Not sure where to start

findingthisdifficult

Sorry this is going to be a long one.

• My estranged Mother died in May this year
• She had 4 children, 3 of which were estranged from her (families are difficult)
• At the time of her death, she lived in a council house

My brother(2) and my auntie dealt with the funeral arrangements and emptied the council house of everything.
My brother(1), sister and I are estranged from them as well so no conversation was had about what to do with all our mother's belongings.
I am the youngest of my mother's children and there is a good chance there were quite a few things in her house that belonged to me like coursework, old clothes, maybe some jewellery. I have no idea what has happened to everything.

My brother(1) asked if he could keep some things from our mother's garden. He was informed that it had all been stolen....I don't think this is true.

My questions are:
a) is there a way to find out if she had a will? (I don't think she did)
b) we think she had life insurance (how would we find out what happened to it)
c) would my brother(2) had to have applied for probate in order to cover funeral costs etc?

Thanks in advance and sorry if they're really stupid questions but google has not helped me so far.

lisyloo

Sorry for your loss.

I presume you mean she rented a council house?

I can only answer 3) but If the amounts were small and just in cash then the banks would usually give out the money to your brother as a beneficiary.
The limits for banks are usually £30k or £50k.

Do you think it was a small insurance of the type used for funerals or a large amount?

You may have to say goodbye to it all as I’m not sure how you’d prove any of it. Your brother should not have thrown away your stuff but could you ever prove your mother never threw it out or it wasn’t stolen donkey years ago? (I don’t think it was I’m just saying it nigh on impossible to prove).

findingthisdifficult

Thanks for your super quick response lisyloo.

Yes she rented a council house.
I don't think the insurance was for funeral costs, but I have no idea of the amount it would have been for either.

I had a feeling we may just have to accept that we've lost it all but thought it was worth asking around.

lisyloo

If there was a life insurance in place then there would have been a direct debit or standing order running making ongoing payments.

One route to investigate would be to ask the bank, if you know which bank she used for her current account.

I have no idea whether they would say, sorry it’s closed and we’re dealing with brother(2) or whether they would provide the information.
I would expect to have to provide ID and birth certificate showing you are her offspring.
I have no idea what their response would be but that would be one avenue to try as there won’t be any insurance without ongoing payments.

Socajam

If you and your brother were estranged from your mother, why would you want any money from the estate?
It's hard, but move on life is too short to hold bitterness, trust me on this one.
Also, why did you not get in touch with a family member you had communication with to get your stuff?
Don't let this stuff eat you out because we have to die and leave all the crap we collected during our lifetime.

findingthisdifficult

Just to be clear Socajam, it wasn't all about the money, for the most part of my life we got along fine, we fell out over a few years ago over something really silly which I for one will regret for the rest of my life, thanks for assuming I was just questioning this for anything I could get!!

There wasn't a family member involved in dealing with her funeral and belongings that I was in communication with to ask about my stuff.
My 3 siblings and I found out there would be an actual service less than 24hrs before the funeral!!

Marcon

findingthisdifficult wrote: »

My questions are:
a) is there a way to find out if she had a will? (I don't think she did)
b) we think she had life insurance (how would we find out what happened to it)
c) would my brother(2) had to have applied for probate in order to cover funeral costs etc?

a) if there was a will and it went to probate, you can buy a copy for £10. See https://www.gov.uk/wills-probate-inheritance/searching-for-probate-records
b) you probably can't. If the life cover was made by means of a single premium, there would be no ongoing payments appearing on either bank or credit card statements. Outside chance it might not have been claimed and you could try https://www.uar.co.uk/Customer/Home
c) no, particularly if the estate was quite small (certainly not if under £5,000)

Don't forget that if this was a council house, the council in question would require it to be emptied and handed back to them as soon as possible, so your brother and aunt would have been under pressure to get things sorted out/disposed of. If you were estranged, sadly it isn't surprising they didn't contact you.