Shielding The Family Making A Will
If you fail to write a will, then who determines who gets what? Things wont proceed how you would have chosen. To be certain your preferences are followed, you need to draw up a last will and testament.
Should you die without writing a will it’s the law that dictates how your property is distributed. The intestacy laws will be used and it may not be how you’d have hoped or wanted.
If you are legally married or have a civil partner but are without offspring and your belongings is valued at a set amount or less then your partner would get the total of the estate including any life insurance cover . If the estate is valued at more than this figure and you have existing family, your spouse would still receive this amount, in addition to half of the surplus. There exists an order in which relatives would inherit, with surviving parents situated at the start of the list, followed by brothers and sisters and so on.
If you have a civil partner and offspring then your spouse will receive the set amount as above and half of the excess. The descendants will receive 50% of the sum over the threshold immediately and the other 50% on the passing of your spouse.
If you have offspring but no legal spouse, then your children would share the estate. This could not be as you would have hoped. You could have a companion who relies on you and who you might have intended to get at least a proportion of your assets, who’d get nothing.
To eschew all potential apprehension about your assets, regardless of how basic it may appear, it would be wise to draw up a will. There are various ways to do this. You could construct it yourself or use a skilled will agent or a solicitor.
Many people write their own last will and testament, generally using a template which you can buy from stationers. Caution is advised should you proceed along this route – it’s deceptively simple to make a mistake and you could potentially make it void. The expense of having a will written, especially a comparatively simple one, is not excessive and you can be assured that your wishes will be realised.
A professional will company or a solicitor will be used to handling all types of enquiries and will be able to help you. You might have questions to do with setting up trusts and perhaps taxes.
Having made your will, it’s a good decision to review it on occasion, as your situation changes. If you decide to change it, then it is a smart move to revoke your previous one and have it remade. If the alterations are minimal, it might be easier to write a codicil to form a section of the last will and testament and to be used in partnership with it. Any codicil will have to be constructed in the same way as the will in regards to signatures and witnesses.
Please be aware that any health insurance cover will terminate on the death of the will holder and no value will be attributed to It in the will.