Making sense of a Will

E0909

Hi could someone please help me make sense of this Will? am I right in thinking that a codicil should be attached. Thank you in advance

I give devise and bequeath all my estate both real and personal whatsoever and wheresoever of or to which I shall be possessed or entitled at the time of my death or over which I shall then have any power of appointment or disposition by Will and not hereby or by and Codicil hereto otherwise disposed of unto my Trustees upon trust to sell call in and convert into money such parts thereof as shall not consist of money with full power to postpone such sale calling in and conversion for so long as they shall in their absolute discretion think fit without being liable for loss and to hold my residuary estate (consisting of my ready money and the proceeds of such sale calling in and conversion after payment thereout of my funeral and testamentary expenses and debts and any legacies hereby or by any codicil hereto given) upon trust for person A aforesaid if she shall survive me and attain the age of 18 years absolutely provided always that if person A shall die before me of before attaining the age of 18 years then my trustees shall hold my residuary estate upon trust for person B

Keep_pedalling

No, codicils are basically amendments to a will so are never written when the original was drawn up. It is simply saying that these clauses are subject to any codicil written between making the will and the death of the testator.

Yellow_mango

I must say I’m a big fan of the “modern trend” to write legal documents in English. There is just no need for this!

E0909

Thank you keep peddaling would you also know if where is says any legacies hereby might mean?

nom_de_plume

Hereby roughly means in this case "by means of this Will" or "by this Will".

E0909

Could anyone explain to me what this basically saying .. the reason for me believing there may have been an attachment was because of the mention of legacies but very little detail here many thanks

Mojisola

E0909 wrote: »

and to hold my residuary estate (consisting of my ready money and the proceeds of such sale calling in and conversion after payment thereout of my funeral and testamentary expenses and debts and any legacies hereby or by any codicil hereto given) upon trust for person A aforesaid if she shall survive me and attain the age of 18 years absolutely provided always that if person A shall die before me of before attaining the age of 18 years then my trustees shall hold my residuary estate upon trust for person B

E0909 wrote: »

Could anyone explain to me what this basically saying .. the reason for me believing there may have been an attachment was because of the mention of legacies but very little detail here many thanks

As I read it, it's an attempt to future-proof the will in case the deceased made any codicils later on - if you haven't found any in his/her paperwork or lodged with a solicitor, you'll have to assume there aren't any.

It looks very straightforward - if A is 18 or over and alive, he/she gets everything; if not, B gets it all.

E0909

Mojisolo where it says upon trust would that mean a trust fund is in place?

Mojisola

E0909 wrote: »

Mojisolo where it says upon trust would that mean a trust fund is in place?

No, it means the executors hold all the various elements of the estate until the estate is settled and they pass the final amount on to the beneficiary.

It sounds as if you would benefit from having a short appointment with a solicitor to confirm to you exactly what the will says to put your mind at rest.

AnotherJoe

Was whoever wrote this charged by the full stop?

Try reading it without punctuation, and you'd need scuba equipment !

FreeBear

Many solicitors are averse to using punctuation in wills. Their reasoning is a simple full stop or comma can alter the meaning and extra punctuation could be added at a later date.

Breaking the block of text down in to sentences separated by blank lines would avoid confusion and make it easier to read.