Is There A Trust To Ensure House Goes To My Beneficiaries?

Foresty_Forest

I want to leave my house to my beneficiaries, to share in its sale after my death. If I were to outlive my wife, how would I protect the house from my myself, any future marriage and the authorities? I have a friend who says his stepmother pressured his father into making a deathbed change to his will, effectively disinheriting him. So is there a trust (or other arrangement) I could have set up to ensure that the house goes to my beneficiaries?

Browntoa

Possibly , but you need the expertise of a solicitor with experience of estate planning , not the "experts " on a forum .

Needs to be done at an age when you would not expect to be needing care soon otherwise "deprivation of assets" can be an issue and it all reversed

Mojisola

Foresty_Forest said:

I want to leave my house to my beneficiaries, to share in its sale after my death. If I were to outlive my wife, how would I protect the house from my myself, any future marriage and the authorities?

If you and your wife own the house as 50/50 'tenants in common' and write wills that leave half the house to the beneficiaries with the right for the survivor to continue to live there, at least half of the value will be protected.

As Browntoa says, see an experienced solicitor and explain your requirements.

princeofpounds

Although it's not very clear what you goals are (you are not really that specific in your description, nor in your current circumstances), but yes, you can probably use trusts as part of a strategy to achieve the inheritance outcome you are looking for.

One of the most common arrangements is to put the house (or a share in the house) in a trust, assign what is called a life interest - essentially the right to use the property until death - to someone, and then it passes to the ultimate beneficiaries on the death of the person holding the life interest. It essentially sets the arrangement in stone, managed by a trustee who is responsible to all the beneficiaries.

Protecting the house 'from the authorities' is a slightly different matter... if your set-up is contrived to get around inheritance tax or care fees it may well fail, as it rightly should. There are rules around concepts like 'deprivation of assets' and 'inheritance tax taper relief' that prevent tax evasion and reduce the scope for tax avoidance, but within those rules you can sometimes find a more tax-efficient set-up if you plan sufficiently in advance.

You should consult with a solicitor who specialises in estate planning.