Inheritance Question

[Amandaclark]

If my husband died, what would happens to the money in our joint account? Would his children inherit half?

What does his will say?

Depends.

If he dies without a will, then there are set rules on what happens, depending on the size of the estate.

If there are surviving children, grandchildren or great grandchildren of the person who died and the estate is valued at more than £270,000, then the husband/wife inherits all the personal property and belongings of the person who has died, and the first £270,000 of the estate, and half of the remaining estate.

The children would inherit the rest.

If it is a joint account, then it would be considered that half the balance in it is your money anyway.

If you hold an asset as a joint tenant the principle of survivorship will apply and the asset does not form part of the deceased’s estate.
The money would all belong to you.
All assets in your dh’s sole name would be part of his estate and distributed as per his will.

The Key issue is how the account is held:
Joint tenants or tenants in common.
As joint tenants you are each treated as owning the whole amount rather than a specific share so when one tenant dies the money is owned entirely by the other tenant. It’s the same for a house held as joint tenants. For the bank account you would death certificate to change the account to sole name from joint, but not a grant of probate as it does not form part of the deceased’s estate.

The bank were happy to remove my late DP's name from what was our joint account without seeing the actual death certificate. They checked the register of deaths online.

It was all sorted out over the phone.

Oh, and all the money that was in it is now mine, it doesn't form part of his estate.

As per that last few posts about joint ownership.

My late-DH still had a joint account in his and ex-wife's name. That account became her sole account and was outside his estate.

ShanghaiDiva is correct

Joint accounts and joint property belongs to the surviving spouse. You do need to remove the other persons name though