hi there,
My wife lost her step grandad last week, she was the only person in his life and has been for around 10 years. There are no real other family at all, in his will which he did a while ago he left everything to my wife and her sister and left me as executor.
The problem and confusion I have at the moment is how to proceed next, basically he owned a bungalow but had taken equity release many years ago. That value now is just shy of 99,000 that he owes them. Similar bungalows have been sold for 135k but they were in saleable condition. His bungalow is far from saleable and is an utter mess inside, it would basically be sold to a developer to be gutted out, may even just go to auction.
So we don’t really know what to do next, and assuming it may be worth around 100k that would mean it would pay the equity release of and that’s it however if I get a solicitor involved which I would assume I would need to then we would be liable for their fees if there was no money left after equity is paid back. We would also be liable for the estate agents fees.
So we just don’t know what to do. I have yet to contact a solicitor and we haven’t registered the death yet but from what I can see online it seems I have to apply for probate to deal with his estate. Do I have to get a solicitor involved to do that? We’re were also thinking that if we try and get an idea of it’s value and it’s around or less then 100k could we dissolve the will and let the government/ local council sort it out?
Anyone got any advice?
My wife lost her step grandad last week, she was the only person in his life and has been for around 10 years. There are no real other family at all, in his will which he did a while ago he left everything to my wife and her sister and left me as executor.
The problem and confusion I have at the moment is how to proceed next, basically he owned a bungalow but had taken equity release many years ago. That value now is just shy of 99,000 that he owes them. Similar bungalows have been sold for 135k but they were in saleable condition. His bungalow is far from saleable and is an utter mess inside, it would basically be sold to a developer to be gutted out, may even just go to auction.
So we don’t really know what to do next, and assuming it may be worth around 100k that would mean it would pay the equity release of and that’s it however if I get a solicitor involved which I would assume I would need to then we would be liable for their fees if there was no money left after equity is paid back. We would also be liable for the estate agents fees.
So we just don’t know what to do. I have yet to contact a solicitor and we haven’t registered the death yet but from what I can see online it seems I have to apply for probate to deal with his estate. Do I have to get a solicitor involved to do that? We’re were also thinking that if we try and get an idea of it’s value and it’s around or less then 100k could we dissolve the will and let the government/ local council sort it out?
Anyone got any advice?