Wills

[thefamous5]

Forgive me if I've put this in the wrong topic, I just know this gets the most attention!

I've just read a thread that refers to wills and it actually for me thinking.

I don't have a will.

I'm in my late 30's and healthy(ish!). I'm married, no intentions of divorce or anything like that (been together since we were kids, I quite like him!). We have four children together.

I don't own any property, or anything of great material value. I'm unlikely to either, (as is husband!). Just rented property, older car, no assets really.

I'm very close to my family (parents and siblings, I even adore my sister in laws) so nothing to worry about there either.

Do I need a will? Should I have a will? If yes,
what would I actually need to put in it?

Thankyou in advance for any advice!

I've arranged probate for the estate of several family members and if I could give anyone one piece of advice to make things easier when you are gone, it would be to write a will.

The first question for so many of the things which need to be done, start with 'is there a will?'

It's not impossible to continue without a will snd in some circumstances, there may be no difference in outcome.

Having a will makes everything easier. Why wouldn't you want to make things easy on whoever is left ?

Is there any complication which makes you hesitate about what arrangements to include in a will?

Wills aren't always necessarily about assets (although, you never know when you might win the lottery!).
You can put wishes in it like how you'd like your funeral carried out, for example.
You might decide to take out life insurance or private/work place pensions. Even if you only have minimal life insurance enough to pay for funerals, it can be a pain for a loved one to try claim this without a will.
More importantly, you can put in place what might happen should the children, God forbid, be orphaned. Who should raise them/reside with.
Let's hope it's not something you'll need for another 50 - 60 years, but always better to have one just in case.
Doesn't have to cost a fortune. Google holographic wills or do one through post office. Some charities do them for free if she offer to leave them a nominal sum, even £50 - £100

There's no estate and there won't be any (unless I won the lottery!), so there would be nothing along those lines for anyone to ever need to sort out.

There's nothing that makes me hesitant about creating a will and absolutely no complications. I'm just curious as if it is something I should do anyway.

The faff, time and stress your executor or next of kin would have to go through to prove there isn’t a will and guess what you want done with your books/jewellery/ornaments/furniture once you die probably outweighs the hour or so it would take you to write a very simple will and ask two friends to witness you signing it.

I never really thought about the funeral and child arrangements - this is what I mean, I'm not sure about this at all! It's just something I've never really thought about and thought to find our about.

Very good point about children - ideally they'd go to my parents who are still young enough to cope or my eldest brother. I would rather them go to my brothers rather than my parents in law (get on ok, but kids are closer to my family!) so I guess that's something I should think about formally writing down.

Pensions etc - I'm self employed (freelance so no big money or assets!) so it's private but again; I guess writing it all down makes it easier for anyone left dealing with it.

My family all know my funeral wishes (as cheap as possible!) but again, I guess writing it down formally would make it easier for them.

Thankyou !

In your situation, everything would go to your DH if you died, and if you both died at the same time, or if he predeceased you, everything would go in equal shares to your children. If one of your children dies, after having their own children, their share would be divided between their children.

That's the default. If you want anything other than that to happen (eg not include one child/give something to a sibling's child or the donkey sanctuary/bypass your DCs and give everything to grand children/whatever) you need a will.

Good point.

I'm a very basic person, so there is unlikely
to be anything to worry about really but yes, I suppose an hour or so now is better than any unnecessary hassle for someone after I've gone.

Oh, and you might want to add something to protect your DCs should you die and your DH to subsequently remarry, and then die. In that situation the second wife would inherit everything.
(you never know when you might come into some money unexpectedly - eg lottery/inheritance, so it's as well to be prepared).

There is likely to be an estate though. Your bank accounts, your car, death in service benefits, anything sentimental like photos or personal trinkets.

Do you KNOW whether or would go to your husband or your children or shared between your blood relatives? If you dont know the correct answer to that, that right there is an example of the burden the executor of your estate will need to deal with. Your children will be over 18 one day, what about then?

Yes, true.

My eldest is only 11 at the moment so a while off thinking about their families but life runs away doesn't it?

Thankyou. I think once they're all back at school I'll look at getting one sorted, and get husband to do the same.

My dad has recently been the person in charge of sorting everything our after his childless, unmarried very elderly uncle
died, but he was quite wealthy with property etc and I know that's been a ballache and a half to sort out. Always assumed that not having anything of material value I wouldn't need one, but it looks like it would be wise to do one anyway.

Thankyou!

Sort it, and sort it quickly.

Even if you only have joint assets, not having a will can cause delays and confusion when dealing with all the administrative stuff after a death. Worst case, people can come out of the woodwork and make a claim on your estate. Having a will reduces all that stress. Your husband will already be grieving, why add to his stress.

And that's before you even think about what happens if you both die in say a car accident, leaving your kids behind.

It's a really simple process, you can buy kits online or at W H Smith, and there's plenty of advice on what to write, it's not like you need to spend money on a solicitor.

Even a basic bank account needs sorting though.

The reason why neither of us have sorted it is because other than bank accounts (which are joint and we don't have any savings of note) ,there is no estate. We dont own and never will, old banger of a car, no expensive jewellery or anything of worth. The most valuable material item I own is my second hand MacBook laptop 🙈. I doubt there will ever be anything much either as we don't have families that have a lot in the way of future inheritance - one property on my side to be split between three of us, and that's if my parents don't need care!

There's no one that come after anything because apart from there being nothing, we don't have any complicated families.
Literally us, our children, our parents and our siblings and we all get on.

Obviously I know things can change in a heartbeat so if we did ever come into money/property/etc, we would have done one then, and when our kids are adults we would have done one, but it felt a bit irrelevant at the moment.

However it's definitely given me food for thought as to to what would happen to our children if anything happened to us both (ie go to next of kin on my side of the family rather than husbands) but there would be no one wanting to contest that anyway but yes, getting it down in writing formalises it's

Going to do one in next couple of weeks.

That money in the joint account could be the difference between you having a funeral or not. If you die without a will, that money can't be accessed, sometimes for years after.

Personally I don't put much stock in funerals, but it may be important to your children

I used a site called freewills.co.uk - it was recommended on the MSE website. It was very straightforward and really was free (although they do keep trying to get you to use their services for other things...)

There's always the possibility you might inherit something from somebody, that could change things.

Without a will, any joint accounts will be frozen until probate is granted. Could that leave either of you in trouble?
who will get the kids should anything happen to both of you?
do you have life insurance? Has that been put into trust?
having a will will make things much easier - you can name your executor, the kids’ guardian, etc.
it is not just for when something happens to one of you, but also if something happens to both of you

You should have a will to state who should look after your children in the event that you both die.
You should also ideally have life insurance in place to provide for your children and the executors of your will would manage this.