Mums Will, failed!

[1452kc]

Husband(H) and Wife(W) walk into a Solicitors(S) to make the W Will, both H and W are present in the same room at the Will writing. W has been unwell for a number of years and will, just a few weeks from now pass away. H and W have lived separate lives for many years, separate beds, separate rooms and if finances would have allowed, separate houses. They have no children, H has no children, W has adult children from a prior relationship. H and W bought a house together over a decade earlier, the house they live in, the bulk of the purchase was made with W money, which included inheritance from W parents and blood relatives. However they own the house 50/50. H is somewhat controlling and abusive.

W tells S she wants to leave her half share in the house to her children, S adds to the Will, i assume after informing W this is what would be needed, that 'there was to be no restriction on the sale of the property' and 'no life interest for the H'. The point of these statements was to ensure the children got the W share in the house upon her death, not decades(?) later when the H dies. The H has significant funds of his own after inheriting his own fathers house.

During this meeting about the Will, the S asks these laypeople(H and W) 'is the house held as JT or TIC', what layperson know the ramifications of that? Anyway, S states in his notes that the(who responded?) response was 'TIC'. As the house is held as TIC what W has put in her Will, ie leave her share in the house to her children, is valid. Anyone can check the Land registry for a few £'s to find out the answer to JT, TIC, why didn't the S or S secretary do so? Why even ask the question? S should confirm with the source(Land Registry). Lazy, negligent, stupid, in on it? The H and S were both male, same age, etc.

Around a week later H walks back into S office and asks 'what if the property is not held at TIC?', S states, ' you will need to discuss that with your W'. S does not contact W. H does not talk to W.

A few weeks later W passes.

Turns out property as documented at the Land Registry is held as JT. Therefore W share passes to H and Will is worthless.

There may be paper work at the property that severed the JT, but that cannot be accessed. H will not allow it.

So the issue is the TIC vs JT. Many argue a course of action can severe a JT without any formal paper work explicitly severing the JT. If you apply for divorce it's likely you don't want to leave your share to your soon to be ex partner. Equally if you make a Will in front of your partner that states you want to leave your share to your kids, not them, surely that severs the JT. It's just common sense. Another point is, both(we will never know) H and W stated the property is held as TIC during the Will writing, that's a mutual agreement right there, a bit like saying 'i do' in the church.

So why does H now own 100% of the house? What a bs legal system. Deliberately grey, it should be a flow chart.

So how do we go back and get JT changed to TIC, so the Will is effective and the children can get their inheritance.

Thanks

Whilst she was alive, she wrote a contract(Will) that left her share to her children. Thus the tenancy can be seen to have been severed at the point she signed the contract(Will)

You may believe this to be true,but it is not

Because Wills don't come into effect until after death. That's the whole point. They don't mean anything before that. They don't hold any power before that. The posession of a Will doesn't sever a JT. She didn't sell or give the house to you while she was alive.

You can put anything in your Will, but if it's not legal it won't happen. If I wanted, I could write in my Will that I want to leave my neighbour's house to my sister. But that's not going to happen because it's not my house. The whole house automatically became your mum's husband's when she died. Your mum had basically written in her Will that she wanted to leave half of her husband's house to her children. She couldn't do that.

You could maybe challenge the Will on the grounds that your mum wished to leave her share of the house to her children but a legal error was made in severing the JT or while recording the Will. But you would have to prove that. So far you have nothing to say that she did try to sever the JT or that she didn't tell the solicitor it was JT. These things get very expensive very fast.

A Will is not a contract.

From Co Op legal services

"If you own your property with someone as Joint Tenants it means that, upon death, the ownership of the property passes to the remaining owners that are alive and it does not pass under the terms of your Will."

There it is, it is what it is and always has been - it might not be fair, might not be logical, but it's how it works.

I really understand your upset and pain, but that doesn't change how these things work.

Just a long as everyone sees how backward it is. The fact a Will doesn't sever a tenancy when it operates in a way to explicitly exclude the other tenant, is daft and backward, and needs to be addressed. This is not a technical or engineering challenge where there are REAL problems have to be solved.

This is just paper work, someone made an oversight, it happens, ie not including a Will such as this to be able to sever a tenancy, they failed to put that scenario in a list of things that can sever a tenancy. That list simply needs to be amended. It's just paperwork.

The will is a set of instructions to the executor, it is not a contract - as said above it doesn't come into effect until after death, and if something is stated in the will that cannot be enacted, then that just doesn't happen.

If James & Doreen own 23 Acacia Ave. but later divorce, sell and split the proceeds and move on, James goes bankrupt and dies with nowt, but his will was never changed and leaves 23 Acacia Ave to his son - it can't happen, as he doesn't own the asset.

Likewise in your case, the law automatically gives the joint Tennant, who already owned 100% of the house (joint tenants both own 100%, so when one dies, their is still a sole owner) then the will doesn't work, and the instructions in it do not get enacted.

Another example would be Burt has a Picasso and wills it to his nephew Jeff, but later sells the Picasso, then Burt dies, Jeff has no gift to receive, he doesn't have a claim for the cash equivalent, the asset no longer exists.

someone needs to change that , there just words, so that the law as written in some law book, and are easy to change.

""If you own your property with someone as Joint Tenants it means that, upon death, the ownership of the property passes to the remaining owners that are alive and it does not pass under the terms of your Will.""

here you go, an amendment "Unless your Will explicitly details what is to happen to your share, in which case the Will is followed with regards to your share in the property"

...why has it not been fixed?

Because legally, in a joint tenancy both parties own 100% of the property, when one dies, the remaining party still owes 100%, the dead parties 100% ceases on their death, there is no transfer, and as the surviving party still owns 100%, that they have always held it is still theirs.

Joint Tenancy is unique, it's not held as 50/50

the Will operated on her half share, that 'half' share has been repeated everywhere, they own it 50/50 not 100/100, when she passes the 50 passes to the other 50 owner.

You only have 50/50 in TIC, in JT it's 100/100 and neither party can will to anyone other than the other.

That's why it has to be TIC for the will to work. In JT both parties have 100% vesting in the survivor of them on death.

Anyone with eyes in their head can see what was intended. What the intention was, and that intention was legal/allowed/etc. So why are judges not simply looking at this nonsense and ruling in favour of Wills.

You would never get away with this bs in engineering/technology/science, any stem area where real problems have to be solved, because this is bs nonsense, that not one has bothered to fix this even though it would take 2 mins to write the amendment into the book.

stem > law

"Tenants in common each own a predetermined percentage of ownership interest in the property. Joint tenants, on the other hand, each own 100% of the property."

"With joint tenants, each co-owner owns 100%, but for tenants in common, the ownership percentages total 100%. The ownership share can be broken down any way you like. For example, Tom could own 50% while Richard and Harry each own 25%. Alternatively, they each could own 33.33%."

It’s not a question of fixing it- it’s that way on purpose because no one has a right to know what’s in your will before you die. If you could sever a JT by will, that would allow an owner to benefit if the co-owner dies first but sever if they themselves die first, which is obviously unfair.

I know you are frustrated but it doesn’t follow that the law should be changed.

Does this mean that you first raised the complaint over 15 years ago?

Unfortunately, is it not the case that the claim is now out of time? It's very frustrating and unfair OP I understand, but it appears you were not able to prove your claim in 15 years.

i appreciate you writing it down, and i know its 'real', but its nonsense. its la la land. It's not logical or sensible, and it's only that way because a not very smart person put it in a book a long time ago, and no stem people have come along and amended it since; because they are busy solving real problems; instead of created problems that only exist due to poor wording.

All the best, Good night!

...why has it not been fixed?

It doesn't need to be "fixed". Joint tenants already have the ability to sever the joint tenancy.

The law is very clear.

"Joint tenants" both own the whole property. When one owner dies, the other owner becomes the sole owner.

"Tenants in common" own shares of the property. You can leave your share to whoever you want because you are the sole owner of that share.

But why does it need changing, this works for those that choose it.

Your DM (and family) should have checked the full implications and if the outcomes wouldn't be what she wanted, change the agreement so that the outcome is what is wanted.

Just because you think it hasn't worked out for you, doesn't mean this option is taken away for others.

I don't know what STEM has to do with the law. If STEM people are as smart as you think they are, they will also tell you that the law is very clear on this matter.

And that is the wrong attitude, you have an error in your flowchart, it comes from the fact you are missing a section where a drafted/signed Will that operates on that person's half share of their property, DOESN'T server a JT, when it should, as that is the intention.

In the STEM world, we would fix these problems so they can't occur again, in Law you perpetuate them, even though (unlike the STEM world) it's just a few words in a book to fix it; whereas in the STEM world it might be years of research and graft to fix a problem.

Dunning-Kruger in action.

Give it up OP.

This appears to be ancient history. You’re not getting your hands on the cash

There is a bug, it should be fixed. Then the solicitor would not be doing 'work' that was pointless. ie Drafting Wills that don't work.

"this works for those that choose it." ? except it doesn't, and this is one of many examples.1 in 5 Wills a solicitor puts together, fails to some degree, that is a very poor track record, and wouldn't wash in any other profession.

People seem to find it hard to admit that the work they are doing is a bit crap, and worse still, they are not prepared to improve that work, or improve the system, so it less error prone.

Even though to make those improvements is very, very simple.

STEM > LAW

Night Night.

🎁🐸

If H has no children, who inherits from his will. Or if he doesn't have one. Actually presumably he does, because he was at the solicitors originally. If not, Won't it come to you anyway?