Your legacy is no laughing matter
"Probaby unsurpassed as a specimen of the 20th-century garden." Lawrence Johnston bequeathed his stunning garden at Hidcote to the National Trust. Houses dishes the dirt on several houses and gardens transferred by will.
Heard the one about the healthy and wealthy businessman whose wealth was sturdier than his health?
He died of a sudden heart attack in his early 50's.
Fortunately, he had a will.
Unfortunately, he never signed it.
What about the famous comedian who said he would leave a fortune to two admirers - in a new will?
Consider, too, the elderly woman - neither wealthy nor famous - who divided her estate equally between her two brothers. Wisely, she named each of them. Alas, one name was that of her nephew, not her brother. Oops.
The many Britons who own property abroad (and the many foreigners who live and own a home here) should be interested in the man who, correctly, made wills in both France and the UK to cover his assets in each country. But the language in his French will was ambiguous; it may give his daughter more than he intended - and leave his partner homeless.
FINANCIAL PLANNING
After learning that he would soon inherit a fortune when his elderly father died, a plain young man decided to marry and enjoy his wealth with someone.
Soon he met a beautiful woman.
"I may look ordinary," he said, "but I'll shortly inherit millions." She was impressed, and they exchanged contact details.
Three days later, she became his stepmother.
One of these days...
The executive with the unsigned will was Australian media magnate Robert Holmes à Court (1937-1990).
He had apparently been carrying it around for more than a year. Why didn't he sign it?
He never said, we will probably never know, and the assumption is that he intended to sign it one of these days.
We can answer a related question, though: How much legal weight did this unsigned will have over the distribution of his fortune?
The answer is...
None. Zero. Holmes à Court died without a will. His fortune - bolstered by his 1985 sale of the rights to the Beatles songbook to Michael Jackson (1958-2009) - was distributed according to the rules of intestacy.
Shortly before his death, comedian Benny Hill (1924-1992) said that he wrote a new will in which he left substantial gifts to two admirers. When Hill, who never married or had children, died a few months later, his fans held their collective breath wondering about the identity of the two lucky beneficiaries.
They are still wondering. One will was found. It was 30 years old. Hill's parents, brother and sister were his beneficiaries, and they all died in the interim. His estate went to his nieces and nephews.
Did the confused elderly woman intend to name her brother or her nephew - or both? Even the judge was baffled, ruling the gift "void for uncertainty."
The French-English conflicting-wills property dispute may be settled by a compromise that leaves everyone basically satisfied. If it goes to court, one or both of the parties may become homeless and poorer due to legal fees.
The Innocent Woman with the Worthless Will
Swedish journalist (and, at his death, an aspiring rather than a successful novelist) Stieg Larsson (1954-2004) is a symbol for How NOT To Do It. He had made and signed a will many years earlier, but it was incorrectly witnessed - therefore invalid.
Shortly after his death, his novels became runaway bestsellers, and posthumously he became very rich. This sudden wealth did little for his live-in companion of 30 years, Eva Gabrielsson. Larsson died intestate, so his beneficiaries were his father and brother. An updated valid will would have made a world of difference for Eva Gabrielsson. (Full story)
An instructive contrast is offered by Jade Goody (1981-2009), Big Brother TV celebrity and mother of two young boys who succumbed to cancer at the age of 27.
When Goody realised she was terminally ill, she devoted herself to securing the financial futures of her children. She participated in various media projects to increase her income, and she arranged her tax and financial affairs to minimise inheritance tax - one facet of which involved marrying her boyfriend. Tying the knot as part of a shrewd overall tax-planning scheme substantially increased the trust fund established for her boys.
A curate's egg
Wills can be defective, in part or as a whole - rendering the will itself partially or wholly null and void. The offending part, even the entire will, can be regarded as if it doesn't exist at all.
A great irony in will-making is that many people make a will precisely to not die intestate and then make a defective will resulting in intestacy.
Defective wills arise for various reasons. Are all required signatures present and accounted for - and legitimate? Did the witnesses really witness the signing? Did anyone unduly pressure the testator? Does the giver of the gift really, or still, own the gift in question, and is the beneficiary still alive to receive it? Is this 'Last Will' really the last one - or is a newer one lurking somewhere?
The potential for error is vast - and greedy relatives and friends are ready to pounce and provoke a nasty challenge over the slightest weakness, whether real or perceived, invented or imagined. And even if a will is sound and legally valid, another question arises: is it financially wise - or wasteful?
“Rich people are no better than poor people — you give them a third and they want two-thirds.”
Brooke Astor, Philanthropist (1902-2007)
Shabby wills result in confusion and conflict instead of clarity and fairness. Well-drafted wills go hand in hand with well-planned estates and are the best defence against contention and chaos.
Why go to the trouble and expense of making a will when the rules of intestacy will distribute the estate to close family anyway?
- Because close relatives sometimes die at the same time as, or soon after, you do.
- Because intestacy can mean delay and uncertainty.
- Because intestacy may clash with your wishes or intentions (your assets may go to the 'wrong' relatives).
- Because financial-planning benefits comes only with a will, not with intestacy.
These answers, and a few others, are explained further in the section that answers the question, Why bother? and elsewhere in this site.
" . . . "
"I took a sheet of paper from the top drawer of the desk and placed it in front of him. Without speaking he wrote out the will, just the eight lines. A reasonable annual income for his wife and everything else in trust for the child. He may have wanted to get rid of me; I think he did. He may have been beyond caring; that is possible. He may have taken it for granted that he would be alive to make more formal arrangements next day. Most of us make that assumption."
P D James, A Taste for Death (1986)
