We have recently been through the probate process with my late father's estate. He died at the end of June and by the time the funeral had been arranged and previously-arranged holidays had passed, I was able to apply for IHT cert and probate in early September. I did everything online - no printing of forms etc. I understand that this facility has been introduced relatively recently and some of the on-line advice from Which, Moneysavingexpert etc was out of date. Probate was granted exactly 2 months after we applied for it.
My father's case was relatively straightforward inasmuch as my mother had predeceased him by several decades and there were no jointly owned assets, trusts or squabbling relatives; the total value of the estate did not reach the IHT level. The fact that LL's ex is sole executor does simplify things a bit as, in our case, my sis and I are both co-executors - so a number of documents have required both our signatures; as we live 130 miles apart, it makes things less convenient.
We applied for probate for 3 reasons ....... because there was a house to sell; because there were shares to sell; because there were bank accounts that had to be closed. Different banks have different rules some don't need probate for <15,000, for others, it's <£50.000 and only sight of the death certificate is required.
In LL's case, everything is being passed to the widow, including the house so, unless there are shares to be sold and banks that demand probate ......... is there any need to obtain probate? A friend was recently sorting out his mother's estate and he reckoned that the only reason that they had to apply for probate was because NS&I demanded it in order to release a small amount of savings.
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Probate question new
Probate question new