Will Writing in Huntingdon, St Neots, Biggleswade

A pair of ‘Protective Property Trust Wills’ offer the most common form of protection against losing assets to pay for possible future ‘Care Home Fees’ Quite simply instead of a spouse leaving their home to each other on the 1st death the first person to die’s share of the property goes into a ‘Property Trust’ the ultimate beneficiaries are normally the children. This protects the dead persons 50% of the home. The surviving spouse can remain living in the property or move in the future if required.

Bob & Ann’s Family Home

Time after time Bob & Ann Kept putting it off leaving their children’s future in the hands of fate!

Bob & Ann both aged 76 owned a 3 bed semi worth £220,000 which they wanted to leave their children. Bob & Ann thought they had planned well but some years after Bob died his wife developed dementia and eventually Ann was moved into care, her house was sold, and the money used to fund the nursing costs. Ann lived in the nursing home for 3½ years in which time over £200,000 of her money was spent funding her care, when Ann died only £14,320 was left.

Stories like this are common, the sad thing is Bob and Ann knew about the benefits of Protective Property Trust Wills but time after time kept putting off upgrading their old Wills. It would have been so easy for Bob & Ann to upgrade their Wills.

Bob & Ann (like most married couples) had made only basic Wills so that when Bob died, Ann was left everything in Bob’s Will including the family home. Because Ann ended her life in care all the money had to be used to pay her care home fees.

With ‘Protective Property Trust’ Will’s Bob & Ann would have legally protected 50% of the value of their house.

Cost of a Protective Property Trust Will: £450 per pair

David’s Spendthrift Son

David is 60 years old and has only months to live, David is divorced and has 3 children and one son Mark who is hopeless with money.

David is a successful business person and has acquired a substantial estate which he wants to use to help his son Mark, but he knows Mark will spend or waste his share of the money in a very short time. What can David do? David can set up a ‘Discretionary Trust Will’ The terms of the Trust create a Discretionary Trust so during the lifetime of Mark the trustees of David’s Will can control the funds ‘at their discretion’ which are given to Mark.

The Trust may be for a specific sum or the whole or part of the estate. After Mark’s death, any remaining funds can be passed to David’s other beneficiaries or charity’s. Control always remains with David’s trustees.

Cost of a Discretionary Trust Will: £250 each

It is estimated that only 1 in 3 people have a Will but increasingly in the modern family arrangement their importance is growing dramatically. Gone are the days when a husband and wife stayed married for life, had 2.4 children and relied on the Laws of Intestacy to pass their estate on to their loved ones.

It is now commonplace that a person may have had multiple marriages, children by different parents, or even choose to remain unmarried. In all these cases a Will is of paramount importance to direct where a deceased’s assets should be bequeathed. The Law of Intestacy seeks the last surviving blood relative and in absence of one passes the entirety of an estate to the Crown. Who would want this if they had a close friend, a cohabiting partner or a favourite charity?

One such area worthy of highlighting is the ability to give a loved one a right of occupation to remain in your property for their lifetime. To liken this to a real-life example, a testator may have had children by another during their lifetime and now having ended their relationship with the children’s parent has started a new relationship with another. In our experience, whilst a testator is always concerned with the needs of their new partner, ultimately their intentions are in most cases to provide for their offspring.

As a person’s most valuable asset is normally their home, this raises the question of what would happen to the property were the person to die. A right of occupation clause would be important in this case, as it would allow the testator to place their property in a life interest trust for the benefit of their children whilst allowing their current partner to remain in the property for their life. This would then serve to tick both boxes of the testator’s concerns:
(1) making sure offspring are provided for and
(2) making sure their new partner was not without a home.

The trust would be worded in such a way to protect the children, ending the arrangement if the deceased’s partner married or cohabited.

Cost of a Right of Occupation Trust Will: £250 each