As an executor paying bills for an estate

wilkko73

I'm going to start acting as an executor for my  late mum's estate soon.I was wondering today how bills that are owed would be paid such as remaining social care bills etc and was reading about an executor account  can be opened to pay bills but if you DO NOT have a Grant of Representation an Executor Account can still be opened, however, you will only be able to pay out the final funeral bill and receive payments. You will not be able to make any other outgoing payments from the account.

So how would you get a Grant of Representation ? And is that just a certificate that you can show to the bank?A Grant of representation is not the same as completing probate is it?

p00hsticks

Did your mother leave a will ?
If so and it names you as executor then that should be sufficient evidence for the bank that you are the estates representative. However, they still may not release any money to you without probate, especially if there are other beneficiaries. 

If you don't have access to money from the estate to pay the bills, then you either have to tell the people owed that they will need to wait until you have access to the assets, or if you personally have the funds and would prefer you could pay them out of your own pocket and reimburse yourself when the estate money is released after probate 

You don't need a specific executor account (not many banks offer them now),  just open a new current account in your name to receive the estate money and pay any estate bills as and when you can. And keep good records of all incomings and outgoings to produce the final estate accounts.

Keep_pedalling

Based on your other thread you would seem to be the only executor and beneficiary of your mother’s estate so you don’t really need to open an executor estate, but for simplicity I would keep estate money separate until you have wound up the estate. You just need a separate bank account in your own name.

You are going to have to apply for probate to get the house transfered to yourself, but you may not need it for her bank and savings accounts as banks have quite high limits they will pay to the executor without it (up to £50k in a lot of cases). 

Depending on the value of her estate you may also need to do an IHT return. This will be needed if it is over £325k or £650k if she was a widow and had inherited all of her husband’s estate. 

wilkko73

Hi @Keep_pedalling         Thank you, the house could be possibly £520k at the very most  comparing it to recently sold homes in the road but ours is rather tired to be fair, she has about £25k in savings and about £13k of that will go on the funeral and remaining care billls owed.I believe my late father that died a long time ago will have an unused allowance. I've lived in the house since birth is there not another allowance of £175k that can be added to the £325 for mum as well,? I'm a bit confused about all of these allowances and which ones to apply 

Keep_pedalling

You will not need to use the residential NRB exemption, you can get away with just user her NRB and the transferable NRB from your father’s estate, which gives you a total exemption of £650k. Not using her residential NRB means you do not have to complete an IHT return.

As her estate will be well under IHT territory with that £520k valuation I would go with that for the probate. Alternatively, if you are thinking of downsizing when this is all sorted out, get 3 estate agent valuations and go with the average, which would give you a better idea of its value.

wilkko73

Thank you @Keep_pedalling I don't know if this effects things in terms of my late Father's allowance but the home was transferred to my mother in 1995 as that's when my dad became ill with cancer and he must have thought that would put mum on a more secure footing he died in 99 so would that be seen as him using any of his allowance ?Although I don't think there are taxes involved between passing from husband to wife even though the gap was less than 7 years.But I know nothing about this kind of thing.

Keep_pedalling

wilkko73 said:

Thank you @Keep_pedalling I don't know if this effects things in terms of my late Father's allowance but the home was transferred to my mother in 1995 as that's when my dad became ill with cancer and he must have thought that would put mum on a more secure footing he died in 99 so would that be seen as him using any of his allowance ?Although I don't think there are taxes involved between passing from husband to wife even though the gap was less than 7 years.But I know nothing about this kind of thing.

It does not mater what the value of your father’s estate was at the time of his death, you can still claim his full unused NRB. If it was actually needed you could also claim the transferable residential NRB even though that exemption did not exist at the time and he did not actually own a home either.

wilkko73

Thank you @Keep_pedalling so you know you said earlier in the above case if you used the NRB from Mum and dad which made £650k so an IHT return would not have to be completed how do you tell them about the NRB for Mum and Dad that I want to use is that just mentioned during filling in Probate forms and is there a particular form to declare that an IHT return is not required? I suppose a death certificate and a marriage certificate would need to be sent as well for proof to apply Dad's NRB.

Keep_pedalling

wilkko73 said:

Thank you @Keep_pedalling so you know you said earlier in the above case if you used the NRB from Mum and dad which made £650k so an IHT return would not have to be completed how do you tell them about the NRB for Mum and Dad that I want to use is that just mentioned during filling in Probate forms and is there a particular form to declare that an IHT return is not required? I suppose a death certificate and a marriage certificate would need to be sent as well for proof to apply Dad's NRB.

The probate application asks you if you have had to submit an IHT return or not and also asks if  are claiming the unused NRB from the pre-deceased spouse. 

The probate application can be done on line but you might like to have a read through the paper version before you do to see what information you will be asked.

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65a900ce94c9970013aeb9c6/PA1P_0124_citizen.pdf

wilkko73

Hi @Keep_pedalling

Thank you for your help

wilkko73

Hi @Keep_pedalling so I'm named as the executor on the will I'm a bit confused reading about applying for a grant of probate so is that something I have to apply for before even attempting to fill in probate forms online

I read this online  "Before issuing a Grant, the Probate Registry will have dealt with any disputes about the will which they’ve been told about and will have confirmed if any inheritance tax due has been paid"   So you've got to confirm that IHT has been sorted before you even send off for a Grant before you can even start on the probate,if in my case where I'm later using those 2 NRB so not paying inheritance tax how do I declare that when sending off for the Grant of probate which I assume is a letter or certificate that I need before even starting probate?