Adult brothers not entitled to further money under father’s will
July 29th 2021Two adult brothers have failed in their attempt to be given a share of their deceased father’s estate after being left out of his will. Rebecca Armstrong Associate Solicitor reports on this recent case. The High Court ruled that it was clear that the father had made provision for them while he was alive and did not want them to receive anything further. The brothers were aged 40 and 39. Their…
Court settles siblings’ dispute over their mother’s will
June 17th 2021The High Court has refused to allow a man to remortgage his deceased mother’s house after her three other children disputed the validity of a purported will and where there was reason to believe that she had been subjected to undue influence. Rebecca Armstrong Associate Solicitor reports on this recent case. The property was a five-bedroom house in south London in which the mother had lived since her divorce in…
Children entitled to a share of father’s estate despite estrangement
June 17th 2021Two teenage brothers have been granted a share of their father’s estate even though they were estranged from him and had been excluded from his will. Rebecca Armstrong Associate Solicitor reports on this recent case. The two boys, referred to only as J and H in court, who were aged 16 and 15 respectively at the date of their father’s death in 2018. Their parents had divorced in 2012. The mother…
Can someone with Dementia make a valid will?
May 21st 2021The simple answer: Potentially. Rebecca Armstrong explains below … It is often assumed that an individual with Dementia can’t make a valid will and it is therefore one of the most common grounds for challenging the validity of a will. That is not right though. The mere existence of such a diagnosis does not mean that the person lacked the necessary mental capacity. The issue with dementia is that a…
Court corrects error in Will to reinstate deceased’s wishes
March 9th 2021A court has corrected an error in a man’s will to reinstate his original intention as to how his estate should be divided among family members. Rebecca Armstrong reports on this recent case. The issue arose because the deceased had made a will in 1998 dividing his estate into 52 parts to be given to different named beneficiaries from his wife’s family. A codicil executed in 2005 deleted two individuals…