It is a common sense step to ensure an orderly arrangement of your affairs.

Many people believe that making a will is equivalent to signing their own death warrant. It is not.

A will is a legal document which sets out in detail to whom you wish to leave your estate upon your death. Your estate consists of your cash, including all bank and savings accounts, together with all of your assets such as houses, cars, shares, furniture, jewellery and all other personal effects.

Anyone over the age of 18 and ‘being of sound mind’ can make a will. Being of sound mind is defined as being fully aware of what one is doing.

A will can be simple, such as leaving everything to your next of kin, or detailed to the point of nominating specific books to be left to named people. You can of course leave your estate to whom you wish, however it is wise to take advice in certain circumstances as wills can be contested.

It is vitally important to make a will as this reduces the problems and difficulties to those you leave behind upon your demise.

1 THE IMPORTANCE OF MAKING A WILL

A will is a legal document, detailing how you wish your estate to be settled upon your death. The making of a will is a comparatively simple process, yet almost two-thirds of people in the UK die without one. There could be several reasons for this.

Many people believe that their estate will automatically go to their spouse when they die. Others genuinely have nothing to leave. Some have no close relatives or friends and could not care less what happens when they die. A number think that only rich people leave wills. However, the main reason is that the person has ‘just not got round to making one’.

You do not have to wait until you are getting old before making a will, you can always alter it later if you wish.

Some good reasons for making a will include to:

• make life simpler for your family on your death
• ensure your property goes to the people you want to benefit
• ensure your spouse is not deprived of his/her home
• ensure a common law partner benefits as you would wish
• ensure specific gifts pass to whom you wish
• ensure funeral expenses are paid from your estate
• ensure that your property does not go to unknown relatives
• minimise tax on your estate
• ensure your assets are properly managed
• give you peace of mind
• help your affairs to be settled quickly
• ensure any change in circumstances do not accidentally revoke your wishes.

Any person who dies without making a will is said to have died intestate. In such cases, the estate is subject to the laws of intestacy. These laws or rules were drawn up in 1925 and are therefore outdated as they do not take into consideration the changes that have taken place in family relationships in recent years. However, they still apply and the only things that have altered are the sums of money involved.

Under these laws, when a person dies without making a will, leaving a spouse and children, the surviving spouse will receive the personal chattels and the first £125,000 plus a life interest in half the estate with the remainder being shared between the children. If there are no children, the spouse receives the first £200,000 with the remainder being distributed among the nearest relatives. Chattels are things such as furniture, the car and other personal effects. If the family home is owned as a joint tenancy or tenancy in common, the laws as described in section 2 below apply.

The laws of intestacy include a set order in which relatives can benefit from the estate. This is:

• spouse
• children (including illegitimate and adopted)
• parents
• brothers and sisters
• half-brothers and sisters
• grandparents
• uncles and aunts (full-blood)
• uncles and aunts (half-blood).

If any of the above die before you, then their children, if any, will benefit. Where there is no surviving spouse or children, efforts must be made to find relatives who could benefit from the estate. It could happen that the eventual beneficiary is a distant cousin, nephew or niece that the deceased person may not have seen for many years or even knew existed.

To benefit as a spouse under the intestacy laws, he or she must have been legally married to the deceased. The law does not take into account common law partners.

Problems caused by intestacy include:

• If there is no will, members of the family will have to sort out the estate.
• Unless the right provisions have been made, the home may have to be sold to meet taxation and other costs.
• All bank and building society accounts will be frozen (unless they are joint accounts) until probate is granted.
• The spouse may be left with insufficient funds with which to live and maintain the home.
• it will take more time to administer the estate than if there had been a will.
• It may be necessary to engage the services of solicitors to locate distant relatives. This will cost money.

All in all, as I am sure you will agree, it is well worth spending a little time and effort to make a will.