Need a solicitor for probate and set up trust - help!

BlondeHeadOn

Board Guides please move this if there is a better place for it, but I thought I'd try it here first!

My brother has died and I am one of the executors for the will, but he has left a rather complicated will including a trust fund to stop the children from just selling his house and spending all the money now - he has arranged for the house to be in trust and rented out until the youngest is 25 when they can sell it and split the proceeds. The rest of his money (not much) is to be tied up in administering this trust, and also be kept out of reach until the children are both 25 (in about 9 years time).

Two problems with this:
1. We need someone to tell us how to set up the trust fund and to run it for us
and
2. (a biggie!) the eldest daughter is going to go ballistic at this provision, as she has already assumed that the house will be sold and she will get half the money straightaway - she is 19. It was partly to stop this happening that my brother made this will. Because of this, and the fact that the will is complicated anyway, myself and the other executor have decided that we would like to have a proper 'reading of the will' so that the whole thing can be explained to all of us by a professional, and - more importantly - the eldest daughter can't misundertstand us or verbally attack us (or worse!)

So: can anyone advise on how to choose a good friendly solicitor who would be able to do these things for us, or how to go about finding one? I don't know any solicitors at the moment - is there a forum which can advise or give recommendations for these? Or anyone know a good one in the Reading area?

I am all at sea with this (on top of dealing with the death as well), so any help at all would be gratefully accepted!

rayday2

Oh hell how complicated have you thought of speaking to the CAB see if they know of anyone who can help? Or maybe one of the charities that deal with deaths in famalies.

Sorry on your loss btw.

BlondeHeadOn

rayday2 wrote: »

Oh hell how complicated have you thought of speaking to the CAB see if they know of anyone who can help? Or maybe one of the charities that deal with deaths in famalies.

Sorry on your loss btw.

No I hadn't even thought of CAB or a charity - thank you, that might be a good start. I've only found out about this today, as just received the will. It's just all beginning to hit me that he's gone as well, so I ran to the comfort of DFW for a bit of tlc as well as good advice ...

Thank you so much for your reply.

rayday2

I really wish I could help more but it is such a specialised subject. I would hate the thought of you making a wrong decision when you have so much on your plate so CAB was my only thoughts!

I hope you have someone to support you especially dealing with your niece death can bring out the worst in famailes, sadly oh and weddings as well!

Take care and hopefully someone else will have good ideas - did you post on the family matters board too they are pretty good?

tallyhoh

www.hmcourts-service.gov.uk/cms/wills.htm

Have you looked at the court stuff? see above. I wish I had checked it out when my dad died instead of paying a solicitor to sort out probate for me.

It sounds quite complex but it probably isnt that bad. If you do have to resort to a Solicitor make sure you get a approx cost first.

BlondeHeadOn

I never thought of the family matters board (doh!) - can I post the same message again or should it be moved over there?

Thanks again!

rayday2

Copy and paste it then you have the best of both boards!

katierose

Sorry to hear about you're loss.

alared

Sorry about your loss and the position you now find yourself in.

First and formost I must tell you that there are NO "good friendly solicitors".
There are only ones that charge you a big fat fee of a percentage of the estate which could be as high as 10%.
So on a £200,000 estate their bill could be TWENTY THOUSAND POUNDS.
The other thing to remember is that they will be in no hurry to get things moving and could take up to a year or more.

I`m sorry I can`t help anymore but if you could do it yourself with help from friends and Has been suggested the CAB.
There is also lots of info on the net and I`m sure other MSE`s will add their thoughts.

For anyone else thinking of making a will DO NOT make a solicitor an executor,unless you want a good chunk of your estate taken from you.

BlondeHeadOn

I must admit I don't like the thought of paying throught the nose for professional help, but need to make sure all is done properly. I had no idea the will was going to be so complicated when I agreed to be an executor! I can see why he did it this way, but boy is it going to cause problems....

rayday2

Its amazing what we can tackle in the world when we have the knowledge - hopefully the CAB will point you in the right direction and you can get things moving.

To me the difficult bit I see is the family issue side but you have to keep at the back of your mind this is what your brother wanted and there must be very good reasons why he choose this way. It is the last and most important thing you will ever do for him, I wish you will and hope you get enough information to make it as easy as possible.