Understanding my late grandmas will

Sarahspangles

darrend2812 said:

@p00hsticks
@Sarahspangles - No, my aunt and uncle sadly never had children therefore the property is to be shared with my grandmothers grandchildren - 4 of us in total. 

I feel for your uncle, although it sounds as though you’re not rushing anything. Hopefully he’s in a position to move on to somewhere comfortable.

darrend2812

@Sarahspangles - I do too. As a family, we're not selling the property any time soon and reiterated my uncle can stay as long as he chooses however the will does contest this and requires us to sell. The house needs a lot of work and collectively as grandchildren we're unable to afford to pay for any refurbishments/improvements. 

silvercar

darrend2812 said:

@Sarahspangles - I do too. As a family, we're not selling the property any time soon and reiterated my uncle can stay as long as he chooses however the will does contest this and requires us to sell. The house needs a lot of work and collectively as grandchildren we're unable to afford to pay for any refurbishments/improvements. 

If the four grandchildren, who now effectively all own the property collectively, agree then uncle can stay as long as he wants. 

Sarahspangles

silvercar said:

darrend2812 said:

@Sarahspangles - I do too. As a family, we're not selling the property any time soon and reiterated my uncle can stay as long as he chooses however the will does contest this and requires us to sell. The house needs a lot of work and collectively as grandchildren we're unable to afford to pay for any refurbishments/improvements. 

If the four grandchildren, who now effectively all own the property collectively, agree then uncle can stay as long as he wants. 

Except the OP states that the Will requires the property to be sold.  In the meantime they are in the position of being landlords, and the OP also states they have no funds for upkeep or repairs for the property. There may also be a CGT liability although with house price inflation low this is less of an issue.

Keep_pedalling

Sarahspangles said:

silvercar said:

darrend2812 said:

@Sarahspangles - I do too. As a family, we're not selling the property any time soon and reiterated my uncle can stay as long as he chooses however the will does contest this and requires us to sell. The house needs a lot of work and collectively as grandchildren we're unable to afford to pay for any refurbishments/improvements. 

If the four grandchildren, who now effectively all own the property collectively, agree then uncle can stay as long as he wants. 

Except the OP states that the Will requires the property to be sold.  In the meantime they are in the position of being landlords, and the OP also states they have no funds for upkeep or repairs for the property. There may also be a CGT liability although with house price inflation low this is less of an issue.

If all the beneficiaries agree, then that clause can be ignored, the upkeep issue is the big problem.

unforeseen

Keep_pedalling said:

Sarahspangles said:

silvercar said:

darrend2812 said:

@Sarahspangles - I do too. As a family, we're not selling the property any time soon and reiterated my uncle can stay as long as he chooses however the will does contest this and requires us to sell. The house needs a lot of work and collectively as grandchildren we're unable to afford to pay for any refurbishments/improvements. 

If the four grandchildren, who now effectively all own the property collectively, agree then uncle can stay as long as he wants. 

Except the OP states that the Will requires the property to be sold.  In the meantime they are in the position of being landlords, and the OP also states they have no funds for upkeep or repairs for the property. There may also be a CGT liability although with house price inflation low this is less of an issue.

If all the beneficiaries agree, then that clause can be ignored, the upkeep issue is the big problem.

I don't think it can ignored because the grandchildren were left the residual estate and not the house. The house will continue to be owned by the estate until sold. The grandchildren are not in a position to do a DOV because none of them have been bequeathed the house. 

Keep_pedalling

unforeseen said:

Keep_pedalling said:

Sarahspangles said:

silvercar said:

darrend2812 said:

@Sarahspangles - I do too. As a family, we're not selling the property any time soon and reiterated my uncle can stay as long as he chooses however the will does contest this and requires us to sell. The house needs a lot of work and collectively as grandchildren we're unable to afford to pay for any refurbishments/improvements. 

If the four grandchildren, who now effectively all own the property collectively, agree then uncle can stay as long as he wants. 

Except the OP states that the Will requires the property to be sold.  In the meantime they are in the position of being landlords, and the OP also states they have no funds for upkeep or repairs for the property. There may also be a CGT liability although with house price inflation low this is less of an issue.

If all the beneficiaries agree, then that clause can be ignored, the upkeep issue is the big problem.

I don't think it can ignored because the grandchildren were left the residual estate and not the house. The house will continue to be owned by the estate until sold. The grandchildren are not in a position to do a DOV because none of them have been bequeathed the house. 

Unless I have totally misunderstood this, the house is part of the residual estate so the residual beneficiaries can make a decision whether to sell or not. If they don’t sell then the estate needs to transfer the ownership to. Not that I would recommend they do this as it leaves ongoing issues that could last many years.

sheramber

If the estate has no money what happens if the house needs repairs?

Although no rent paid the estate is now a landlord so needs to comply with the landlord laws 

https://www.gov.uk/renting-out-a-property

Sarahspangles

sheramber said:

If the estate has no money what happens if the house needs repairs?

Although no rent paid the estate is now a landlord so needs to comply with the landlord laws 

https://www.gov.uk/renting-out-a-property

I believe in this scenario the uncle would have a licence to occupy, so while the beneficiaries do have responsibilities they aren’t those of a formal AST.

Shelter covers this including case law:  https://england.shelter.org.uk/professional_resources/legal/renting/introduction_to_security_of_tenure/what_is_a_licence