Solicitor has not applied for probate yet!

cherry76

Daughter mil died in June, solicitor is the executor and has not applied for probate yet. My sil is so laid back and is not putting pressure on her. My daughter does not want to interfere and just let her husband gets on with it. It is going to be costly with winter approaching and the house also needs to be checked as they live far way. I cannot interfere as well it seems applying for probate and being granted will take a long time. The house is worth aprrox £500,000 to be sold. Will not be surprised if it will take more than a year to obtain the grant. Estate is very uncomplicated. 

p00hsticks

Assuming you mean June this year then that's less than four months, which doesn't seem too long to me. You say the estate is very uncomplicated but then say that there is a property which by itself is worth more than a single  IHT allowance. 
Better to take time to get the probate application right than try to rush it and make mistakes or omissions which then lead to delays in probate being granted....

RAS

Guess your SIL is grieving his mum's death? And if she appointed a solicitor as executor, it will take a lot longer to get probate than might be the case with DIY.

Not least as probate can't be applied for until the IHT liability is fully assessed and payment made towards it. So the money has to be garnered in first.

The inheritance will be nice when it arrives, but you need to keep out of this if you want to remain friends with SIL.

cherry76

RAS said:

Guess your SIL is grieving his mum's death? And if she appointed a solicitor as executor, it will take a lot longer to get probate than might be the case with DIY.

Not least as probate can't be applied for until the IHT liability is fully assessed and payment made towards it. So the money has to be garnered in first.

The inheritance will be nice when it arrives, but you need to keep out of this if you want to remain friends with SIL.

It’s the parents who did a mutual will when they got married and never updated it and appointed solicitor as executor. SIL did not ask her to renounce and she never offered. They both passed away, there will be no inheritance tax as the estate will not be more than 1 million. I do agree I need to keep out of it. There are two beneficiaries sil and eldest brother.

RAS

Based on other comments here, mutual wills can be more problematic than mirror wills.

Rhubarbium

My mum died at the end of April and I’ve been doing the probate myself. I’ve not been hanging around but going through the process takes time. I didn’t final number I needed from one of the banks for the IHT400 until  August. I then submitted that to ensure we got my father’s nil rate band transferred. You then have to wait 4 weeks after submitting the IHT400 form before applying for probate. So it was 18th September when I submitted that. I guess it’ll could be early next year before probate is granted. So in summary the process takes time regardless of who’s doing it…..

SVaz

They could ask the Solicitor to step aside and deal with it themselves.  

There is no incentive for a Solicitor to do things quickly.
I’d be raging by now,  your SiL should have the grant in his hand or very close to it.
My Dad died in late July 2020 and my wife sorted out probate, we had it by the October.  

They aren’t going to get the house on the market before Xmas at this rate. 

I hope there is enough residual cash to pay the bills all Winter and the empty house insurance,  plus they will have to start paying Council tax in December. 

Your Daughter needs to be more proactive,  explain the above issues to them both. 

p00hsticks

RAS said:

Based on other comments here, mutual wills can be more problematic than mirror wills.

But also based on comments on this board, many people mistakenly refer to mutual wills, which are rare, when they actually mean mirror wills, which are commonplace and generally add no more complications that would two independent wills. 

p00hsticks

SVaz said:

 plus they will have to start paying Council tax in December. 

No they won't, if they are in England / Wales and the property is empty as a result of the death. 
A class F council tax exemption applies for up to six months after the grant of probate is awarded (not six months after the date of death)