Should my solicitor have told me my parents house had sold?

[Tryintoparent]

Sadly my parents passed away and left their house to be shared between me and my two brothers. They appointed a solicitor to be executor of the will and we are currently going through the process.
The solicitor takes ages to reply to emails and phone calls which is really annoying but most annoyingly she didn’t inform me personally when my parents house sold.
My brother was told via phonecall from her of the exchange date etc but my concern is, how does she know my brother and I have a good relationship and can trust that he will pass on the message to me and my other sibling.
Surely something like this should be communicated to all three of us via writing? What if I had have wanted to visit their house one last time and was denied that opportunity because it had exchanged and completed without my knowledge…
I’m trying to work out if she has been negligent or if I’m simply expecting too much?
Any help would be gratefully appreciated

I would have expected the three siblings to agree for one to be the point of contact with the solicitor tbh. If a solicitor makes three phone calls you will be charged for the time it took to make three calls, not one, ditto three letters to inform you in writing. Most people would be annoyed at what they may well perceive to be unnecessary costs. Going forward I would clarify with the solicitor who/how you want contact being mindful that all contact will have a cost. If she picks up the phone to return your call but has no information to pass on she will still bill for the call so she is possibly trying to be nice.

We recently sold our Parents house as they have now both passed away.

Myself and my Brother were executors and had a solicitor deal with everything to deal with probate and the sale.

They only contacted me or my brother, they did not contact my other siblings to tell them about offers, exchange or completion, we let them know about offers etc as even though we could decide without them we thought it only fair to involve them.

If they only have your brother as a contact they will only contact him and expect him to pass on any information - they will not know the family dynamics.

Have the solicitors been contacting you about other issues, do they have your contact details.

Who instructed them and who was their contact.

As a beneficiary they will contact you by letter to ask for proof of who you are and your bank details to pay the money.

The more the solicitor does the more it costs.

Did your Parents appoint them as executors because of the family dynamics and is your brother the oldest / golden child so they gave his contact details ?

Sorry for your loss 💐

Thank you for your replies.
Yes, that’s a very valid point about everything she does costing us more money.
We hadn’t been asked (nor did we think) to appoint one of us as a point of contact.
i suppose that has been the messy thing about all of this.. she will contact one of us regarding one matter and then another of us for something else so there hasn’t been any consistency in the lines of communication.
Solicitor has all of our contact details.
We all get along fine. My parents appointed the solicitor as executor so that none of us would have to deal with it all. They didn’t name any of us to be head contact.

I work in a solicitors and this is perfectly normal, if you didn’t get on we’d expect you to let us know and as pp said the more times we contact you the more it costs. We do get complaints that we don’t respond quickly enough too, but you need to understand that solicitors aren’t a call centre, we’re doing work that sometimes requires a lot of time on one thing, and we have other clients who also need our attention or sometimes your question means we have to go and get information from someone else to be able to answer it, which again takes time.

Thank you for this.
i think I have been expecting too much lol

The executor is not your solicitor, she was appointed by your parents to carry out the wishes expressed in their wills. I think in her shoes being expected to phone 3 siblings separately is a bit much. There's also a risk, where siblings don't get on, of allegations that they're being given different messages one favoured over the other etc etc etc.....

That said knocking off a quick email to all three would be quick and easy.

The solicitor should really be agreeable to using your preferred method of communication. So if you all jointly ask them to email you all with updates they should agree to that.

Did you brother tell you?
If so, what’s the issue?

The presumption unless she is instructed otherwise will be that she can speak to any of you and that will get passed on

Also - she has been instructed to sell the house, not think about your emotions. I expect she told your sibling about the exchange because she needed some info or à confirmation she could agree paper work.

I am sorry for your loss

If it bothers you just ask her to communicate with all three of you by email. That way you all get the same info at the same time. I'm a solicitor and tend to pick up the phone because it is fastest, but won't result in a lot more cost for you all to receive a single email.

In my experience as a solicitor, if I am appointed as the executor I would only give updates to beneficiaries at key stages to minimise costs to the estate. However when I do, I would always try to give all beneficiaries the same information (usually by email because, again, it’s cheaper to do one email than several telephone calls). The exception to this is if a beneficiary has contacted me for an update, so perhaps your brother contacted them?

We set up a joint email account for all the correspondence around the house sale, probate, funeral arrangements, so we all had access to all the interactions. No one was left out of the loop although I did most of the correspondence from our side.

Also, as an aside, beneficiaries are actually entitled to surprisingly little information. They are entitled to be told they are a beneficiary and to see the estate accounts at the end. However, most professional Executors would usually give periodic updates as a matter of course.

My parents used professional executors for their wills. I have 2 siblings. I don't remember anyone ever agreeing who the point of contact would be but it seemed to be me! So I would say it is fairly standard practice.
I remember taking a call when I was in the Supermarket saying buyer wants to exchange and complete in 2 days time. It was an advisory call, not something for me to 'agree' to.

That's bad then , a free for all. She should have asked for one contact point.

This.