Costs for lawyers to settle an estate?
Discussion
Not knowing any lawyers personally, I thought I'd ask in here. What's the going rate to do the necessary to sort out someone's estate after they shuffle this mortal coil? Just had the paperwork through for my late mother, and on a real simple [as I see it] estate with modest possesions including her house, with just a single beneficiary [me] the lawyers seem to have racked up £6K of charges....plus VAT. To say my flabber is a bit gasted is an understatement. How much effort goes in to paying a few bills and filing some papers? Of course if this realy is some horrendously time consuming activity then I'll just accept it, but it hardly seems 'value' to me.
I agree with the previous post to get a breakdown of costs and with the benefit of hindsight, I would have asked for this before they started.
Have recently been an Executor for a fairly complex estate ( I am not a lawyer) and got the solicitor to do the things I couldn't i.e. file for probate.
the rest I did myself and I paid about £1100 inc VAT.
Having said that I spent numerous days / hours sorting out everything from Electric bills to selling the property and chattels, paying bequests to charity. I imagine if they have done alot of this the time involved and costs would rapidly escalte out of hand.
I realise that we don't always make the most rational decisions at difficult times, I know I sold some items off cheaply just to clear them. But overall faced with this situation again I would get the lawyers to do as little as practically possible and struggle with the rest myself!
Have recently been an Executor for a fairly complex estate ( I am not a lawyer) and got the solicitor to do the things I couldn't i.e. file for probate.
the rest I did myself and I paid about £1100 inc VAT.
Having said that I spent numerous days / hours sorting out everything from Electric bills to selling the property and chattels, paying bequests to charity. I imagine if they have done alot of this the time involved and costs would rapidly escalte out of hand.
I realise that we don't always make the most rational decisions at difficult times, I know I sold some items off cheaply just to clear them. But overall faced with this situation again I would get the lawyers to do as little as practically possible and struggle with the rest myself!
I've been an executor 7-8 times and I've done the job myself other than twice. It does take a while and there's a load of paperwork but I did find it satisfying. There's plenty of good up to date publications to help you get the job done.
The two I did't do were because a house had to be sold. In both these cases, what were reasonably modest estates if the property was excluded produced legal fees of around £12,00-£15,000. I would not use the legal services of any high street bank because they would charge much higher.
R.
The two I did't do were because a house had to be sold. In both these cases, what were reasonably modest estates if the property was excluded produced legal fees of around £12,00-£15,000. I would not use the legal services of any high street bank because they would charge much higher.
R.
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