Probate advice needed!

[Toady]

Hi, I am hoping somebody can give me some advice.

My nan died on 31/12/09 and left me (grandaughter) and my mum (daughter) her estate jointly. The main bulk of this estate is her house.

This house was bought by my step grandad approximately 1980, he then married my nan and then put her name on the deeds shortly after about 1981. My step grandad then died in 1987 leaving his estate to my nan.

She lived in the house until about 5 years ago when she had to move into a care home. My mum then rented her house out and has maintained it so she could use the money from the rent towards the fees of nans care home. If my mum had not done this then I believe the government would have sold the house to fund nans care home.

Anyway now the will and probate are being processed. My step grandads son (who has kept in touch with nan since his father died)has started to email my mother saying that he wants his fathers house back. He has produced my step grandads will which states that he indeed left his estate to my nan and that when she died in the future he would HOPE that she would pass it on to his children.

Obviously my step grandad died 22 years ago and this is the first we have known of his sons interest in nans house. Can he do this? If my mum had not rented it out the house would have been sold anyway. My Nan nearly sold the house a couple of times when she lived there but she never did. As far as we were aware it was her house.

Any advice would be appreciated.

It was her house and she bequeathed it as she saw fit. He cannot take back the house but he could contest the will. I'm not sure it will do any good though.

It sounds unlikely that any claim he made against the estae would get anywhere. If your Nan owned the house with your step grandad as "joint tenant" then as I understand it his part would automatically become hers on his death and would not have formed part of his estate. If they owned it as "tenants in common" then it passed to your Nan under the terms of his will and was hers to do as she chose. His hope expressed in the will would not be enforceable.

However if his will only gave her a "life interest" with it then being left to his children on her death then you have a problem.

It would be worthwhile getting a solicitor to look at both wills just to be sure and if required write a polite but authoritative letter to the grandson telling him his claim has no basis.

Sorry about the use of quotation marks. It is difficult to avoid legalese, hence the suggestion of speaking to a solicitor.

Thanks for that advice, Mum got the deeds of the house from the solicitors and both my step grandads name and my nans name are on them as joint tenants.

The probate got posted off this morning so I assume that if he does contest the will we will hear about it.

My mum is upset by the emails and phonecalls from her 'step brother' and feels like she is being harassed by him so hopefully things will be sorted out soon. The ironic thing about it all is that if the house had been left to my step grandads children then my mum would not have had the harassment of renting her house out for the last 5 years to pay for nans care home and Nan would have got it all for free.

It depends on how exactly it was worded 'In the hope that she would pass it on to my son" does not impose a trust, so the house was left to your nan outright and she can leave it as she wants by her Will. 'and after her death to my son X' would probably impose a trust.

However, do check how the house was owned. If it was as joint tenants it would have passed to her outside his Will anyway, so even if the Will purports to contain a life interest trust, this doesn't affect the house.