George Green LLP Welcomes Two New Family Solicitors to Sutton Coldfield Office
George Green LLP is thrilled to announce the expansion of its Family Law team with the...
The Grant of Probate (the “Grant”) is the legal document which gives you the authority as an Executor to deal with a person’s estate.
You should receive the Grant within 10 working days of making the application. Unfortunately only 9% of Grants were issued within this time frame during 2019. The average time to receive the Grant was nine weeks in mid-2019, although this was reduced to five weeks in December 2019.
Once you do receive the Grant, you can take the following steps to begin to deal with the estate:
1. Financial assets can be transferred to an agreed ‘executorship account’. This can be your bank account if you are one of the Executors or a bank account that has been set up for dealing with the estate.
2. Pay off any debts or outstanding payments including any outstanding tax and bills or repay any overpaid benefits. It is sensible to place a notice in The Gazette and a local paper to give creditors the chance to claim any money they are owed, which will protect you from responsibility for any debts. You may also need to pay inheritance tax.
3. If money is held in a joint bank account, it will automatically pass to the other joint account holder. If there is any property and this was jointly owned with another person as joint tenants, the ownership of the property will automatically pass to the other owner. If the property is owned with someone else as tenants in common, the share of the property will pass under the terms of the Will.
4. Once all debts and taxes have been paid, you can distribute the estate in accordance with the Will and prepare the estate accounts, which must be signed by you and the main beneficiaries.
Our lawyers have offices based in Wolverhampton and Cradley Heath and provide assistance to clients across the West Midlands including: Stourbridge, Kidderminster, Birmingham, Dudley and Walsall.
If you would like to discuss any probate matters, please contact us on 01384 410410 to speak to one of our Private Client lawyers.