Who to leave assets & savings to

[ThreeTwoFour]

I have a few assets and savings, worth a fair bit, shared jointly with DH. I need to make a Will to make sure my father isn't able to inherit a penny if I die (abusive awful person) so DH will automatically be the sole owner of it all, but then DH asked but what happens if we both died, or when he dies after me/vice versa?

Neither of us have family to leave anything to. :( Would it be weird if we leave it to friends? Should we tell them? Or a charity of some sort - again, do they need to be informed?

It's a first world problem for sure but it's giving me a bit of heartache feeling sad there's no one close to inherit all our hard work.

Not a legal person ('m sure someone will be along shortly to advice properly) but we have a similar situation. We have made mirror wills leaving everything to the other partner in the event one of us dies. We also have addition provision detailing exactly who gets what in the event we die together (in a car crash, or similar situation, for example). In my case, my brother and his daughter, plus a small provision to favourite charity.

Just make sure its all written into your will, properly witnessed and signed and that you have appointed competent executors to carry out your wishes.

That's very helpful, thank you.

I don't know anyone who would be a competent Executor - another hurdle!

Hi this is quite common really. If you don’t make a will and your DH died before you it could all go to your dad so you definitely need one. A solicitors firm can be your executors so if you’re really stuck, make sure you’ve picked a solicitor with good reviews etc. You can leave to friends, charities etc and you don’t need to tell anyone. They’ll find out when they need to x

You can appoint a solicitor to be executor of your will

You can leave your assets to whoever you want , after DH, including friends and even some donations to charity - local small ones hardly get any funding. So a local animal rescue centre or community charity

Your request is quite common, "Leave everything to Person X unless they die within 28 days of me, in which case leave everything to Person Y or Charity Z"

You can appoint a solicitor as executor but they will either charge a fee or a proportion of your estate.

If you choose to put a charity as a beneficiary they will probably be willing to act as an executor so they get all the money.

The Solicitor can act as an executive. It's usually best not to tell people that they are in your will. My current boyfriend bought his house from a charity. The owner had no family and had left it to them. Have a think about what's important to you and pick a cause to give a contribution to. It could be a different one than your DH.

There's nothing wrong with leaving it to a friend or a charity. Perhaps if you went to a university you could leave it to a scholarship fund and help a few disadvantaged strangers very early on in life. In some ways I think that's much more romantic than the idea of paying for adult children's house renovations or something!

A charity or friends are fine; make it clear in your will that you have decided not to leave it to relatives due to not having a functioning relationship. One question; if you both died then who would know to get a copy of the will? Rather than directly giving to friends, do you have any friends with children who don't have a great amount of money? You could leave it for the children with parents as executors, it's a gentler way to give. You should ideally not tell them, because circumstances might change meaning you want to change your beneficiaries, and they wouldn't miss what they never had; you can ask them to be your executor without revealing the contents.

A charity, or multiple charities.