Leaving daughter out of will, advice needed please.

Malthusian

lisyloo wrote: »

If you have given away a large amount then it’s not bullet proof from a deliberate deprivation point of view.

We're talking about challenges by heirs. The OP is clearly compos mentis or they wouldn't be here, and has made no suggestion that she has any expectation of needing care in the near future.

Even if the OP gave all her money to her granddaughter and then did go into care tomorrow, her granddaughter would be liable to pay her care costs but she wouldn't be any worse off than if the OP hadn't given her the money.

(Unless of course the granddaughter has already spent the money. I imagine this scenario doesn't arise very often, but the consequences would presumably be bankruptcy for the granddaughter and Overmydeadbody Grove for the OP.)

Either the OP spends X on care fees and leaves the rest to her granddaughter, or she gives her money to her granddaughter, it's assessed as deliberate deprivation, the granddaughter spends X on care fees and keeps the rest. Either way the granddaughter ends up with the same amount.

By contrast, a successful challenge to the Will by the daughter, or an unsuccessful challenge that cost the estate money in legal fees, would leave the granddaughter worse off, in favour of either the daughter or their lawyers.

*edit* And let's not forget that it's not deliberate deprivation if you can show there was a motivation to give the money away that didn't involve dodging care fees. "Why did your grandmother give you all this money?" "To ensure my mother didn't get her hands on it, as confirmed in this letter she wrote me" is a very good motivation.

In that scenario the granddaughter may well do the decent thing and spend some of her grandmother's money on her grandmother's care to keep her out of Overmydeadbody Grove, even without being legally liable.

Marcon wrote: »

Leave a token sum to your daughter and leave something to a big national charity - preferably a % of the residual estate. They are absolutely excellent at seeing off challenges when their own bequest is under threat!

Do not leave %s to a charity, ever. They are also very good at blackmailing the granddaughter the OP actually wants to benefit into giving them a larger share of the estate, threatening to sue the executors if they don't give in. If you leave them a £ amount they have no leg to stand on providing they get what the Will says. (Although you must review this regularly, and if the estate is diminished, e.g. by care costs, it will become a larger % of the estate.)

Giving the granddaughter two potential challengers instead of one does not appear to solve much.