Solicitors/inheritance/family or all 3

Cannot decide which is making me most grumpy today so I am saying all 3 I think !
Solicitors because they seem to have no idea what they are doing but they were paid in advance so we seem stuck with them.
Inheritance because what should have been simple has turned into a nightmare of large proportions.
Family because they are making it all so much worse than it needs to be and refuse to work together !

I can see this all dragging on long after this generation are all dead and gone at this rate.

Re: Solicitors/inheritance/family or all 3

This is one reason to make out a will which we did many years ago. Saves all family arguements as to who should have what and why.

Re: Solicitors/inheritance/family or all 3

Well in this case there is a will and we all know what MIL wanted, it should be a straight split 4 ways since FIL has died but over a year later we are still trying to get solicitor to put it through probate.

Re: Solicitors/inheritance/family or all 3

it may not be the solicitors fault, probate can take ages, a friend whose father died it took over a year to get sorted quite recently

Re: Solicitors/inheritance/family or all 3

Oh it is, they keep passing it from one partner to another all too busy to do the case. That was after we found them, they had merged and not told their clients I had to go through the law society to trace one of the solicitors from the old firm then they had to find who had our case !

Re: Solicitors/inheritance/family or all 3

Know what you mean, our solicitors have "lost" the information on my late mothers trust fund. Worse than that they are part administrators of the Fund as are myself and sister. They were supposed to oversee and advise on which shares to get and when to swap to our advantage. So far it has been up to me to find companies and all they have done is loose money to brokers and their fees.
Unfortunately it is very hard to break a trust fund without all parties agreeing and my sister is the fly in the ointment she wont agree to break it.

Re: Solicitors/inheritance/family or all 3

Solicitors -who else gets paid more for messing up and fobbing folk off with excuses?

Re: Solicitors/inheritance/family or all 3

A word of warning....quite some years ago a friend of ours had big problems re her father's will. Pauline, our friend, was adopted as a baby by a farming couple. Shortly after being adopted the farmer's wife died so he employed a housekeeper to take care of the house and baby. Auntie, as we all called her, including our friend, would only take the job on provided Henry (farmer) married her. He agreed but it was never a marriage as such, Auntie was paid a wage and had her own rooms. Everything worked well for years, Pauline grew up, married and had 3 sons, Auntie became Auntie Howard to them too. The problem arose when Henry died, he left money to the 3 boys, money to Auntie and the rest to Pauline. Auntie was not happy but Pauline offered her half of the money, but Auntie didn't want half she wanted it all. The case dragged on for almost 4 years, eventually it had to go to some law court in London who eventually ruled in Pauline's favour. However by the time all this was sorted out there was virtually no money left, it had all gone in legal fees and basically nobody benefited, they all lost.

Re: Solicitors/inheritance/family or all 3

Unless a will is complicated involving large sums of money/investments/ inheritance tax probate should only take 5 or 6 weeks. It is in the solicitors interests to draw it out as long as possible and many do just that charging for every phone call and letter.

Re: Solicitors/inheritance/family or all 3

It's a large sum of money to us but I guess that's relative ? about £200,000 in all
It was complicated slightly by my MIL leaving it in trust with the capital being protected for her sons and their father having the interest. But once he died it should have been simpler just sharing the money out after probate.