Buying a house while claiming benefits question

Britannia12345

We're renting at the moment. The solicitor is a different one from the one we're using to buy the house. He's advancing us just enough money to buy the house and pay for the conveyancing, not the full amount of the legacy from the will. Obviously when the full amount comes through our benefits will stop. 
I asked him if it was possible to pay for the house directly but he says the money has to be paid into our bank account. 

Spoonie_Turtle

Then as far as I understand, it needs to be in your bank account before you claim UC in order to get a year's transitional protection, disregarding the capital over £16,000.  If the rest of the money comes through within the 12 months (providing you haven't bought the house and gone below £16k in the meantime) then you'd still be able to claim UC for the full 12month period.

It would mean your claims for IS, HB, and CTS would stop, but ESA and PIP would continue unaffected and the Child Tax Credits would continue until the date you claim UC.

Muttleythefrog

Grumpy_chap said:

Why does the money ever have to go in to the OPs account?
Why can't the Solicitor simply pay for the house directly?

I would imagine it raises all sorts of issues for parties involved. For the conveyancer who is the client, resolving beneficial and legal owners, how can they enforce terms and conditions signed by the purchasers (such as on sending monies/payments, providing information) if responsibilities lay with a 3rd party, anti-money laundering complexity added. For the solicitor handling the estate getting embroiled in a transaction they have no interest in and elevated risks of involvement in fraud or money laundering. For the purchaser risks the solicitor will fail to act in their interest properly and difficulties possibly proving they have the funds for the transaction to seller side/estate agent (as they will not likely have any immediate financial information like a bank statement to show access to the funds they're committing to the table unless and until they do have control of such). I'm sure there'd be other issues I haven't thought of off top of head including insurances.

It just seems a no no although I'm not sure if there could be a different approach if the solicitor or solicitor firm had been the same (which appears not the case here) for the matters in question.

Others raise relevant issues including the transitional protection and timing of the monies received and that transfer to U/C. And yes the purchase transaction itself it liable to take many weeks, probably months. But also the point that further inheritance will be received... the timing of which is not known but if that will indeed end entitlement to means tested benefits then I suppose the issue (at least one of retaining such benefits) is a temporary one anyway... and on that point I'm sort of in a parallel situation as my wife needs to resolve her mother's estate abroad... she will surely need more than a month outside the country so will lose U/C but when the estate is dealt with then that would end the claim anyway. 

Good luck with plans.

Time2Go_25

I always thought that other than for a few exceptional circumstances money couldn't be released until after probate.