Contract with heir hunter query

barbiedoll

I'm in exactly the same position as you, I was contacted late last year by a "Heir Hunter" firm (who turned up at my house with a camera man, in case I wanted to be on the telly...which I don't!) I did post on here about it, check under my username, it wasn't that long ago.

My brother and I were looking into doing this stuff ourselves, before we signed a contract with any of the four different firms which contacted us. However, even though my brother has been researching our extensive family tree, we realised that trying to track down and contact the relatives from 9 different siblings, was a mammoth task and we gave up and each signed a contract (with different companies) to get our money. Which probably won't be a huge amount, so far there are at least 13 beneficiaries that we know of!

Your relative who has taken on the task, needs to be mindful of any "lost" beneficiaries who may come forward after the funds have been distributed. He/she will be liable for paying them, and they may well come after you for a share if someone has been missed.

I was happy to sign away a small proportion of mine as commission for someone else doing the legwork. As I see it, 5% of not much, is even less, and either way I'll be getting some money that I didn't have before and that I didn't know about. But I think that your contract will still have to be honoured, as you have already signed it.

Good luck anyway, hope you don't have to wait too long for your cash!

Malthusian

Dandylion wrote: »

If you take it to the extreme, what's to stop anyone identifying beneficiaries, will or no will, and saying sign this and I'll help you claim your inheritance. Then the beneficiary can't have their inheritance direct from the executor, just because the heir hunters were quicker to get in touch than the executor? It's making my head hurt!

Well, it's highly unlikely to happen as most people who are beneficiaries of a Will would find out immediately when their dear old auntie or dad has died.

I could go round their house and con them into signing a piece of paper saying I was going to "help them" claim their inheritance for a fee but as soon as they'd realised they'd been had, and that there wasn't actually any "helping" for me to do whatsoever, they could simply refuse to pay up. As I've provided them with no services, there's no way the courts are ever going to uphold my contract.

You on the other hand have received a service for which consideration is due. As YM says heir hunting is not easy. If I get a tradesman to paint my wall red and the day after I decide I don't like it and my brother paints my wall blue for free, I still owe the tradesman for the service.

I don't think you jumped the gun, not many people would wait weeks after receiving an "heir hunter" letter to see if someone contacts them independently. I'd just enjoy the windfall.

Grumpelstiltskin

I'll tell you a story which happened very recently. The person involved asked me to look into it as he knew I researched family history.

This man received 7 letters from 7 Heir Hunting companies in a 2 day period regarding the same person who he had never heard of.

He thought it looked a bit odd but invited one to come and see him.

The rep. knew how he was related and he signed up with that company.

Now some easy online research showed the relationship as correct but the funeral had only taken place days before these letters were sent and by looking at the Bona Vacantia site the information had only appeared the same day as all the letters were dated.

Why such hurry and why so many? It does appear that there is property worth a lot of money involved and no will has been found yet, but had there been enough time to check that there wasn't a will lurking somewhere and he had left all his money to the cats home, I don't think so.

getmore4less

All the main HH firms are onto that list first thing every day.

Its a race and guess work initially which will come up trumps since the estate values are no longer listed.

Some HH get tip offs or asked to investigate estates

Someone put it on the list, most likely because they could not be bothered to deal with any of it(nursing home, hospital, council...) and no known relative or person willing to have a go.

There will be clues, the death certificate and who organized the funeral are two.

unforeseen

Grumpelstiltskin wrote: »

I'll tell you a story which happened very recently. The person involved asked me to look into it as he knew I researched family history.

This man received 7 letters from 7 Heir Hunting companies in a 2 day period regarding the same person who he had never heard of.

He thought it looked a bit odd but invited one to come and see him.

The rep. knew how he was related and he signed up with that company.

Now some easy online research showed the relationship as correct but the funeral had only taken place days before these letters were sent and by looking at the Bona Vacantia site the information had only appeared the same day as all the letters were dated.

Why such hurry and why so many? It does appear that there is property worth a lot of money involved and no will has been found yet, but had there been enough time to check that there wasn't a will lurking somewhere and he had left all his money to the cats home, I don't think so.

Forgive me for sounding stupid but I doubt that the deceased would appear on bona vacantia within days of death/funeral considering probate is not normally applied until some weeks after death.

Also declaring a deceased as bona vacantia is not a process that would complete in the short period between death and interment

Grumpelstiltskin

I can assure you it did, there was a gap between death and funeral probably because of Christmas and New Year but I found a death notice online which gave the date of the funeral.

I think at least one of the Heir Hunters had been tipped off and one look at the Land Registry would confirm who owned the house and then if they did what I did and Google the address they would see what the next door property sold for very recently.

Yorkshireman99

Grumpelstiltskin wrote: »

I can assure you it did, there was a gap between death and funeral probably because of Christmas and New Year but I found a death notice online which gave the date of the funeral.

I think at least one of the Heir Hunters had been tipped off and one look at the Land Registry would confirm who owned the house and then if they did what I did and Google the address they would see what the next door property sold for very recently.

This is very odd indeed. Estates only appear on the Bona Vacnatia list if the estate is intestate and there are no known living relatives who might inherit. To establish this takes months not days. In other words there simply is not sufficient time to go through the formalities for establishing these facts in such a short period.

Grumpelstiltskin

Yorkshireman exactly my thoughts but having seen the letters and done the research I did I have to believe it. In fact I said what if a will turns up but evidently the H H rep. aid they take out insurance to cover that possibility.

Like I said there were obviously no close relatives they had to go back to parent's siblings and their descendants and there will be a large sum of money involved.

getmore4less

We have been here before
who are these people doing these weeks and months of research,

Never got an answer last time, don't expect one this time

It can be no one.....

Unless someone picks up an estate it will just sit there until someone BV it.

Institutions that employ people just won't bother as they cannot charge for the work, even if they employ people that can normally charge estates like solicitors.

That leaves unmarried partners, friends, neighbors and random strangers(by definition it does not include blood relatives) some might pick up some research others, even if they register the death and do the funeral may not realize the need to BV the estate if they don't want to deal with any more work, they are under no obligation to do research if they don't want to.

Some may get picked up by a tipped of HH and get added to the list when they give up.

There will be plenty that get no real research at all because there is no one to do it.

Just look at the BV list there are recent entries 3-4 weeks from death.

entry date--date of death
08/02/2017 11/01/2017
02/02/2017 17/01/2017
31/01/2017 10/01/2017
04/01/2017 11/12/2016
22/12/2016 28/11/2016
13/12/2016 25/11/2016
...

Grumpelstiltskin

Getmore I think that the TV programmes give the impression it is a long period of time before estates appear on B V and I admit I thought that but as you have said and I found out it only takes a few weeks.