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

But they would have a copy in the file, which I assume isn't the case here alas.

the paper work from the solicitor is scant, and doesnt contain anything regarding a severance. The paper work in the home is not available to us/gone/burned.

Did she have an email? These days drafts are usually sent that way rather than by post.

This

yeah, but its been over ten years of ownership, which solicitor did the severance, could of been any one of a dozen in town, the firm that handled the purchase of the property merged with the firm that did the Will, but a different one may have done the severance.

Good call, and OP might be able to access that.

And that's the big part of the Ops problem, its all down to them, the husband has , as far as can be proved, done nothing wrong, and doesn't have to do anything - he has inherited by default, for him that's that.

Yet in your first post you said H and W have lived separate lives for many years, separate beds, separate rooms and if finances would have allowed, separate houses
So what is it?

If the solicitor had provided her with the paper work they will have a record of that. And no they're not legally obligated to chase people. Plus, as they charge for every phone call and letter they send, clients woud not agree to being chased either.

Well, apart from seemingly being aware his W Will was worthless and instead of informing her, H just went out and made a big ticket purchase that day....and waited for W to die. Yeah, so apart from that done nothing wrong.

Again, in your first post you said that your DM / stepfather stated to the solicitor that their house was owned as Tenants in Common. It’s not the will writer’s job to check this information! So if it HAD been owned as tenants in common, BOTH parties would have been required to sign for it to be changed as joint tenants.
You’re fighting a very expensive losing battle. What you think should be the law isn’t what the law actually is. You may have some claim on your mother’s estate if she was financially supporting you already, but it doesn’t sound like this is the case.

No, he said 'what if its not TIC' he didnt state which is was, he just asked what effect that may have, and this 'what if' was a week AFTER the W made her Will.

And all of this is irreverent, the LR should have been checked by the Sol.

Why would he need to move into a large camper home - you said he had inherited his own property!
Are you making this up as you go along?

You said H went to the solicitors afterwards to enquire as to whether the JT meant the will wouldn't work.

This action works in his favour as he can claim that he wasn't aware until he checked with the solicitors, and could say something like a friend said he should check.

He sounds like a sod, but I don't think you can prove any sort of conspiracy, even if he was conspiring against your DMs wishes (he clearly doesn't want to follow them) you can't, suspicion and proof are different animals.

Sadly he has the law on his side unless you have the proof of the severance, and that I fear will be elusive.

If H/W told the solicitor the house is TIC, he would accept that in good faith and wouldn’t routinely ask for deeds to confirm. If they weren’t sure, they should have said so and it could have been confirmed by looking at deeds. It looks as though the mistake lies with H/W.

A complaint to the solicitors ombudsman is free, but I’d think very carefully about your chances of success before spending any money pursuing a legal case, as gutting as it feels.

Can you/have you checked for this severance document with all local solicitors?

I'm not replying to you anymore, you keep 'stating' things as fact, when ive written otherwise. In this one you have said 'need to move', I never wrote that, no he doesnt 'need' to, it was a peace deal as the camper was worth £35-40k to make up for that fact he was pissed at losing his W's half share in the house, as for some reason H thought he would be getting everything and W kids would be getting nothing. Your not really understanding the hoops a person has to jump through when living with an abusive, coercive partner. If you going to quote me, quote me, correcty.

Do you have a report or witness statement from an expert in preparing wills as to whether this is viewed as correct practice? Can you point to anything in the standard textbooks advising on this as good practice? It would be immensely helpful if both apply.

So you would ask someone with dementia about the tenancy position of the property? Instead of spending 2mins and £7 checking it?

Would you ask someone who seems healthy but was 102 years old?

What about someone with an iq85?

What about someone who is trying not leave their partner their half share in the house and that person is in the room with them, and you have to go home with them?

Exactly, where is your cut off? Why try to judge/guage/guess at a situation when you can get the EXACT answer in 2mins for £7.

It’s very easy to check deeds with the LR, and it’s very clear how it’s held by more than 1 owner. If your DM bought the house 10 years ago, the deeds will be at the LR - she would not have a paper copy. Seeing as she used the same firm of solicitors to buy the house and write the wills one would assume she used the same firm to change ownership from JT to TIC. Are you claiming that they have been so neglectful that they’ve destroyed the paperwork? Or are you claiming that your stepfather somehow has managed to change ownership from TIC to JT behind your DMs back?

This may be of zero help but my two pence worth.

We bought our house in 2003 as TIC. We weren't married. We only got round to making wills in 2019 (yes shame on us). We told the will making solicitor that our house was TIC. For whatever reason (their suggestion or ours) this got checked. Lo and behold we were registered as JT.

So who made that mistake? The solicitor at the time of purchase, an administrative error in the registration office. Who knows?

Is this an avenue worth checking - if your mum believed it was TIC, could an error have been made in the registration process?

We never pursued getting to the bottom of our incorrect registration, just amended it.

I haven't read the full thread, apologies if this has been covered.

as for some reason H thought he would be getting everything and W kids would be getting nothing.

Probably because he was there when they bought the house together and the tenancy was explained to them.

There is absolutely no reason for a will writer’s job to to check ownership of a property - the same as they would not check how much the person has in their bank account, or the value of any article they have stated in their will should go to Aunt Freda! Just because you think that should happen, it doesn’t mean it has to in law.

Why guess, just check the LR when doing the Will.

I'm a solicitor and I think this is negligence on the part of the solicitor. Make a formal complaint to the firm and ask them to confirm they have notified their PI insurer. Their insurance will cover this and you should pursue the claim through to a settlement, which may well require you to instruct a (different!) firm of solicitors to run the negligence claim for you.