Inherited house sale...

theboylard

Morning all,

been a long time!
Anyway, the basic plot is:

Father-in-law passed Nov 2011.
Estate left to the current mrs theboylard, which includes the family home.
Probate all done and dusted in 7 weeks.
Spent a bit of money on the house - new kitchen, decorating throughout, cheap new carpets, new roof (flat roof )
We have now decided to sell the property, similar sold pricing is £87,000 to 95,000, with EA's suggesting £100k?

To be honest we just want to move on.
It's 100 miles away (in sunny Doncaster) so managing it and letting is something we've toyed with, but to be honest we've been in our home for 13 years, hardly spent a penny on it and we'd like to do something for us, as well as pay off a large chunk of what's left of the mortgage.

Looking through all the paperwork we have (deeds etc), it appears the house is not registered with the Land Registry?
Would it make sense to find a solicitor/conveyancer to do that separately or handle the registry and sale?
A little research says the fee for the LR is £150? But apparently it's quite technical so LR suggest using a professional to do that bit?

Next one is tax.
No inheritance tax as estate was below threshold.
On the sale, is there any capital gains due?
Could we offset costs paid out bringing the house into the 21st century against any liability?

Any and all thoughts, suggestions and recommendations all gratefully received!

Thanks all for reading.

RAS

Your wife has a capital gains allowance of £10K per annum.

Has the house increased in value by over £20K? Does she have £mK in shares that she has been buying and selling?

theboylard

Hi RAS,

thanks for clarifying that
When does that value increase start from?
When she became the legal owner (ie when Probate was granted) or another point in time?
Judging by sold prices for the area, probably static taking into account the work done on the house.

No to the share dealing either!

Thanks again,

CLAPTON

Why do you say the house is not registered with the land registry; surely when your wife became the owner she transferred the property into her name?

Capital gains tax is based on the gain in price since acquisition less allowable costs; so the starting point would be the probate value.

Allowable costs and buyiong and selling and 'improvements' but not maintenance. Decorating and new carpets and new roof would all be maintenance; I'm not sure about a totally new kitchen.

She has a cgt allowance of 10,900.

What was the probate value?

theboylard

Hi Eric

the house was bought in 1954 by the in laws, but the mortgage was solely in my m-in-l name. There is an amendment to the deeds in 1986 when the mortgage was paid off and my f-in-l was added as joint owner.
My m-in-law passed in '95, so house and estate passed to f-in-l.

As we had to go through the court of protection due to f-in-l being diagnosed with vascular dementia, and because my f-in-l had no living will/power of attorney, all of the financial matters we sorted and got in order before he actually passed, so Probate was just a simple form completion exercise.

It was only when the family solicitors finally released the paperwork they had been holding that we realised the house appears to have never been registered, this is when we got the deeds.
As compulsory registration only occurred from 1998 onwards on the sale of a property, it has never been registered.

The kitchen before was circa 1972, and was literally falling apart! Our kitchen fitter was amazed it was still standing!

Based on property sold when completing the CoP application, and in it's then condition, the court accepted the £80,000 value we put on the house.
The subsequent values I initially quoted, since Probate was granted, is reflected in the work completed and values of similar properties.
The lower valuations are ours, the upper the EA's.

Thanks