Help with Gifts of money!

samer44

My mother created her will recently and I have some concerns.

1. She didn't have her property valued , the will writer used her phone and just used a general estimate for the area, she said £200,000.. (my mums house is from the 80's, really needs complete renovation and has no central heating. She has a few thousand in her bank accounts.

2. Mum left £60,000 in gifts of money to her grand children and 100% of residual estate to me.

3. When I said I was concerned with the amount of gifts being quite high and that I would have to sell the house to pay for it, the will writer said you won't have to sell the house you can live in it if I wanted to.

So
a. I'm confused as to how the gifts of money are to be paid

b. I am also concerned that mum doesn't realise that she may need to make another will if she has to sell the house to pay for her care as the gifts of money are quite high and at this point it may become very stressful for her. She is 79 and has poor mobility and is not in great health. I have tried to explain to her but she gets upset when I mention it.

Any advice great fully received!

RAS

It really isn't your business to decide what your mum puts in her will. It is for her to decide. The fact that the property needs selling to pay the specific bequests is neither here nor there.

And she doesn't need a new will if she has to sell the house to fund her care. If when she dies there is enough left over, the grandchildren get their bequests and you get the residue. If there isn't enough to pay the specific bequests, then the grandchildren can be paid pro rata but there will be no residue.

Keep_pedalling

If she died tomorrow then you would either have to sell the house or if you really wanted the house buy out the GCs share of the house.

I agree that this is a poorly written will as it does not take into account the possibility that there is a chance her estate may end up much smaller because if she spends the latter part of her days in care the house will be sold to fund that, and after the bequest to GC the residual estate will be zero.

The general advice on this board is to always use a solicitor who will cover off all the what if situations. It seems clear your mother wants you to get the larger portion of her estate but this will could mean you end up with nothing.

Devongardener

It’s always difficult when specific sums are bequeathed to beneficiaries, it’s generally better to allocate a percentage of the whole of the nett estate value. 

For example if your mother’s estate is worth say £240K and she thinks she wants the grandchildren to receive £60K that leaves £180K to you, or in percentages one quarter for the grandchildren and and three quarters for you. This allows for fluctuations in house and savings valuations, and any care or other major expenses your mother might have in the future.
I know your mother doesn’t want to talk about it, but can you persuade her that a visit to a solicitor would make sure she understands the implications?

OldMusicGuy

Oh dear. We had a similar issue with my FiL. He drafted his will a while back and left many specific gifts of money to grandchildren and great grandchildren with the residue going to his kids. Roll on many years and he had to go into care, sell his flat and had a much smaller potential estate than he would have done when he created the will. We explained to him that specific bequests had to be paid first, and this meant his kids could end up with very little. He of course had no idea this was the case, and he wanted to be sure his kids had something. So he sat down with a local solicitor and drafted a new will which delivered what he wanted.

Unless you can sit down and explain this to your mother and get her to decide on what she really wants to happen, you will have to deal with a poorly thought out will written by someone who clearly has not explained the implications of that will.