knew about the will and for whatever reason decided not to follow it, then he could be personally open to either criminal or civil liability depending on the circumstances of the case. But for that to happen there needs to be a complainant, which if you decide to open this up would be you! If there weren't other aggrieved beneficiaries there really isn't anything to be gained by opening this all up. There aren't any tax or other legal niceties in all of this related to MIL's estate, which has been settled, and finally distributed.

No one has any legal clout as you put it to decide what you should do. You asked for informed opinion as to the best thing to do however, and that's what I have tried to give you, three times now.