Complicated inheritance of a house query

Scotty_Ash

My wife and I have a rather complicated situation with regards to inheritance that any help would be gratefully received...


My Wife's grandmother recently passed away and her estate is being divided equally between my wife's dad and aunt who are performing the probate themselves. The dad wants to do a deed of variation for his half to my wife as the house has been in the family for over a 100 years and wants us to live there and we are more than happy to move there.


We also need to buy the aunt out of her share which she is happy to do but obviously with the deed of variation on one half of the house and having to purchase the other it is starting to get messy, especially as we cannot purchase the half of the house until our current property is sold and also due to the fact that the dad and aunt are doing the probate themselves to save solicitors fees.


Has anyone been in this situation before that could offer experience on how we are to go about it all?


Thanks

jackyann

Not exactly, but similar enough. First of all, ensure that the house is safe, make sure the insurance company know the house is unoccupied (assuming it is) and arrange for someone to pop in and keep an eye on it. Agree who is to pay bills - theoretically the estate, but we took this on as a gesture of goodwill.

Talk to the Probate Office about a Deed of Variation. They are usually very helpful. It is this that may cause the executors to seek legal advice if it isn't straightforward (sometimes because of deprivation of assets if someone is claiming means tested benefits or likely to need care.

Arrange a valuation of the house. Most estate agents happily do this -best to ask an older well established firm. You may like to get 3 and take an average, or you may all agree to trust one firm. Tell them why.

There is no rush to sort it all out - unless you have a deadline for moving in. Hope this helps.

Yorkshireman99

jackyann wrote: »

Not exactly, but similar enough. First of all, ensure that the house is safe, make sure the insurance company know the house is unoccupied (assuming it is) and arrange for someone to pop in and keep an eye on it. Agree who is to pay bills - theoretically the estate, but we took this on as a gesture of goodwill.

Talk to the Probate Office about a Deed of Variation. They are usually very helpful. It is this that may cause the executors to seek legal advice if it isn't straightforward (sometimes because of deprivation of assets if someone is claiming means tested benefits or likely to need care.

Arrange a valuation of the house. Most estate agents happily do this -best to ask an older well established firm. You may like to get 3 and take an average, or you may all agree to trust one firm. Tell them why.

There is no rush to sort it all out - unless you have a deadline for moving in. Hope this helps.

In this sort of situation a paid for valuation by. RICS surveyor is essential. Professional advice on the DOV is also needed to avoid the very costly consequences if they get it wrong.

Keep_pedalling

Do you really want to move into the old family home? If not you should be frank with him. Trying to cling on to family homes is rather ridiculous unless it is something a bit special.

Scotty_Ash

To answer some questions, yes we want to move to the house, and we can afford to pay half of it once we've sold ours. There have been 3 valuations, all a bit different and the house is being looked after. Everyone is happy with the idea of what we want to do but unsure of how we go about it. I think getting getting professional solicitor/probate advice is the way to go.

getmore4less

If the aunt is prepared to wait for her cash this is a fairly trivial exercise once you understand the basics and timings

The house gets transferred to you

Dad does a DOV to get the tax benefits of his gift bypassing his estate.

You pay the aunt for her share and any SDLT on that.


Depending on exact timing there may be the extra SDLT which gets claimed back.


As has been said probably a good idea to take over the responsibility of the house immediately while you sort out the rest that reduces the administrators work load.

getmore4less

It breaks down as.

Executors do a standard admin for probate and IHT return.

The beneficiaries gift/sell the house to you.

The transfer can be done as a single transaction with the land reg.

Keep the executor hat and beneficiary hat separate.

Yorkshireman99

All very well but not something to be attempted by a novice without professional advice!

Tom99

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Following your Dad's deed of variation the executors can transfer the house into you and your aunts name. Then later when you sell your house you buy out your aunt.[/FONT]

getmore4less

Tom99 wrote: »

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Following your Dad's deed of variation the executors can transfer the house into you and your aunts name. Then later when you sell your house you buy out your aunt.[/FONT]

The DOV can be done independently, the only person that needs it is the Dad to protect the gift of the house share from becoming part of his estate and they have 2 years for that, depending on the value of the share and his estate a DOV may not be needed.

No point in introducing complications when none may be needed,

if the OP is happy to take on the cost of the property while trying to sell theirs and the aunt happy to wait for the sale this will be simpler than an estate where the property is to be sold.

if there is the need for a mortgage(new or port) then it can be beneficial to do the process as a purchase from the estate and will need solicitors.