Inheritance

[chocolatesaltyballs22]

Need advice please. My daughter (17) has inherited a substantial sum from her grandparents on my ex husband's side. They died several years ago and I knew there was an amount held in trust for her until she's 25. I didn't realise there was an issue until recently when my ex brother in law got in touch with me.

Basically there was a pot of money split between 3 surviving grandchildren. The issue is that my ex has since had another child (who his parents didn't even know existed) and is now contesting the Will to try and get his new child a share of the money, despite what the will says. His brother is obviously tied up in all this as it impacts how much his kids will get. It's likely to go to court and as part of that we are trying to get the money released for my daughter when she is 18 so that he no longer has control over her.

My concern is that my ex has control over the trust and we know that he has not ringfenced my daughter's money from his own inheritance. So if he died tomorrow the money would likely be split between his two children.

His brother has fallen out with him over this and has a solicitor involved. My ex is very controlling and abusive and my daughter rarely sees him any more. He's being very difficult about the whole thing and just keeps telling my daughter that she doesn't need to worry about it. I don't trust him.

Do I need to get my own solicitor involved or should I leave it to the brother? I could really do without the extra worry at the moment but I don't want my daughter being screwed over by her own father.

Anyone?

I don’t know the ins and outs but if her money isn’t ring fenced I’d be taking legal action to get it in a separate trust (if it has to be in a trust) immediately. If his contesting of the will is successful the trust can then hand back the correct amount if compelled to by the court, but the rest will be safe.

Who's the executor? Is it the brother? Personally I'd leave it to him. I doubt your ex would be successful in contesting the will if the three grandchildren were named in the will. However, as he is a trustee he could mess things up that way. Are there other trustees you can trust?

My ex is the trustee along with some solicitor friend of his that he roped in to be the other trustee. We emailed the other trustee asking some questions but we haven't had a response from him. He passed it into the ex to answer all the questions and he's just lied about where the money is, then abused the brother for getting me involved in it all. It's a mess - I don't know what to do.

Get your own solicitor. You need to protect your daughters money

When my grandparents passed they had 3 kids and the money was split 3 ways. One auntie has no kids, 1 had one daughter (my cousin) who died with no kids herself then there was me and my brother
Nothing was left to Grandchildren only children and if my mum had 4 kids the money would be stretched round

If it's actually willed to your daughter then my understanding is it's hers but if it's her dads or he's the trustee he could effectively share his half between his children be it 2 or 8 and if someone disputed it it would be down to the courts but possibly they would likely award your ex husband half and his brother half as that's seen as a fair split.

Something like this happend to a work colleague and there was 4 grown up kids and some had kids and 1 didn't and she was arguing saying she wanted 25% of the pot and the trustee argued thisenwith dependants should get more of it

The court split it 4 ways but every case is different

It is illegal for him to withdraw any of her money, apparently

meetfabric.com/blog/what-is-a-trust-fund#

To be clear, my ex and his brother received an amount themselves. Then the remaining money was split 3 ways between 3 grandchildren, one of whom is my daughter. I believe my ex has lumped all of her money in with his and invested it all together, without ringfencing her inheritance. The more I talk about this, the more dodgy it sounds.

You need your own solicitor who specialises in trusts. Now.

Him accessing her money many well be illegal but once it’s gone your daughter won’t be able to get it back.

It is far too late to make an Inheritance Act claim and, in any case, it cannot be used for grandchildren unless they are dependent on the deceased at the time of death. He could contest the will on other grounds but it sounds like he effectively wants to rewrite the will so that, as well as including grandchildren who were alive at the time the estate was distributed, it gives equal shares to any grandchildren born later. I don't give much for his chances.

As trustee, he is holding your daughter's inheritance for her benefit. He may not use it for any other purpose. If he uses (or has used) any of it for himself or his new child he is in breach of his duties as a trustee and can be required to personally make up any shortfall.

If that what you think he’s done then he’s in trouble.

Being a trustee is a legal responsibility. They must only act in the interests of the beneficiaries not themselves.

Is this definitely a will trust? If so you’ll be able to view the details of it as once probate is completed the will becomes a public document. Without seeing the terms of the trust everything is speculation.

I wouldn’t bother discussing this with your ex I’d spend some money on a decent solicitor and ask them to investigate on your daughters behalf.

Get legal representation ASAP. If his friend is his solicitor, I’d say they’ve done something dodgy.
I’m not surprised he’s your ex. The money was meant for the three gc, not any future ones.

What prh said.

I’d use the solicitor your ex-BIL is using and make a joint claim. It will simplify things, your ex-BIL has the same aims as you (full amount to existing 3 GC) and it keeps everything focused.

I would want to have a chat with a solicitor with a mind to take legal action. Not least to have her money transferred directly in to and ISA or account under her name. Not his.

How much is it, will it be worth potentially a couple of thousand in legal fees? These things do rack up quickly.

It's worth the legal fees. She's due to inherit in the region of £90k.

Thanks for your advice everyone. I'm going to look for a solicitor.

Great you are getting a solicitor. Trustees have certain duties and responsibilities. One key responsibility is that trustees must provide accounting. Basically they have to produce good records of the financial side of the trust. Certainly the minute she is 18 she should ask him to show detailed accounting of what has happened to her money. If her father refuses she needs to ask the other trustee. If they both refuse then they are in breach of their duties. If someone has very obviously breached their duties as a trustee then your solicitor would help you to take them to court. You would ask the court to remove the trustees and they would appoint alternative, I would expect some other solicitors. As for him fighting for his other shield to get a slice that is likely to fail. A case where a challenge to a will might succeed is if someone let's say wrote a will leaving everything to a person they were having an affair with and nothing to your spouse. Or if a someone dies leaving everything to a spouse when they has a child under 18, the child might be awarded an amount in place of child support. Or an adult child with disabilities that left them unable to work who was financially supported by a parent might be awarded money do they would not be suddenly destitute. There cases would probably succeed because the dead person was financially responsible for the claimant. These grandparents had no financial responsibility towards this other grandchild. The ex will need to prove the grandparents were financially responsible for the child.

Also I believe that benefiaries had have power over trustees in some circumstances if they unanimously agree on something and are all over the age of 18. I have been doing research for a legal issue in my fiances family and I read that trustees have the duty to act in the interests of benefiaries. Therefore if all beneficiaries want someone I think they can club together to demand it. Essentially I read that even if a trust says age 25 if all beneficiaries ate over 18 and unanimously demand their money they can get it. It said that this is because it is slightly dodgy ground legally to withhold money from adults. I'll see if I can what I read. Also if the ex does not give her every penny he is personally liable. I think giving some of her own money to his kid would be seen as fraud.

If it is a discretionary trust which some will trusts are then it might not be that any specific beneficiary is entitled to any specific amount. I think as pps have said you must get a specialist lawyer.

If the brother is of the same mind as you there's no need for another solicitor at the moment.

In my fiances family a trust was created by his grandmother. Her house was to be used by one of her children to visit her son with downs syndrome and when he dies her estate will to be divided. The trustees have a lot of power over the division of the estate, it is a discretionary trust and they can divide it in any way they want. Her beneficiaries are her issue and greater issue which means children and grandchildren and great grandchildren. However it seems to have been decided by trustees on moral grounds that everything should go to children only ( to two daughters) and that grandchildren should not be involved. We only know because we found the will on the government website, it was not seen as important to inform anyone other than children. point is that in some cases children may feel they have a moral right to their parents estate split equally. They may see themselves as being much closer to their parents than grandchildren and therefore may see themselves as being morally justified doing dodgy things with trusts. This does not mean this behaviour is legally justified. Your ex probably feels that morally half his parents estate should have been his and half his brothers and that his children should not have got anything or a token amount until he himself dies. While this is a very common sentiment and may explain his behaviour that is not what the grandparents wanted. Particularly as grandchildren may be giving money to stop it going to a random new spouse of a child. Fiances aunt has stepchildren that we expect her to leave her half to and his late seventies mother has a new much younger fiance she met a few months ago and they are planning do wills to make sure they are both ok other if one of them dies. He is the most likely survivor due to being 7 years younger. so if she dies before her disabled brother half the estate may well go straight to her widower who will doubtless give it to his own family. So don't feel bad about being ruthless, it's what the grandparents wanted and they may have wanted it for good reason as I myself would consider giving straight to grandchildren due to the risk of a random step parent ending up with family money.

Particularly annoying if the two sisters die before their brother and money goes half to new stepdad and half to stepchildren who entered the family in their thirties and who gran never really knew, but that's complex trusts for you !

if its a fixed trust (i/3 of the money to 3 grandkid) then his actions of intermingling that money with his own are illegal as far as I know.

The other trustee, if there are a solicitor is ALSO responsible.

If dad just died, they would have to trace the money using various rules (which i study next term) and her 1/3 share would still be hers, and not shared 50/50 with his other child.

I'd get back onto the other solicitor to say what you understand the case to be and can he confirm, as if its true, you will report them both (i'd check with an independent solicitor first, get them to act for you, getting all the facts first, copy of the will etc)

Thanks everyone for the really good advice. Ex has told other trustee not to respond to me as he doesn't want to incur legal fees. Well he shouldn't have bloody appointed a solicitor as the other trustee if that's the case should he! I belive that the other trustee has a duty to respond.

Trustees have certain duties, every trustees must be willing to communicate with beneficiaries. Every trustee must provide clear accounting to beneficiaries. Every trustee should be accountable and personally liable for mismanagement of funds. Desiciobs over management of funds are taken together and so all trustees are personally liable as far as I'm aware. I dont think they are allowed to play the blame game and say it was all someone else's fault if money gets mismanaged. If your ex gives money to the other child I think you may possibly be able to chase both of them for the money as a court may just assume they would have both agreed and were both aware of not going on. Because if one of them paid no attention to what was going on with the money they have enabled the mismanagement to happen.. that's the point of having more than one trustee ! I think if ex makes the money disappear you could go after both trustees in court. If neither of them have cash you could have charged put on their house I'd have thought but please check everything with your solicitor?

Do you think his solicitor friend would like being held financially liable if ex gives money to someone not in the will so essentially embezzling it. How do you think the solicitor friend will react if you tell him that ex had not ring fenced money is going to take half of it for his other child and got will be chasing both of them in court. You could ask his solicitor friend if he loves ex to potentially loose money in court because ex has taken it and he is also responsible as a trustee with regard to not stopping it happen. Also you could look into reporting solicitor friend to the law society for professional misconduct if he insists ex should do whatever he wants with the money and basically steal it.