Recently in Wills and Probate Category

The Legal Services Board (LSB) has called for sweeping regulation of the will-writing industry after finding systematic problems with the services offered by solicitors and other providers.

The LSB oversees the regulation of lawyers across England and Wales. It was commenting after investigation by the Legal Services Consumer Panel.

The investigation found that the service delivered by firms in the sector was systematically poor, sloppy and dogged by simple procedural errors. In the worst cases customers were subjected to unfair and pushy sales tactics, and in a few instances customers were actually stolen from.

The Government's legal advisers have recommended that the law be changed to allow unmarried partners rights over property belonging to one another. The change would see the rights of unmarried couples move closer to the situation that is currently only afforded to those who are married or in a civil partnership.

The Law Commission's recommendations look to end 86 years of rules which deny cohabiting couples the same rights of inheritance if one partner dies without making a will.

Under the present law an unmarried partner has no automatic right to their loved one's property if they should die intestate, that is without a legally valid will. Every year some 350,000 people die in such a situation.

The Scottish Government has announced plans to amend the law relating to the forced sale of homes for those who die intestate, that is without a will. Under the current law, relatives of any person who dies intestate can be forced to sell the deceased's home if it is valued at over £300,000.

Under the new proposed law, this threshold will be increased to £473,000 to reflect long-term increases in property values since the last revision in 2005.

As in English law, a spouse or civil partner of a person who dies intestate in Scotland has a prior right to receive the home they shared. However the Scottish law differs from that in England and Wales if the property is worth over £300,000 when a forced sale may be ordered if there are rival claims from the deceased's children or siblings.

Family heirlooms, a favourite lamp or maybe a priceless painting are the kind of assets that people leave to their loved ones in their wills, but a trend has developed recently of people including internet passwords in their estate planning.

Research by the internet hosting company Rackspace found that British people have amassed a £2.3 billion collection of videos, music, books and photos stored online.

Rather than lose all these digital assets, 31% of 2,000 UK adults surveyed claimed that they would pass on their digital legacy to their family members when they died.

Heather Ilott has successfully challenged a previous court ruling that meant she could not claim part of her mother's £460,000 estate which had been entirely bequeathed to three animal charities. The Court of Appeal said Ilott is entitled to an inheritance as it had been "unreasonable" of her mother not to make a provision for her daughter in her will.

Melita Jackson died in 2004 at the age of 70. She had written her will in 2002 and left an accompanying letter explaining why she had not left anything to her daughter. The two had become estranged after Ilott eloped at 17 and the relationship had never been repaired.

Ilott approached the District Court after her mother's death when her will was revealed to leave her entire estate to three animal charities: the Blue Cross, the RSPB and the RSPCA.

The ex-girlfriend of a marine killed on duty while serving in Afghanistan is contesting his £300,000 will, claiming she is entitled to a larger share.

Sgt John Manuel died in 2008 when a 13-year-old suicide bomber detonated explosives.

Sunderland county court heard that Sgt Manuel made his will in 2002 and left his entire estate to his mother, Pauline. But his legacy is being challenged by his former lover.

The Legal Services Board has postponed until 2012 its decision as to whether will writing should become regulated or not.

The Board is also thinking about launching a formal investigation into conveyancing as a result of the high incidence of negligence claims by consumers and fraud within the industry.

It will not be until after the third quarter of 2011 that the Legal Services Board will decide whether or not to approach the Lord Chancellor and ask that writing wills be a reserved activity under section 24 of the Legal Services Act 2007. A post-investigation consultation is set to take place between January and March 2012.

The four-year battle over the inheritance of a 287-acre parcel of farming land in North Yorkshire moved to the Court of Appeal this week. The land comprises Potto Carr Farm near Northallerton and is valued at £2.35m.

The former owner of the farm, Joyce Gill, died in August 2006, aged 82. Thirteen years before her death, she and husband John Gill -- who died in 1999 -- signed "mirror wills", which stated that if one of them died the farm and all their savings would pass to the other; and upon the death of the last surviving spouse, the farm would go to the RSPCA.

As a consequence of this arrangement, the couple's daughter Dr Christine Gill received nothing.

Dr Gill challenged her mother's will, however, and last autumn Leeds High Court ruled in her favour. The court said her "bullying" and "domineering" father had coerced her mother into changing her will to leave the farm to the RSPCA.

The psychiatrist and lawyer/boyfriend of the deceased Playboy model Anna Nicole Smith were found guilty of fraudulently supplying her with controlled substances last week.

Anna Nicole Smith died on 8 February 2007 as a result of an accidental overdose of prescription drugs.

Investigators discovered she'd taken over 600 different types of painkillers, antidepressants, and muscle relaxants in the weeks leading up to her death.

Of the 11 drugs in Smith's system when she died, eight were prescribed to her former boyfriend and attorney Howard K. Stern. Two were written out to someone called 'Alex Katz' (believed to be an alias). And one was written for Ms Smith's psychiatrist Khristine Eroshevich.

Dr Eroshevich also wrote all 11 of the prescriptions.

Over recent years, many wine dealers and investment companies have peddled the idea that wine is the ultimate recession-, inflation-, tax-proof investment asset -- worth its weight in gold.

When you pass on, the story ran, HM Revenue & Customs wouldn't assess inheritance tax (IHT) on the current market value of the wine, but rather on the price it was bought at.

Theoretically, this would mean that for a vintage case of wine purchased fifty years ago for £400 but now worth £4,000, you'd only have to pay £160 rather than £1,600 in IHT.

A recent study by Prudential discovered that 1 in 3 couples over 40 don't know or understand the details of their partner's retirement savings. Perhaps more shocking, 1 in 5 said that they have never even talked to their partner about financial planning for retirement.

BBC Panorama aired a programme about private will-writing companies on Monday night. Apparently these companies now write about 10% of all new wills in the UK, but they remain largely unregulated.

Panorama, which is now available online through the BBC iPlayer service, presented evidence of serious malpractice and fraud among some of the companies.

In one case, a firm lost a will even though it charged a fee to store it safely. In another, beneficiaries struggled to receive the money owed to them, and cheques from the firm they were dealing with bounced.

In other cases, companies advertised will-writing services for £75-£100, but the true cost of the "deals" ended up being 100 times more after "hidden" estate handling fees were taken into account.

In 1924, shortly before he died of tuberculosis, Franz Kafka wrote to his friend and fellow Jew Max Brod asking him to "burn unread ... everything I leave behind ... in the way of diaries, manuscripts, [and] letters".

Thankfully Brod did not comply. Instead, he published some of the manuscripts -- including The Castle, The Trial and Metamorphosis -- and Kafka became famous around the world.

Unpublished material

In 1939, Brod fled his native Czechoslovakia and moved to Palestine to escape the Nazis. He took two suitcases of unpublished Kafka material with him, which he subsequently deposited in a Swiss bank vault in Zurich.

Home equity release arrangements, such as "reverse mortgages," can be useful tools for retirement planning. Before entering into such an arrangement, however, you need to understand that there are both advantages as well as disadvantages.

What is a reverse mortgage?

A reverse mortgage, sometimes referred to as a "lifetime mortgage," is simply a loan secured by your primary residence which is repaid after you die.

How do reverse mortgages work?

You will own the property subject to the reverse mortgage during your lifetime, but when you die it will be sold, with the proceeds used to repay the loan. To the extent that the sale proceeds exceed the amount required to repay the loan, the surplus will form part of your estate (and be distributed in accordance with your will or, if you do not have a will, the intestacy rules).

[Continued from What Everyone Needs To Know About Reverse Mortgages - Part 1]

Some points to consider (contd)

You should also bear in mind that a reverse mortgage might make it more difficult for you to relocate, since you will need to pay off the loan when you sell your house. In those circumstances, you may find that the remaining equity is not sufficient to finance the purchase of another property.

Home reversion plans

A home reversion plan is similar to a reverse mortgage in that it enables a retired person to swap home equity for cash or income. The way that a home reversion plan works is, however, very different to a reverse mortgage.