Time to wind up an Estate

[EdLaguna]

How long should it take to wind up an Estate when there is a straight forward non contested will?

[Buenchico]

It depends who is doing the job. A few solicitors are extremely efficient. Many (most?) are slow and extremely inefficient.

When my father died I obtained probate myself and had everything sorted out in about three weeks. But most solicitors will take at least 3 months to do the same task. Many will take 6 months or longer.

Chris

[Kathyan]

My mother in law passed away last June and my husband received his cheque from the solicitor about two weeks ago. This is in Scotland by the way.

[buildersmate]

A couple of points to add to Chris'.
The timescale isn't really driven by whether the will is non-contested or not - more by the nature and quantity of the assets to be liquidated. Any estate that involves property or investments (investment products - not simple bank accounts) is likely to take longer.
The generally-accepted principle is that executors have one year to complete the task but this is a maximum and it doesn't have to be that long.
However an executor is well-advised to wait for 6 months from the date of probate before distributing the estate (because it allows for anyone who thinks they may have a claim to emerge from the woodwork), and paying off all the debts of the deceased can take time - for example, dealing with HMRC for income tax during the final year of life. All of these things prevent finalising the estate - though don't prevent a partial distribution.

[cassa333]

My mil died last june and it still hasn't been sorted yet. Mind you they have only just sold her house and shares in her name have to be changed over so they can be sold so it can take ages or it can be relativly quick. It depends on what they had and who is dealing with probate.

[EdLaguna]

Thank you all for your input, which is most helpful. My FIL died over 2 years ago and all I hear from the solicitor is that he apologises for his delay when I can get him to reply! Residing in the USA and the estate being in England makes it very difficult and frustrating.

[fredpuli47]

Well, Ed, once the executor has grant of probate (which itself involves his paying any inheritance tax before he can get a grant.He normally takes a 'probate loan' a kind of bridging loan to do this then repays that from the estate) he can proceed to administer the estate.That's when the fun starts.If the estate is very simple e.g. , consisting of the deceased's savings in the bank, his ordinary house with ordinary contents and some shares on the stock exchange the only delay is in waiting for the Revenue to agree the executor's valuation made as at death (which was done when probate was obtained).If not the executor can spend the next two years arguing about businesses privately owned (trading or not trading, assets wholly for business purposes or not,value of share in it, tax relief claimable ),all expenditure in the seven years before death (was it out of income or assets, was it for maintenance of the deceased or others, was it gifts of an extraordinary kind to reducing the estate) land owned (was it agricultural or business or partly so or just private ) and so on. The Revenue can be quite slow.My mother died just 3 years ago, leaving an estate of extraordinary complexity and value and we haven't agreed absolutely everything yet (but we're very close) !
However, straightforward bequests of modest amounts of money or identified chattels can be dealt with almost straight away on getting probate and should be. The executor is not barred from distributing the whole estate, including residue, then but he'd be very unwise to do so until everything had been finally settled with the Revenue !

[modeller]

fred is there someone or some organisation that edlaguna could complain to ? He seems to be getting apologies but no explanation .

[Eve]

Have you tried asking for a detailed explanation as to the progress so far, work to be done and reasons for any delays, see if you can get to the bottom of why it is taking so long and take any further appropriate action from there.

[EdLaguna]

Thank you Fredpuli47, Modeller and Jenna1978 for your suggestions which are most helpful in more than one way.
Probate actually closed over 18 months ago without any problem. When the sub-contracted solicitor handling the Estate left unexpectedly after assuring us the Estate would be wound up in January 2009, the partner and co-executor with my wife has repeatedly apologised for being delinquent in not transferring shares into our names, providing us with an acounting etc. (The Estate doen't have any business complexities.) He doesn't respond to most of our letters or emails, and when he does it is with a promise that he will attend to matters! He withdraws fees without my wife's concurrence. Surely there must be some way to get him off the 'dime'! We don't want to be contentious, but maybe it is time.

[fredpuli47]

Ed, the solicitor is not only the solicitor to the estate, the executors, but is a co-executor himself.That is a doubly onerous burden which he is failing to discharge.He is professionally responsible as the solicitor and personally responsible as an executor to ensure the estate is administered and wound up properly and in due time.

Involve the Law Society, the governing body of solicitors. They have enormous , and varied, powers over all solicitors and their code of conduct is exemplary and wide-ranging.The code surprises me sometimes but then I'm more familiar with the other branch of the profession (That rarely does anything wrong.That's because it never gets its hands on clients' money !) Their complaints body for advice and making complaints Is:

www.legalcomplaints.org.uk

It's a breach of professional duty to fail to keep clients informed of progress (or lack of it, with reasons).It's also a breach to fail to reply to clients' letters. Unnecessary slowness must be a breach. The Law Society may well see others. You must surely have standing if a beneficiary and the other executor certainly has standing to make such complaints.

[EdLaguna]

Thank you very much Fredpuli47 for information on this complaint site. I will download the PDF guide and complaint form and be ready to submit the complaint if we don't get closure when we return to England in mid-March. We truly appreciate your input.
Ed

[EdLaguna]

Thank you all for the advice you have provided, and in particular I would like to single out Fredpuli47 for his indispensable suggestions. As a result, good progress has been made and we have been promised that the Estate will be wound up by next month. Many thanks once again everyone.
Ed