Trouble with step-daughter who’s contesting a Will

[FluentAzureOP]

Hello everyone, I’m hoping the hivemind has some suggestions for this as it’s deeply troubling. My friend’s dad has recently lost his wife after nearly 20 years of married life. He loved her deeply and is still grieving her death. In fact it’s hitting him hard again as the first anniversary of her death draws near.

He and his wife made ‘mirror wills’ which left everything to the other one and named the surviving spouse as Executor. As far as I know, the wills were properly written out by a solicitor and signed and witnessed properly. A short while ago he decided to apply for Probate believing that he needed it to legally administer the will only to find that his step-daughter had blocked his application. This is the latest attack on him by the woman concerned. She previously suggested that he would dispose of her mother’s belongings to his own family and not her’s, she has accused him of stealing a family heirloom and has said that she doubts he will pass on a valuable piece of men’s jewellery to his step-son. She has also taken some jewellery items.

He has been deeply upset by this. He’s grieving for his wife and has tried to explain that he would never just discard anything of his wife’s, and if there’s anything in particular his step daughter wanted just to write it down in a list and he will either give it to her or leave it to her in his own will as he will have to make a new one.

He always treated his step-daughter with honesty and affection, regarding her as essentially his one of his own children, and has been generous and supportive to her, as he was to his wife, and has no idea what’s behind it all, except, perhaps, that his wife’s former husband is guiding it from behind the scenes.

His feels a deep sense of betrayal and the relationship has got so bad that he regards his step-daughter with total contempt now. He’s written to her solicitor (who blocked the Probate application) asking what the grounds for contesting the will are and they seem to be ignoring his letters.

He understands that the will cannot be contested as his wife was in good physical and mental health when she made it. Does anyone have any sensible advice for him (apart from just ‘go and see a solicitor)?

Thank you in advance 😊🙏🏻

Unless the daughter was financially dependent on her mother, I would agree, very little chance of success. And would still argue she hasn't been disinherited until the SD passes. I mean, she is probably not doing any favours to her chances of being in his will for much longer. But maybe they were already on bad terms or he had been clear he wasn't including her in his will, who knows we just don't have enough info.

I lost my husband so understand your friend’s grief, but there is no excuse for him not making more effort to give this woman her mother’s possessions. A year is nothing in terms of grief, but it is plenty of time to organise things like handing on family heirlooms and jewellery.

I didn’t contest any will.

But it was a bitter pill.

Spouses grieve and move forward to love, and sometimes marry again. While their departed spouse remains in their heart, there is often space for somebody else to be their New Spouse.

But your parent. Not so much. It’s a full stop. End of the line. And grief for a parent, I discovered, can feel like somebody has pushed you face first inside a washing machine of emotions. Whirling you so fast you barely register what you are feeling before your head is banging about underwater again with a new wave of something else.

Including rage. At your parent for dying. At the universe for taking them. At your parent for deciding that the feelings of somebody they chose were of higher consideration once their time on this earth was done, than those of a person they made. At the bereaved spouse who may in time, move forward. While you are stuck in No Parent Anymore Land.

He’s grieving. So is his late spouse’s child. It can be messy. Legal argy bargy can be a way of expressing an internal wail/roar that words cannot.

Support him. He is your friend.

Leave space for some understanding that he is not alone in his grief. Bear in mind he might not be ready to hear that right now. But one day, when he wants to make sense of how things unravelled, it might help comprehending, if not forgiving.

May all concerned find peace, which can be a long time coming, but so welcome when it finally finds you and lets you out of the turbulent emotions washing machine from hell.

I think it's unlikely that they were joint tenants because stepdaughter is challenging the will & a solicitor has obviously advised her.

I think it's highly unlikely that she's in his will which is why she's so pissed. She's angry because her SD has taken some control of her mother's finances perhaps

The OP said they had mirror wills so i
I would say it is very likely she IS in his will.

By leaving everything to the man you refer to, the dead woman cut her daughter and other child(ren) out of her will. I imagine that is why the daughter of the dead woman has blocked the application. It does seem quite odd to cut your own children out of your will and so I suppose the daughter of the dead woman is upset and angry.

Even if the man's will provides for his own children and his dead wife's children, he can easily change that and cut the wife's children completely out - the daughter of the dead woman is understandably probably not inclined to trust the man to leave her her "share" or her mum's money.

He can presumably change that though.

It might be that he's had to wait to settle any bills - including bills for a memorial.

I had confirmation [the Scottish equivalent of probate] sorted out (by a solicitor) about 4 months after my husband died but it took me a year to disburse inheritances and family mementoes because of a long delay in sorting out a memorial. (The delay was not of my making.) The funeral was paid for almost immediately.

I also had to get estimates of the value for certain items and to produce an inventory of the same.

What you say makes sense for your situation, but the way OP described it, the daughter in question here was hoping to receive her mum's jewellery and some other sentimental items. None of these items were mentioned in the will, she just hoped the widower would give them to her, but he refused.
Then OP made it sound as though he had only just applied for probate almost a year after the death. Since the will transferred everything to him as her husband, it is hard to know what could be delaying the process.
Anyway, OP has not commented since her first post, so goodness what really happened, if anything!

You should never have a mirror Will if it is a second marriage and you have dc from the first. It runs the risk of the spouse left leaving it all to their own family. It happens all the time and the daughter is right to be worried. Nothing she can do though under English law.

Yep, this man has possibly now under his control the funds this SD father left her mother and inheritance from her grandparents to her parents. People who never knew him and certainly didn’t want him to have their legacy. The default law needs changing to children inheriting at least half upon death of a parent to stop this happening, like some of Europe.

It depends on where you live - in Scotland, children automatically inherit one third of the deceased parent's moveable estate.

So why can’t the daughter understand her mother left her no provision in her will, when she could have easily done so?

The daughter clearly isn’t thinking straight if she thinks she has a hope of being successful to get what’s ‘owed’ to her. Would have been better to let sleeping dogs lie and keep in his good books indefinitely, but too late now.

why do people say ‘friend’ when they mean themselves. It’s so bizarre.

Reverse is even more annoying, guess some people feel it's less identifying

So if my adult children wanted nothing to do with me and let me rot in my old age, I’d have no say in whether they get my money or not? That isn’t a “Will” and I very much hope that never happens in the UK.

It actually happens in Scotland to an extent. No matter what is in the will, children are entitled to one third of the moveable estate: money, jewellery, cars, etc. This is the case even if the children have neglected their parent.