I want to know if my mother is entitled to anything please. My sister died 9 months ago after having been married for only 6 months. Proper to her death she had a will that named my mother as sole beneficiary to her estate. Her husband with whom she had not lived together or had any assets together is claiming the whole of her estate under the law. Do we have a right to challenge, my sister was financially supporting my mother over the past 20 years as she gets very little in pension!! (Click for our general page on Contentious Probate.) More on Probate Disputes. Probate Claim Checker.
Answer: Unless her earlier Will was made with the marriage in mind (which would be documented) or after the marriage, it was cancelled by her marriage. Very few people seem to be aware that marriage cancels a Will in most cases, and either a new one needs to be made, or the old one “revived” with a special codicil. Clearly, your sister may have made another one.If there is no valid Will, then the Rules of Intestacy apply, and her husband is entitled to the first £450,000 of her estate, assuming there were no children. He also gets half of the balance over £450,000 and the other half of the balance is given to her parents (in this case, mother). If there are no parents alive, then the balance is shared between her brothers and sisters.So if she had a large estate, your mother would get something. Your mother could make a claim under the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975, normally within 6 months of probate being granted, so she should see a good contentious probate lawyer immediately as time is of the essence. Your mother may well be able to make a claim under the Act if the husband will not make a sensible offer, which he may well. Do make sure that the first letter from the solicitor is a friendly one – some tend to go for the jugular straight away, and prevent any possibility of the family very working together.
Good luck!
Is mother entitled to anything?
]]>My husband and I were appointed executors by our best friend who was diagnosed with terminal cancer and given 6-8 months to live. He wrote a will stating that after debts, funeral and testamentary expenses, legacies and inheritance tax are paid then any monies left should be paid to his daughter. He has no property, he lived in a shared house, and the only money he has will be his private pension when that is paid out. A couple of weeks ago he stated to us both that he wanted to give each of his brothers and sisters £1000 each. We advised him to write a letter and put it with the will. Sadly he passed last week, just 6 weeks after being diagnosed without having a chance to write the letter, we had to take him to the hospital as he was so unwell. Are we allowed to uphold his wishes even though it was never written but it was something he stated to us both.
It depends. Sometimes assets are left to the executors to dispose of as they see fit, and in this case they certainly have the right to act on a verbal wish and are unlikely to be challenged. At other times they could get themselves in hot water if any other beneficiary feels they have lost out through an unauthorised gift.That said, Minor Gift Schedules are quite commonplace, but they should be mentioned in the Will and should only contain things which are very small in comparision with the total estate and of very limited value.
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