ESA, Housing Benefit and property inheritance

robpw2

zoebuggy wrote: »

Have no doubt I am a genuine claimant. I have absolutely no intention of any kind of fraud, it would make me physically sick 24/7.

The problem to me was if I received this possible asset (which would be well over £16K) I would gain an annual income of £6K ....but loose both my current ESA and my Housing Benefit etc worth 12K.

If it simply replaced one of the benefits and made me more independent, brilliant I would be happy, but instead the result is that I personally would be very very much worse off.

sorry but currently you live on 12k .... you would get 16k ... so you would get and increase of 4k ... thus your not losing 12k your gaining 4k and many people have to live on less then 16k and they seem to do alright without claiming benefits

zoebuggy

paddedjohn wrote: »

You would still get benefits on an income of £6k

I do not think I would get benefits because of the capital asset over £16k over which I would not have individual means of disposal (which I guess would adversely affect my siblings at best.)

zoebuggy

robpw2 wrote: »

sorry but currently you live on 12k .... you would get 16k ... so you would get and increase of 4k ...

No, lol you have misread my posts. I will not get a 16K income, but just 6K.

zoebuggy

paddedjohn wrote: »

You would still get benefits on an income of £6k

other types of benefits? I am learning.

zoebuggy

I guess I might sound like a scrounger, if I could genuinely come of benefits I would be very happy. Being on benefits is not a very good place to be. I am lucky I have several support workers who are helping me.

(side point: I do try my best to voluntary work 16-20 hours a week for poverty charity. )

Mojisola

zoebuggy wrote: »

My brother says that we will not be able to (or it would be costly to) sell the property...due to capital gains/inheritance tax issues.
So I need to get more advice.

Your brother is mistaken (or lying to you because he doesn't want to sell the property).

What's the value of the house versus the retail property? Who owns the other half of that property?

If your siblings had the house between them and you had the retail property, would the amounts be reasonably equitable? Are you prepared to have less than them if it results in a manageable situation? Would you be able to sell your half share in the retail property?

Alternatively, your siblings could have the two properties now and your mother could leave a larger proportion of her estate to you. This is a gamble for you because, if your mother goes into care, a lot of the money from her house could be used paying for care.

I would ask her to word her will so that the executors sell the house and divide the money rather than leave the house between the three siblings. If they are reluctant to sell, you could find yourself in this position again.

All this worry about inheritance tax assumes that your mother wasn't married or that her husband used up his IHT allowance when he died.

pmlindyloo

I am at a total loss as to why you are even trying to do this. It seems, from what you are saying, that no one is gaining financially from this unless your brother and sister are after the extra rental money.

If this is the case why can't your mother just gift you sums of money to help you out from what she receives from the rents?

If this is all about protecting your inheritance on her death then it is up to your mother to get her assets sorted out by using a solicitor to put in place a will/property trusts etc.

This will cost her money but can be done. It needs to be done by someone with that specialist knowledge.

CAB will not be able to help other than in a general way or signposting you to people who can help.

Do you have any friends/family who have used someone who is skilled in these matters?

It is your mother who needs advice.

zoebuggy

Mojisola wrote: »

Your brother is mistaken (or lying to you because he doesn't want to sell the property).

What's the value of the house versus the retail property? Who owns the other half of that property?

If your siblings had the house between them and you had the retail property, would the amounts be reasonably equitable? Are you prepared to have less than them if it results in a manageable situation? Would you be able to sell your half share in the retail property?

Alternatively, your siblings could have the two properties now and your mother could leave a larger proportion of her estate to you. This is a gamble for you because, if your mother goes into care, a lot of the money from her house could be used paying for care.

I would ask her to word her will so that the executors sell the house and divide the money rather than leave the house between the three siblings. If they are reluctant to sell, you could find yourself in this position again.

All this worry about inheritance tax assumes that your mother wasn't married or that her husband used up his IHT allowance when he died.

This is along the lines I am thinking. My brother is a good person, so at worse he is mistaken (and I dont want him to loose out because of me).

I was thinking of giving up this part of my possible inheritance, as it would appear to be easier in the current situation. So a reduced share would be fine by me. I will look into your suggestions here. My mum's mental health is not good to ask her to make decisions.

My deceased dad's unwell elderly brother-in-law owns the other half of the retail property.

Yes to the final distribution of the estate, but hopefully not to my mum is a healthy spritely 106 years plus

Mojisola

zoebuggy wrote: »

My brother is a good person, so at worse he is mistaken (and I dont want him to loose out because of me).

If he is mistaken, make sure he understands that he will possibly be creating a CGT liability by not selling the house - depending on whether house prices rise.

He will also have ongoing tax to pay on any income he gets from rents.

If your Mum and Dad were married, there may be some of his IHT allocation left which can be transferred to your Mum -
https://www.hmrc.gov.uk/inheritancetax/intro/transfer-threshold.htm

rogerblack

zoebuggy wrote: »

I was thinking of giving up this part of my possible inheritance

It is important that you can't do this after you get the capital.
How a person arranges their gifts to you is not legally within your control.
If a relative or anyone else chooses to leave you money in a way that does not affect your benefits, then that is not questionable.

If however you try to modify the terms of a will after death, or do not claim what you might, then you risk being held to have that capital, and being treated from a benefits point of view as if you do.