Conveyancing

[Janey74]

Hi there

Scottish Law

My parents have died with no Will and my brother has appointed himself administrator. We live in Yorkshire ,

I would like to buy the family cottage in the borders out of money from the Estate.

My questions are :-

Would I need to pay stamp duty as I am buying only my share of the house 80k. The house is on the market for £160k.

Is it a change on name on the title deeds?

There has never been a mortgage on the property for 50 years plus.

I need a cheap way to sort this out as Solicitors today have cost myself personally thousands of pounds ,

I really need help direction and advice

Thanks in advance

Jane

[atalanta]

You might start with the Citizens Advice Bureau

[bednobs]

it seems a complicated wy of doing things to me. Surely you won't be buying your share, you'll be buying your brother's share?
Is he happy for you to buy th cottage? i presume tht money left is more thn half the house? Can't you tw between you work out a way of you hving hte house, and he having bigger sgare of money?

[Janey74]

he want to do it this way which is going to costs money . It is on the market currently as I thought the price was high. But heart ruling over head situation and I cant let the house go . hence why I have agreed the higher price.

[Janey74]

This is also Scottish Law which is different to English way.

[KARL]

There may (I think almost certainly should) be a way to adjust the settlement of the estate in such a way that instead of you getting, for example (as I assume) half the house/cottage and half of each and everything else, you get the whole of the cottage and then you divide the rest so that in terms of the total value each gets you are even. In such a scenario you would need to come to an agreement over a) the value of the cottage (can be by having it valued for estate purposes, quite cheap) and b) the way things are arrived at in total. Yes, it involves a new title because a deceased individual cannot own anything and as a new name is entered in the record the new title is required. I would think that involving a solicitor to at least some extent is advisable to ensure everything is done so as to avoid procedural complications.