Q. re a Will: What would you do? Hypothetical for the time being!

[miljee]

My dad's mother died when he was 6. The father, B, remarried YEARS later (dad was then in his 30s) to a woman we shall call X. She had an (illegitimate) DD who was also an independent adult by then. Before this 2nd marriage, B bought his council house. Anyway, 10 years ago B died without a will (apparently!!) so X naturally continued to live in the house. Her DD lived nearby. X then passes away.

There are a couple of scenarios:
X leaves the house to her DD alone in her will- can she do this in that the house was never formally willed to X in the first place? Can my father challenge this?

Or X leaves no will- to whom does the house go?

MY solution would be a 2 way split between my father and X's DD, but I don't think that will happen without a costly fight! Would you fight it?

When B died - to whom did ownership of the house pass?

Here is HM revenues and custom's info

"HMRC Inheritance Tax: Customer Guide
You have selected the following

The estate is in England & Wales
There is a surviving spouse or civil partner
There are children or remoter issue of the deceased
If this is not correct return to page 14 of the Customer Guide

If this is correct, the estate passes as follows

The surviving spouse or civil partner receives the chattels, a statutory legacy of £125,000 and a life interest in half of the residue.
The children receive the other half of the residue in equal shares. If any of the deceased?s children have died leaving issue, then the issue will receive their parents' share per stirpes.
Note - If the estate is less than £125,000, the deceased's surviving spouse or civil partner will receive the whole of the estate. "

from here www.hmrc.gov.uk/cto/customerguide/page14-6.htm That is based on england and wales - you can choose diff options.

If B was married to X and did not make a will after his marraige he would die intestate. If he had a will before he married then the act of marriage renders it invalid anyway.
Then when he dies all his assets up to a certain limit would go to her. This depends on when he died but is in the region of 125K so if the house is worth less then its immaterial she gets the house.

When she dies her assets will be distributed according to her will.
If she leave no will then any assets go to her children.

So unless B left a will its a no brainer the daughter gets the house.

Agree, the house will go to the daughter. That exact scenario happened to me. Also any money left in a will at any time for B, will also go to the daugther

The house concerned is in Cornwall and is probably worth 170K. And yes, I guess B did die intestate in that there APPEARS to have been no will...

I have a friend in a situation- what do you make of this?

A (now) great grandma (GGM!) married wealthy Mr A. They had 2 DCs (Offspring Y). Mr A dies. GGM then marries Mr B. THEY then have 2 DCs (Offspring Z). Mr B dies (let's assume GGM has a strong constitution rather than possesses a ph.d in Toxicology, shall we?!)- GGM is now, as a result of her 1st marriage (and widowhood) a wealthy woman. She is also now in her 90s. Offspring Z are doing all they can to minimise inheritance tax etc etc so as to benefit as hugely as possibly upon GGMs death. Offspring Y seem to be totally out of the frame. Do they have any rights of inheritance, assuming no will?

My friend is the dil of one of Offspring Z. It ain't pretty.