Waiting for probate

Rae626

I wonder if anyone can shed any light on this.. 
I’m a first time buyer and had an offer on a house accepted back to October 2020, all was going smoothly (valuation done, mortgage accepted after 4 weeks, searches done), then unfortunately one of the vendors sadly passed away so a probate application needed to be made. I love the house so I was and still am happy to wait. I was told there are delays in applications due to COVID, however, I’m not sure how long the delays are. 

I see everywhere it can take years, but from what I’ve been told the vendor had plans in place in case this happened so paperwork should be straight forward. 

Has anyone had any recent dealings with probate, and if so, how long was the process from application to you getting your keys? Starting to get anxious that it’ll never happen... 

Any advice (or reassurance) is welcome! 

Tiglet2

We applied for probate in June when a close relation passed away.  There were a few complications, but received the Grant in September.

GN2020

I’m going to keep an eye on this thread as I’m in the same position. 

Our seller passed away a few weeks ago so it’s gone to probate. 

I’ve been told the only asset she had was the house and her estate is very straightforward (left a will naming her beneficiary etc) 

Our mortgage offer expires in June, I’m hoping to god it doesn’t take that long! 

Good luck with yours, I hope it gets sorted out really soon! 

Rae626

Tiglet2 said:

We applied for probate in June when a close relation passed away.  There were a few complications, but received the Grant in September.

Sorry to hear about your relation! 

Ah I see, so around the 3 month mark then. Maybe I will hear something soon. 

Thank you for your help!  

Rae626

GN2020 said:

I’m going to keep an eye on this thread as I’m in the same position. 

Our seller passed away a few weeks ago so it’s gone to probate. 

I’ve been told the only asset she had was the house and her estate is very straightforward (left a will naming her beneficiary etc) 

Our mortgage offer expires in June, I’m hoping to god it doesn’t take that long! 

Good luck with yours, I hope it gets sorted out really soon! 

Yes I was worried about my mortgage expiring too. My advisor has told me not to worry, but I can’t help but worry at the minute. Buying your first house is stressful enough as it is. 

Thank you. Fingers crossed we both get some news soon! 

GN2020

Our broker has said not to worry as well, he said if worst comes to worst we’ll apply for an extension. 

But our solicitor doesn’t think we’ll need it! 🤞🏻
We’re FTB too so this is all new to us as well. 

I’ll keep everything crossed for you 😊

p00hsticks

Unfortunately I think it's a bit of a 'how long is a piece of string' question. The question gets asked quite frequently over on the 'Death, Funerals and Probate' board and the answers seem to vary depending on how complicated the estate is - for example this thread from just before Christmas had some people seeing a turnaround of around ten working days, but more complicated cases where the will is homemade and hand-written and/or there is IHT to be sorted are ongoing after months

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6217111/probate-timescales/p1

NinjaTune

3 months from submission of the form for us.  Our solicitor was very surprised it went through that fast.

If your vendors were joint tenants then probate might not be needed to sell the property.  My understanding is that the property automatically passes to the surviving partner/joint owner without the need for probate?

Mutton_Geoff

I submitted an application in October 2020 and it just came through 10 days ago so around 3 months.

Rae626

NinjaTune said:

3 months from submission of the form for us.  Our solicitor was very surprised it went through that fast.

If your vendors were joint tenants then probate might not be needed to sell the property.  My understanding is that the property automatically passes to the surviving partner/joint owner without the need for probate?

It’s an awkward one so I’ll not go into too much detail but I believe this was double checked and it was found that probate was needed. 

Hopefully mines 3 months too! 

JGB1955

10 days for me....(back in September) but I realise that's likely the best one can hope for.