Making a Will

Eck

I don't know if this is in the correct forum, but here goes, i cannot afford to pay for a will for me and my partner, which i understand is approx £140 for a joint one, this is due to me not working at present and cash is very very tight, but it worries me that if anything were to happen to me or my wife then what would happen to our property which i would like my two children to have equal share of ?
Is there anyway that i can make out a will without having to go to a " rip off " solicitor to have it done? and if there is how do you go about it?




Thanks

Astaroth

You can buy "do it yourself" forms from the likes of the post office. The natural problems with do it yourself legal documents is that you clearly dont have the years of training and experience in the relevant fields of law and therefore the wills tend not to be as comprehensive/ water tight as one drawn up by a professional.

Eck

Why would you need years of training and experience to put on a piece of paper that you would like to leave everything to your next of kin?
Surely it cannot be more simple than that, i think that the legal profession make everything more complicated in order to justify their existence!

achtunglady

Hmm on thinking about this further,and so sorry to be morbid, but what if (god forbid) both you and your partner died, what provisions would there be for your children, have you thought about appointing legal guardians? I have asked my cousin if she would and she agreed. Also, anything you leave would have to be put in trust and a trustee appointed as well.

mattymoo

It sounds simple but it isn't. The will needs to cover a lot of what ifs.

Lets suppose you marry a second time and your new wife and you both have kids from a previous marriage.

Now, if you die, you leave it all to your wife. What is to stop her when she dies leaving everything to her kids and leaving your kids out the picture?

Now lets suppose you and your wife are in the same car and suffer a fatal accident. But you die 10 mins before she does.
Under your simple will, everything goes to her estate and your kids might lose out. Under a properly drawn up will, there is usually a time limit between deaths. If within the limit you are regarded as having died at the same time and then next person in line (your kids / parents) inherit.

Now, what if you, your wife, your kids are wiped out in the same accident. Who gets the money then? Your parents? Favourite charity? Sister / brother?

A solicitor will cover all these scenarios and thinking about it will be quite distressing for some.

achtunglady

Eck wrote:

Why would you need years of training and experience to put on a piece of paper that you would like to leave everything to your next of kin?
Surely it cannot be more simple than that, i think that the legal profession make everything more complicated in order to justify their existence!

I agree,as long as a DIY will is written clearly with room for what ifs and in the event of,( for example I leave my worldly goods to my wife and in the event of her dying before me then it is to be divided equally between my two children and held in trust until they are 18/21) and if you have no complicated money affairs then it should be sufficient. Just make sure the witnesses do not gain anything from the will as this makes it null and void.

We have no property (as yet), no savings but would want our children looked after by family rather than be in the care of social services.

mattymoo

achtunglady - you also need to consider mirroring the wills.

Most solicitors these days charge very little for preparing the will itself. They make all the money from the execution of the will (hopefully years away) and their fee is deducted from the estate.

Astaroth

The misses has a home made will which covers less than 2 sides of paper where as my professionally made will covers 12 or so... a lot of the difference comes from the number of eventualities covered - so for items left in trust for minors who the trustee is and what occurs if the trustee is no longer able to fulfil the duty

In addition to this there is the aspect of how water tight it is, for example if you want the will to cover what occurs if one of the kids "goes mad", "goes to prison" etc then you have to use the correct language otherwise there can be arguments over if the fact your kid is diagnosed with schizophrenia means that they are now "mad" or not and therefore which of your wishes should be followed (eg money is left in trust til they are 21 or remains in trust indefinately but an increase on the draw down from it at 21)

At the end of the day it comes down to how complicated your situation is and how much you care about who gets what. If you want everything to go to your wife if you die or for it to go to your eldest child should you both die at the same time then the will doesnt really matter that much.

Maisie

Some of the charities have a free will writing service. I think they ask you to leave them something in the will to cover this.

Check with your bank etc . Some of the banks have will writing in their additional cover.

It also seems to be the right thing to be 'tenants in common' instead of 'joint tenants' on property so that less tax is paid.