Securing Your Legacy
Planning for the future might seem daunting, but ensuring your wishes are honoured after you’re gone provides invaluable peace of mind to you, whilst also making things as simple as possible for your loved ones, the rules on how to administer your estate being clear and concise.
Inheritance Tax Advice
At Ward and Rider, our team of legal professionals can provide you with advice on this complicated field of law, including Inheritance tax and estate planning. This is a crucial area, one where obtaining guidance is essential.
Power of Attorney
Alongside preparing your Will, our team can also assist you with the preparation of Powers of Attorney documents. This involves you appointing a person who can act as your Attorney who, in event that you become incapable of making important decisions due to illness or injury, can make these decisions on your behalf.
A Will Tuned To Your Financial and Family Circumstances
Providing a quality and personal service to both couples and individuals across Coventry and the West Midlands, our team of lawyers treat each and every client as an individual. We ensure we take the time to understand all aspects of a client’s needs and wishes, so they are carried out in the future.
Book an appointment with us, or request a call back to speak to Wills & Probate Lawyers who genuinely care about your needs and interests.
What Our Experienced Wills & Probate Legal Team Can Help With
- Advice and help regarding a Will
- Advice and help regarding Inheritance Tax Planning
- Advice regarding the preparation of Trusts
- Guidance and creation of lasting Powers of Attorney
- Specialist probate lawyers to Administer your Estate
Our Charges Explained
At Ward and Rider we take great pride in ensuring that all of our clients understand our fees, all being carefully explained before we take your case. The fees do vary depending on how complicated the will, power of attorney case, or probate is, but all of this will be covered in our initial meeting, meaning that there are never any nasty surprises later on.
The Reason It Is Important To Have a Will Properly Drafted.
When considering end-of-life arrangements, consulting with qualified legal experts is essential. Our professional team possess the expertise to navigate complex inheritance laws, minimise tax implications, and create legally binding documents that stand up to scrutiny.
Their guidance ensures your final wishes are clearly articulated and legally enforceable.
The Problems Caused By Not Having a Will
Many individuals postpone creating these important documents, with research indicating approximately 66% of UK residents lack proper estate planning documentation. This oversight can lead to significant complications for families, including disputes over asset distribution, guardianship questions for minor children, and potential tax burdens that might have been avoided with proper planning.
Understanding Wills and Their Importance
A will represents a legally binding document expressing your wishes regarding asset distribution, property allocation, and other important matters following your passing. This essential legal instrument allows you to specify beneficiaries, appoint guardians for minor children, and designate executors to manage your estate administration.
The Dangers of Not Having a Will
Without proper documentation in place, your estate becomes subject to intestacy rules – predetermined legal guidelines that may distribute your assets in ways contrary to your wishes. These statutory provisions rarely account for unmarried partners, close friends, or charitable organisations you might have wanted to benefit.
Creating comprehensive documentation offers numerous advantages beyond basic asset distribution. It allows you to make specific provisions for dependents, address tax planning considerations, and potentially minimise inheritance tax liabilities. Additionally, you can include personal items with sentimental value that might otherwise cause family disagreements.
The process of creating these documents provides an opportunity to thoroughly assess your financial situation, consider potential future scenarios, and make informed decisions about your legacy. Professional legal guidance ensures all aspects of your estate are addressed, from real property and financial accounts to digital assets and family heirlooms.
The Process of Creating a Will
The journey toward establishing your final wishes begins with an initial consultation. During this meeting, your legal advisor will discuss your family circumstances, financial situation, and specific objectives. This conversation forms the foundation for creating documentation tailored to your unique needs.
Following this discussion, your advisor will draft documents incorporating your instructions regarding beneficiaries, specific bequests, executor appointments, and any special provisions. This draft will address legal requirements while reflecting your personal preferences for asset distribution and other matters.
Once drafted, you’ll review the documents with your advisor, who can explain legal terminology and answer questions about specific provisions. This review ensures the documentation accurately reflects your intentions before finalisation. Any necessary adjustments can be made during this stage to ensure clarity and completeness.
The final step involves proper execution of the documents according to legal requirements. This typically includes signing in the presence of witnesses who aren’t beneficiaries. Your advisor will guide you through these formalities to ensure the documents are legally valid and will withstand potential challenges.
When to Update Your Estate Planning Documents
Life changes frequently necessitate revisions to your estate planning documentation. Major events such as marriage, divorce, births, deaths, or significant asset acquisitions should trigger a review of your existing arrangements to ensure they remain aligned with your current circumstances and wishes.
Legal and tax regulation changes may also warrant updates to your documentation. Our professional advisors closely monitor these developments and can recommend modifications to optimise tax benefits or address new legal requirements that may impact the effectiveness of your estate plan.
Don’t Forget to Review Your Will
Experts generally recommend reviewing your documentation every 3-5 years, even without major life changes. This periodic assessment helps identify any outdated provisions, new opportunities for tax planning, or changes in beneficiary circumstances that might necessitate adjustments.
The process of updating existing documentation is typically more streamlined than creating initial documents. Your advisor can prepare amendments, known as codicils, for minor changes or draft entirely new documents for substantial revisions. Either approach ensures your estate plan remains current and effective.
Powers of Attorney: Planning for Incapacity
Beyond addressing asset distribution after death, comprehensive estate planning includes preparing for potential incapacity during your lifetime. Powers of Attorney designate trusted individuals to make decisions on your behalf if you become unable to manage your own affairs.
Two primary types exist: health and welfare powers, which address medical decisions and personal care matters, and property and financial affairs powers, which cover financial management and property transactions. These complementary documents ensure all aspects of your life receive proper attention during periods of incapacity.
Why A Power of Attorney is Needed
Without these important documents in place, family members may face court proceedings to gain authority to manage your affairs – a process that can be time-consuming, expensive, and emotionally draining. Proactive planning through powers of Attorney prevents these complications and ensures your chosen representatives can act promptly when needed.
Our legal professionals can guide you through the process of selecting appropriate representatives, defining the scope of their authority, and properly executing these documents. They can also advise on including specific instructions or restrictions that reflect your preferences for medical treatment, living arrangements, or financial management.
Trusts: Advanced Estate Planning Tools
For more complex estate planning needs, trusts offer versatile solutions that provide additional control over asset distribution, potential tax advantages, and enhanced protection for beneficiaries. These legal arrangements involve transferring assets to trustees who manage them for designated beneficiaries according to specific terms.
Various trust structures serve different purposes. Some protect assets for minor children or vulnerable beneficiaries, others minimise inheritance tax liabilities, and still others preserve family businesses or properties across generations. Your legal advisor can recommend appropriate trust options based on your specific objectives.
Creating effective trust arrangements requires specialised knowledge of trust law, tax implications, and administrative requirements. Our professional advisors will guide you through selecting appropriate trustees, defining distribution terms, and properly funding the trust to ensure it achieves your intended purposes.
Unlike wills, which take effect only after death, certain trusts can be established during your lifetime, allowing you to witness their benefits and make adjustments as needed. This flexibility, combined with potential tax advantages and enhanced asset protection, makes trusts a valuable component of any comprehensive estate plan.
Probate and Estate Administration
Following a person’s passing, their estate typically undergoes a legal process called probate, which validates their will and authorises executors to administer the estate. This process involves collecting assets, paying debts and taxes, and distributing remaining property according to the deceased’s wishes.
The complexity and duration of probate varies depending on estate size, asset types, and potential complications such as contested provisions or unclear documentation. Our professional advisors will guide executors through this process, helping them fulfil their legal obligations while minimising delays and complications.
Help For Executors
For executors unfamiliar with estate administration, professional support proves invaluable. Our legal advisors will assist with court applications, asset valuations, tax filings, and beneficiary communications – responsibilities that might otherwise overwhelm individuals during an already difficult time.
Even with professional assistance, executors maintain ultimate responsibility for proper estate administration. Choosing experienced, trustworthy individuals for this role represents an important aspect of estate planning. Your legal advisor can help you select appropriate executors and provide guidance they can reference when the time comes.
Inheritance Tax Considerations
Tax implications represent significant considerations in estate planning. Without proper planning, substantial portions of your estate might go toward tax payments rather than benefiting your chosen recipients. Professional advisors can recommend strategies to minimise these liabilities while ensuring compliance with all legal requirements.
Current inheritance tax thresholds allow individuals to pass certain amounts to beneficiaries tax-free, with additional allowances for primary residences in many cases. Married couples and civil partners can often combine these allowances, potentially allowing up to £1 million to pass without tax liability in certain circumstances.
Beyond basic allowances, various exemptions and relief programs exist for specific asset types, charitable donations, and business interests. Our professional advisors will identify applicable opportunities and incorporate them into your estate plan to maximise tax efficiency while achieving your distribution objectives.
Lifetime Giving Strategies That Save Tax
Effective tax planning often involves lifetime giving strategies, trust arrangements, and careful documentation of assets and their values. Your legal advisor can develop comprehensive approaches tailored to your financial situation, family circumstances, and long-term objectives.
Protecting Vulnerable Beneficiaries
Estate planning takes on additional importance when considering vulnerable beneficiaries such as minor children, individuals with disabilities, or those who might struggle with financial management. In such cases, specialised provisions are added to ensure these individuals receive appropriate support without jeopardising their long-term interests.
The Importance of Guardianship
For minor children, guardianship appointments represent crucial elements of estate planning. These designations identify who will raise your children if both parents die before the children reach adulthood. Without such provisions, courts determine guardianship based on statutory guidelines rather than parental preferences.
Beneficiaries with disabilities may require specialised trust arrangements that provide financial support without disqualifying them from essential government benefits. These carefully structured trusts can significantly improve the quality of life while preserving access to healthcare and support services.
Our professional advisors are familiar with these complex situations and can recommend appropriate protective measures based on each beneficiary’s specific circumstances. Their expertise ensures vulnerable individuals receive necessary support while respecting their dignity and maximising their long-term financial security.
Do remember that the benefits gained far outweigh the relatively modest costs of obtaining the necessary professional assistance for document preparation and planning strategies.
Don’t postpone this essential planning until it’s too late. Contact us today and let our qualified legal professionals begin creating or updating your estate plan. Their expertise will help you navigate complex legal requirements while developing documentation that truly reflects your wishes and protects your legacy for generations to come.
Why Choose Our Wills & Probate Specialists?
Providing a quality and personal service to both couples and individuals across Coventry and the West Midlands, our team of lawyers treat each and every client as an individual. We ensure we take the time to understand all aspects of a client’s needs and wishes, so they are carried out in the future.
Book an appointment with us, or request a call back to speak to Wills & Probate Lawyers who genuinely care about your needs and interests.
Useful links
- Register your will with Certainty
- Dedicated Wills & Probate Team
- We handle a variety of Wills, Trusts, Estates and Inheritance matters
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Wills & Probate FAQs
In the UK prior to probate only those named as executors in the Will are entitled to see it, however, if for example you are a beneficiary, you can request of the executor to see the will, and in most cases they will allow this and explain what you have been left in the will. After the probate process, and probate is granted, the will becomes a public record and anyone can apply for a copy.
Probate is the routine legal process undertaken which proves the validity of a Will after a person’s passing. Following a grant of probate being issued (acknowledging validity) the probate process encompasses the administration and distribution of the estate, and includes clearing debts. Probate is complete once all debts are cleared and the estate passed on to those inheriting.
If you die without leaving behind a will it means you have passed away ‘intestate’ and as a result your estate which encompasses property, money and belongings, must be shared out according to the rules of intestacy. With intestate succession in the majority of cases your estate would be split between your surviving next of kin, be it your spouse, parents, children or siblings, but importantly not to an unmarried partner.
As with other legal documents, writing a will without a solicitor can result in mistakes or unclear elements which ultimately mean your will can not be actioned when you are gone, and your wishes not met. Even if you decide to write a will yourself it should still be checked over by a solicitor to help ensure your executor isn’t left with any issues to sort at a later date and to ensure it is legally valid. Utilising a solicitor has many benefits in addition to the legal validity including making sure you have had advice on inheritance tax, ensuring provisions are put in place to clear debts and the division of your estate is clear, concise and actionable.
For Total Peace of Mind, we can Register your Will with Certainty.
When you make a Will with us, we can register it with the online Wills database Certainty.
Why Register?
In a recent survey, 67% of people in the UK did not know where to find their parents’ Wills. The passage of time, house moves, a new Will and new relationships are all contributing factors to your family not being able to find your Will when you pass away.
When your Will is needed, the register gives you total peace of mind, ensuring that your loved ones can quickly and easily locate your Will at this most distressing time.
What Does the Register Do?
- It allows your family to locate your Will when you pass away
- It records the solicitor where your Will is held
- It ensures that your last wishes are respected
- It gives you peace of mind
What Happens if I Don’t Register?
- If your Will is missing, your loved ones do not automatically get everythingYour beneficiaries may not receive inheritance in accordance with your instructions
- Your loved ones may be financially penalised
- The Courts distribute your assets deciding who gets what
- It may be assumed that you did not write a Will and again the Courts may distribute your assets
- An old will may be discovered and deemed as your final wishes
- Family disputes can occur
How Do I Register?
Speak to our team about registering your will with Certainty.
Most people generally seem to know about the importance of having a Will, even if they have not yet made one! However, the importance of a Lasting Power of Attorney is not as widely known.
What would happen if you became incapable of making decisions for yourself?
In the event that an illness meant you lacked the physical or mental ability to deal with your own money and affairs, or make decisions about your personal welfare, who would you want to make those decisions for you?
By preparing a Lasting Power of Attorney, you make the decision as to who should take on this role, whilst you are still able to do so.
No-one likes to think this could happen to them, but unfortunately we do not know what lies ahead. It is estimated by the NHS that 2 million people lack the capacity to make decisions for themselves as a result of dementia, mental health difficulties, brain injuries or other illnesses that may occur at any time in our lives.
In such circumstances, it is often assumed that your spouse or other family members are entitled to manage your financial affairs, but without your express authority this is not possible.
There are two types of LPAs:
- Property and Financial Affairs Lasting Power of Attorney
These allow your attorneys to make decisions in relation to buying and selling property, operating bank and building society accounts, paying bills and collecting benefits on your behalf.
Health and Welfare - Lasting Power of Attorney
These allow your attorneys to make decisions relating to your care and living accommodation, consenting to or refusing medical treatment on your behalf, and day to day matters such as what you wear or eat.
If a Lasting Power of Attorney is not in place when needed, an application has to be made to the Court of Protection for somebody to be granted the power to act on your behalf. This is called a Deputyship Order. This process is lengthy, intrusive, expensive and burdensome and requires the payment of ongoing fees. It may also result in someone you would not have chosen managing your financial affairs.
If you would like to know more about Lasting Powers of Attorney, please don’t hesitate to contact our Wills and Probate team, who would be pleased to help you.
Our experts will discuss the implication of Inheritance Tax and help devise strategies that will minimise Inheritance Tax paid upon your estate. Working with you we will look at the options that you can pursue to ensure an efficient transfer of assets to your loved ones.
Your experienced team of specialist lawyers here at Ward & Rider are here to help you so contact us now.
We can help you in relation to the following:
- Contesting a will (whether it be unfair, invalid, fraudulent, lost or destroyed)
- Helping with a claim against an estate under the Intestacy Rules where someone has passed away without making a will
- Disputing your share of an inheritance where it is unjust, unfair, inappropriate or insignificant under the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975
- Challenging the Trustees’ and Executors’ approach to the estate; attempting to resolve any issues or disputes with Trustees and Executors; where appropriate replacing Trustees and Executors
- Stopping assets being distributed until matters are resolved
Bringing a claim to enforce unfulfilled promises regarding an inheritance
This is a very complex area of law where expert advice on wills and probate matters is very important. Call or email us now. We can talk to you about the best approach to take and also about funding, such as no win, no fee and legal expense insurance funding.
Need help with Wills & Probate ?
Get in touch with Ward & Rider Solicitors today to speak to one of our expert solicitors, or to book a consultation.
