Making A Will UK

Making your Will seems a daunting task.  This introduction will help make it easier for you. Read on for help.

How do you go about Making a Will UK?  Well, that question triggers off both technical and practical issues to consider.  Here, we look at some of the practicalities to consider.  These include the types of things that you should give careful thought to whether you are making your Will yourself or having it made professionally.

When we think about how to make our Will the chief thought is that we are making this Will because it is essential for each of us to get things in order for our loved ones for when we pass on. The easiest way is to look at why you should have a Will and what briefly look at what happens if you do not have one.  These are called the intestacy rules.

Making A Will UK – Choosing Executors

An executor will carry out your wishes as stated in your Will.  He or she will have to gather together all our documentation and carry out all of the legal requirements needed to start “administering” your Will.  This simply means carrying out the instructions in the Will.

Making A Will UK – More Advice

It is important to consider who you want as your Executor UK Will.  Thinking of using a bank or a solicitor?  That is quite a natural thought but experience shows that they can be very expensive and not necessarily the speediest way of getting things done.  Administering a Will is really not difficult and you can obtain a great deal of help from the Probate Office who you will find most efficient and understanding.

You can quite simply choose a family member to be the executor and they should be able to carry out this function for you quickly and easily.  Make sure that you ask them first as it might come as a surprise later on if you do not.

Making A Will UK – More on Executors

You should also choose someone who is not only willing to carry out this task but who is likely to be alive when they are needed and who is also unlikely to move away before then.  An Executor can also be a Beneficiary and you can appoint more than one Executor to work together and share the load, if you wish.

When is the Best Time for Making a Will UK?

Apart from how to make a Will you should also consider when to make one.  First of all, you should make a Will right now if you do not have one, and then revisit it regularly. Review it every five years or so, and whenever circumstances change.  Events that trigger a review include when you get married, have children or get divorced. It is also important to know that marriage invalidates any Will made before marriage.

Intestacy – if not Making A Will UK

You can decide who should benefit following your demise and this is a key part of how to make a Will. You are said to have died “intestate” if you die with out making a Will. Intestacy rules will then apply to you situation and the loved ones that you believed would receive your assets may receive little or nothing.

Dying intestate – the Intestacy Rules – Making A Will UK

The law decides who gets what if you die without leaving a valid Will. It does not matter what you have wished for or promised when you were alive because should there be no valid Will then who gets what is determined by the “Intestacy Rules.”

This is an outline to what happens:

If you are legally married:

If your estate is worth less than £125,000 then your spouse gets everything.

If your estate is worth more than £125,000 and you had no other surviving relative (eg children, grandchildren, parents), then your spouse will still get everything.

If you are legally married with children:

If your estate is worth less than £125,000 then your spouse gets everything.

If your estate is worth more than £125,000 then your spouse would get £125,000 and a life interest (that is the right to take interest on the remainder, but not the capital itself) in half of anything over this sum.

Your children would get half the sum over £125,000 immediately and be entitled to the other half on the death of your spouse. Should any of your children die before you then their children would be entitled to take their parent’s share.

If you are legally married, have no children, but do have parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles:

If your estate is worth less than £200,000 then your spouse gets everything. If your estate is worth more than £200,000 then your spouse would get £200,000, plus half the balance. The remaining half goes to the other relatives in this order of priority –

• parents
• brothers, sisters
• half brothers, sisters
• grandparents
• aunts, uncles
• spouses of aunts, uncles

If you are not lawfully married, but have had children:

Your estate will be shared between the children. Should they die before you then their children would take their share.

If you are not lawfully married, have no children, but have parents or have had brothers, sisters, grandparents, aunts, uncles:

Your estate will be shared equally amongst them in this order of priority –

• parents
• brothers, sisters
• half brothers, sisters
• grandparents
• aunts, uncles
• spouses of aunts, uncles

If any of these have predeceased, but have living children then the children will take their parent’s share.

If you are not lawfully married, and have no other relatives:

Your estate will go the Crown

“Common law” husbands and wives are simply not recognised under the Intestacy Rules.

Children, however, include natural, adopted and illegitimate children, but excludes step-children.

Guardians

If you have young children, you can appoint “guardians” who will be responsible for your children’s care and welfare should neither parent be alive.  The Courts or Authorities will choose someone for you if you do not leave a Will, and that well might not be someone you would have chosen yourself.

You should name a person or people that you personally know and trust to look after the assets that you have left to your children until the children become old enough to take responsibility themselves.

Inheritance Tax – Making A Will UK

Inheritance tax is much less of a problem for many people but there are still plenty of people around who could benefit a great deal by organising their Will properly.

There could well be some opportunities to do some tax planning to reduce Inheritance tax, or how you leave things for others. Take care about leaving things directly to grandchildren to skip a generation.  Cases have arisen where a subsequent divorce has split that asset and it has left the family!  You can get around this issue by the use of a Trust.

Funeral Arrangements – Making A Will UK

Did you know that this part of your Will that is not legally binding? In actual fact, it is just your preferences.

It is easy to simply tell your family, including your Executors, what your wishes are following your demise before it actually happens. You can go into more detail this way, if you wish, and it saves writing everything down. Most people can cover this off in a conversation lasting only a few minutes.

However, you should state your wishes in your Will so that your funeral arrangements will be as you wish.  You could detail everything that you wish or, perhaps, refer to more details in a separate letter that is addressed to your Executors.  You should also state where and how the funeral should be paid for.

This is a brief introduction on how to make a Will.  There are quite a few more things to think about and the best thing to do is start a list and be organised for when you come to get your Will written.

See  making a Will UK.