Inheritance nightmare - charge against the house

[DoneOver]

My step dad has died. His will leaves me and my siblings my mum's house. (She died first, house nothing to do with him.) However we have now found out that a while back he put a charge against it which gives most of the house value to his own daughter. (not my mums child.) Clearly mum stuffed up by dying before she wrote her will. But its very unfair, is there any legal redress at all?

@Bluntness100 a trust is not always administered by a bank or solicitor, a life interest trust would be dealt with by the executor, which was fairly likely to be the step father, so it’s possible he could’ve put a charge on the property when he really had no right to. OP really needs to get proper legal advice, but I don’t suppose we’ll find out if she has as she seems to have disappeared.

Could you post the exact phrasing of her will? It sounds like she attempted to create a trust and he was the trustee?

@Bluntness100 trustees do often breach their fiduciary duties you know

I haven't disappeared, I've been at work! Plus I have little to add at the mo...I do indeed need some legal advice since (as has been noticed ) I dont have a very good grasp of it all. I will update when I get some clarity!

@Bluntness100 - The OP said, " Im guessing he did inherit the house...he always said the house was in trust". She has not said definitively that he inherited the house. Everything else she has said suggests a lifetime trust. Of course, I cannot say definitively that there is one which is why my posts cover both possibilities. But, given what she has posted, I lean towards there being one.

Your most recent post makes assumption after assumption and is just plain wrong in a number of respects. You are extrapolating from your own experience and assuming everyone else's experience is the same. You clearly don't know the law. It is quite possible the OP's stepfather was the trustee and put a charge on the house, ignoring his obligations as trustee. And I have no idea why you think "probate lawyers" would have been involved at that point.

You cannot say definitively that there was no trust. On balance I think there probably was but no-one can know for sure unless they have seen the OP's mother's will.

I'm pleased you're going to seek real life legal advice as it could strongly be to your benefit.

Glad to hear you are going to solicitors. There is too much guesswork on this thread & you'd be wise not to pin your hopes (or fears) on what some posters have to say. Bring the will & also get a current copy of the property title if you can or bring folio number if you know it. It will save time if you have it as solicitor will need to know who is registered as owner & if your Mother, if SF had a life interest.

There can be many complexities in dealing with a probate. Don't guess or make assumptions - get proper legal advice & ask questions until you do understand who is entitled to what.

www.gov.uk/get-information-about-property-and-land/search-the-index-map

OP please listen to @prh47bridge she knows what she is talking about.

she knows what she is talking about.

He

@titchy

she knows what she is talking about.

He

Really ? I didn’t know men could be lawyers. What are they called to distinguish then from real lawyers - gentlemen lawyers ?

What on earth, SHARON?
prh47 is a male poster.

Defo legal advice.
You may be able to get what you are due if he’s messed up somewhere along the lines. Get your mums will online so you have it to hand and his will also, and take to lawyer.

Right, for anyone who is still interested I have had somone explain mum's will and it clarifies the following:

• mum's will did leave everything to step dad. Im a bit gutted. She'd told me and siblings it was in trust but we can find no evidence of that and a trust isn't referred to in the will. As I mentioned before, she did say she needed to re-write it when she found out she was terminally ill, but that didnt happen. So I assume we are buggered.
• step dad also told us it was in trust , made promises to mum when she was ill, but as above, we have no evidence of this so I now assume he was a lying shit
• just after mum died he put a charge on the house in favour of his daughter, to be 'cashed in' when the house is sold, to the tune of about £300,000
• he left the house to me and siblings in his will. However we have now seen that the charge says his daughter can insist it be sold whever she wants in order to collect the charge money. I assume she will do so fairly quicky!

Extra details - this was my family home, step dad never lived there, mum rented it out and moved in with him. His daughter has never seen it let alone lived there.

I think I have made sense of it now tho. Step dad put the charge on in case we contested mum's will. But it never occurred to us. We believed what we had been told. More fool us, eh?

Thanks for those who commented etc, it did help me clarify stuff, even if I did come over as a naive confused fool. Turns out that was spot on

Very sorry to hear that, op.

That is awful.

I can’t imagine being your step sister and taking your mums inheritance from her children.

Do you know her well?

Oh OP I’m sorry, that’s awful and so calculated, some people really are shits.

In that case the charge makes no sense. He could simply have altered his will to give his daughter however much he wanted with the rest to be shared between you. By creating a charge he is claiming that he owed his daughter £300k. Very strange. I would still get proper legal advice in case you are missing something important.

Earlier in the thread OP suggested he did it soon after his wife's death, in case her children contested the will. Whether that would have made a difference I don't know.

He’s probably promised the mum he’ll leave the house to OP and feels that by doing it this way he’s fulfilled his promise, while still giving most of the value to his daughter.

I don’t deal with charges being put on a property so I don’t know if there would need to be any proof of the daughter giving him any money or not, but I would’ve thought there would or I suppose you could use it to avoid inheritance tax. Worth looking into.

@Itwasntme1 No I dont know her, met her at the wedding and funeral and thats it
@prh47bridge He must have thought we'd contest mum's will. This way we would have still been stuffed even if we did, I assume.

So basically, he has left me and my siblings a £300K debt. And what if daughter doesnt sell it at once, are we liable for insuring it etc in the meantime?? What if house prices fall and the house is no longer worth that much, do we still owe her that amount of money?? Im starting to think this could be even worse than I initially thought.

Oh Op, how horrible for you all. Please get legal advice and hope you get sorted.

It's starting to sound like you've inherited a poisoned chalice OP, I hope I'm wrong though

What a horrible horrible man your mum married.

You really do need legal advice. What happens about inheritance tax?

It’s very possible op your Mum did think she was leaving it to you in Trust. Maybe he was so ‘kind’ to sort it all out for your Mum? Arse...... so wrong. Sorry to hear this. My husband had a very similar thing happen to him 15yrs ago. He ended up with 10k when he was always told the house was his (about 200k) He didn’t fight it. But he has nothing to do with that side of his family anymore!

this was my family home, step dad never lived there, mum rented it out and moved in with him
Was it still rented after she passed away? Who collected the rent? Are there still tenants there?

Did it still have a mortgage to pay on it? Could it be that his daughter gave him £300k to pay the mortgage off?

If he inherited the house, then he could have left you and siblings nothing but he didn't. Until you understand why he put a charge on it, you can't really judgeg his actions.