Inheritance disputes: the ticking financial clock tearing families apart

28:15Lawyers sat in both ends trying to come down, work them up, whatever it is to try and get a deal. We had two brothers, and it was a very straightforward estate. There was arguments about lifetime payments, just as I've been describing to you. It wasn't much. And in fact, both lawyers, I was in one room as a lawyer in the other room, trying to understand what the hell was going on? Why were these two brothers, they wouldn't even move towards each other. Really hostile, really aggressive. Very, very rare. I can count on one hand the number of times the mediator said, look, I'm going to get them in the same room and let's see what happens.

28:47So we brought them into the same room and the mediator just said to the pair of them, what's going on? What is it? And it was quiet for about five minutes. And then one of the brothers jumped up, pointed at the other one and said, you don't understand. You got the red bike. I had to have the yellow one. Joking. No. Bicycle. Some deep child issues there. And lawyers were going, you know, first thing they were doing is, I'm saying that on the disclosure sheet, where's that? And then the second thing is, when? Then it clicked. There were nine. Childhood stuff, yeah. They were nine. And then the brother stood up and the other brother went, but I wanted the yellow one.

29:23You're joking. No, I wanted the yellow one. And suddenly it was sort of hairs, everybody's backs and the necks all stood up and we're like, 10 minutes later, we were outside and we carved up a deal in 30 minutes. And he went for a beer afterwards. He went for a beer afterwards. And that's power mediation, to be honest. You couldn't get that in a court. But in a mediation, he felt brave enough to do it. But it demonstrates to me just how deep this stuff goes. He's carried that his whole life. Like that, like, favouritism, probably resented his brother his whole time. And, you know, as a receiving party, as a child, you tend to look at money as a measure of love, invariably.

30:01So if my sister gets two thirds of what I get, then it means my parents loved her two thirds more than they love me, which sounds daft. But actually, you've got no one to ask and look for reassurance. Again, they're not here. Is that true? It feels like it's true. It does. Yeah, it feels like it happened to me at Christmas. My brother and sister got like one more present than me and I got really upset. I was trying not to because it's Christmas. You know, it's about Jesus. I did though. I didn't get any presents. Yeah, you buy yourself a present, mate. I need presents. because christmas brings out the child in you so like we're all the family we've had a big lunch and like our cousins and stuff and then it's time to open the phone all our cousins left it's me and my siblings and my partner my kid and then we're opening presents i'm like looking around i'm like where's my second present like they both got two and then my mom she could i didn't say anything but she could see i was like obviously like my face is very expressive yeah so she's like my fiance is like you look really like down so i was like oh crap so i like tried to cheer up and then And my mum, when I left, she wrote me a rest.

30:57She's like, you know I love you so much. She's like, your son got presents and so did your fiancé. So that counts as presents for you. And I was like, oh, I didn't think about that. So I can see how people get emotional about this. Because you're like, I'm meant to be the favourite child and they both got two presents. I've only got one. She's like, yeah, but your fiancé and your kid also got presents. So we actually got you five presents. And I was like, oh. So I can understand people taking this to the... I can't believe what I'm hearing. Child. Do you know what I have to say? I love Christmas.

31:25I don't care what you say you love presents I do love presents I've got two things two things to say really one is that that's just like Harry Potter and Dudley when Dudley does that he goes where's my 37th present but point number two I could not describe more beautifully than you just have the actual impact of a will and the I leave you one present I leave them two them two you're sitting there going where's my other one and the only reason why you were okay about it eventually is because your mum told you she said that's not a measure this is why I've done it. The message was better than the present.

31:58Absolutely right. But if they're gone, you don't get that message. Well, that's why you need to leave the message in the will, right? You need to say, for my eldest son, you've been so financially successful that I think it's fair that you don't get the most or whatever. So what we've tried to do with the Bank of Women's Dad idea is to say that we recognise that people aren't going to do a will every time they give a lifetime gift. So let's do a little memorandum of understanding. Something that's produced that explains, like your mum did, explains what and why and how it should be taken into account.

32:26So that then passes on. So the explanation will be the combined value of you, your child, and your partner's presence is the same as the other two, and that's the way it should be. And if it's not, equalise it. And those are the kind of conversations to have. And, you know, pulling it back again a little bit to the finance industry is that anybody managing wealth these days, so any of the big investment companies, anybody else, are recognising that with the size of the intergenerational wealth transfer and the fact that none of them know the next generation down, the only knows those holding the actual funds now is that this money is passing and there are two massive black holes.

33:04You know, there is one that is a hole that says divorce. There is another one that says death. And those two are the places where the finances drop into that they don't know where they go and where they lead to. So this 10 years ago, I've been saying this, but five years ago, they started to twig, I think. And no surprise, if you look at the M &A activity from last year, is you've got people like Octopus Money, and I'm bearing in mind what that site does, but Octopus Money has acquired Amicable, which is an online, very clever divorce law firm doing stuff online and helping people, but actually connecting the next generation down.

33:41So you'll find that that will happen more and more, is that people will be acquiring things that allow them to follow the money down these these black holes into and when you say black hole do you mean that like i i pass money to my son my son dies it then goes to his wife and falls out of my like family it can be that or it could be but but literally your funds are under management um and you have a contract with your financial advisor or whoever's you know some portfolio that you're working with that portfolio know you you'd have a financial advisor wealth advisor coming to you sort of sitting down and saying okay we're going to put in high risk low risk whatever it is when you die the notifications come through six months later there'll be a granted probate and then invariably they'll be cashing all that all those policies all those investments in and then dividing it by three four or five wherever it goes if you don't know where the three four or five is you just lost the entire portfolio of investment money it's gone and most ifas will not ask the question usually of can you introduce me it's a simple answer isn't it can you introduce me to the next generation down so what we're trying to do again bank point out is is get those introductions done have the kind of relationship that you describe is to be able to talk to your kids talk to your parents sit down and say this money's coming through what about care costs you know how are we going to deal with that are we going to try and avoid that if we can or is it something that's right and we should be paying for how big is the care component in terms of like when you come to the the disputes and the debates how much is care impacting like final pots and what people get and yeah impact i mean there's no doubt about it's really expensive isn't it any care costs are phenomenally expensive so you will find leaving aside whether you think it's right that we should be paying for our own care but is is it what it does have a bit like equity release you know whatever you think about equity release it's still expensive way of borrowing money and both of those have a massive impact again it eats into this idea that what people are going to receive or expect or rely is going to be less than what they thought it was going to be and and i think again a stat came out saying that the average amount that the average beneficiary thinks they're going to get is 104 000 pounds so that's the average what they actually receive is about 52 so there's a disconnect between what they think they're going to get and what they're actually going to get so again that feeds into this problem of well what we're going to do then you know i've got 50 000 less care costs start to eat into that 750 quid a week yeah you know like it eats through that in no time if you have disputes then the legal costs are going to eat into that as well on all sides because invariably you tend to trials are quite rare daily mail obviously picks them all but trials are rare you know you tend to resolve most lawyers doing this kind of work would have an ability to be able to get it over the line but i do think that that the amount of costs involved are high you know you think about four parties in a dispute two siblings an estate um and then a warring party is that you've got four sets of lawyers fees haven't you even at 250 quid an hour that's a thousand pounds every hour and it's going to take more than that yeah oh yeah so what we've tried to do is pick off at the death end stuff that's expensive for people to engage in disputes about and find a way to harness legal tech to do it so we've got we created something called iDivide which is a perceived fairness algorithm so if any of your listeners have got you're a coder by I'm mass physical computer science A-laws I am just for context yeah a little bit of science and see.

37:20So I enjoy my numbers and my coding. So I enjoy the text. So, um, and although when I was coding, it was basic and Pascal and COBOL. So it was like a lot different from it now. So it was, um, yeah, it was a clever way of making sure that if people have, if there's a known number of items and a known group of people all arguing about it. So if you've got beneficiaries arguing about photographs invariably or medals or, or, um, Welsh dressers, whatever it is, is that this thing will take you through and give you a fair distribution for 25 quid basically so it'll take everybody instead of paying four sets of lawyers 250 quid an hour this is something that will make that how would it work that out it's got a at its heart it's got a perceived fairness algorithm that's been built by a maths professor far brighter than me so it and it works so it takes you through a series of bidding rounds and it doesn't just simply add up who's bid the most for each item it relates the bidding to each other.

38:12I don't even pretend to understand it. What I do know is the outputs work. Every time we ask them, is this a fair distribution, everybody says, yeah. Does that mean AI is going to take over in the future and just sort it out really quickly? You get 50 grand, you get 10 pounds, you get quid. Latest. Yes, I think we're looking at AI on adult claims, on financial, sort of, I haven't got enough, I want to bring some more, but you're financially independent. So you shouldn't be able to bring it. it runs against testing you know that bad child again um and trying to assess that the merits ai is doing that so we're using ai on the fringes of stuff you could go through there like their social medias and go back and go you've you've not engaged with this individual in years so yeah you know like did that that tells you a story yeah and ai can farm that yeah quite quickly oh we've used social media is hilarious because the number of claims we've had where we can't afford we can't do this we can't do the other and then you go to social media and download it yeah literally you download it and you go well you said shall we have a look at our witness statement from the social media company so how it goes but the one thing that's clear to me though from this conversation is like you know have a will where you say in the will i want this person to have this and this is why and also have a conversation with people while you're alive yeah how does you know to me i can go to my mom and go you know what's the score with the world to main would probably get a slap around the head if you know if i would just feel so awkward yeah is that what it is would your mom would your mom want to talk about it or would she would she say it's inappropriate none of your business she wouldn't say it's inappropriate she would just be like i feel maybe this is my shift in my shoulder i think she'd just be like you just want me for my money yeah like i like i don't know i feel like she would be like why are you asking me like really i don't imagine her not being in this so i don't want to be like if when you're not here how much money do i get you know it's kind of like uh it's a weird one yeah but yeah you could be like i'm It's an awkward conversation.

40:04I'm the kind of child that cries if I get one less present than everyone else. That's a good idea. I'm like, so do you want to show that? Why don't you just send this episode? Just send this episode with like a little smiley emoji. Yeah, yeah, what do you think? Like a money bag emoji. With a money bag emoji. I have to say, T, that's the most beautiful example I've ever had, you know, and I'll be using that myself. I promise. It's a situation. Let's move it into. But that conversation is excruciating at times. I sound like I'm grasping. I sound like I'm wishing you dead. It sounds like I don't care.

40:33It sounds like I just want to know how you're going to divvy it up. And they have financial obligations now. They've got three kids. They just moved house. They downsized a little bit. They might move to the countryside. So they don't know what they're doing. They got rid of their mortgage. Now they're renting. So I'm like, I don't know what situation they're in. And in a way, it's not your business to know. You know, these are individuals. Especially with our parents where they've got a lot of life in them. They're not like 85. They're very active. They're like the primes of their lives. My mum and stepdad are in great condition.

41:05Do you know what I mean? My parents are always jumping on a plane to like here and there. So they're always going on holiday or going on business trips. So they're still like very active. It's like one foot in the grave, isn't it? Yeah. The way to do it and the way we try, most people do will or estate planning when they've had some smell, taste, sight of mortality. You know, that's when people do do a will. It's a friend dies or something happens to somebody that they can relate to. And then suddenly they see the harm and they go, well, actually, I don't want that. Suddenly it's, I don't want to do that to my kids, so therefore I'm going to do it.

41:35When you're young and your kids are under 18, it's an easy decision because you're asking yourself, who do I want to look after the kids if I hold up? You know, that will get people to do well. But like the parents that you're describing, you know, you're all grown-ass men, you know, you'd have to agree about that. So the only way to do it, in my view, is to sort of tangentially a little bit, which is not to say, can we talk about the money and all the rest of it? but is to say, did you know, and try and introduce some kind of knowledge or awareness in a way that is, that suggests nudges. And it might be about tax.

42:08It might be about, you know, something that a joint saving that will work. And did you know that? And whilst you're looking at that, let me give the information. And I think empowering you not to have the conversation, but to pass something on to your parents and say, this is really quite interesting. I just thought you should read it. You know, even the heritocracy book, quite frankly, is read it because actually it will talk about the bank of mum and dad and how that works. I think the – I've seen one case recently, and it's the first time I've seen it creep in, where parents have paid children, overpaid because they were in need, left themselves short, asked for the money back, not got it back, and are now suing – The kids.

42:53The kids to repay the money back in again. money's so dirty it's just so filthy i mean i love it but it's just so filthy like it changes people so much yeah and again it's it's expectations of life in fact just just just on one particular i think about another case that'll flood into my head now one particular case this is 15 years ago this is the first time i ever saw signs of people relying on an inheritance in the future to the point where they can't not have it and it was a chap who died with two daughters, left three million pounds. It's a decent size estate. One daughter had married and was financially very well off in her own right.

43:34She didn't work, but her husband was very wealthy. The other sister was married to an accountant and he had managed to get himself bankrupt. So they were struggling. The daughter, the will, didn't provide for either of them. It all went to charity. so one daughter said well that's great that's lovely dad it's gone it's gone to um hospital as it happens the other daughter says well hang on a minute i i haven't got anything i need to i thought i was going to get something through i knew she was okay so i thought i was going to be getting it all um i got a letter of claim from a very large law firm in london and i remember reading remember this 15 years ago i was reading it go and it started off by saying about eight pages long, started off by saying, I anticipated, I expected, I relied on this money coming through, and I lived accordingly, basically, is what she was saying.

44:25So I did this, I did that, I did the other. And now I'm sure, and I've got this. And I was laughing through the first four pages. I got to page five, and I'm thinking, oh, my God, page six and seven, I'm starting to see, if she's relied on that, and they've not sort of disavowed her of that kind of belief, does that create an obligation for them to make good on it? And actually, she brought a claim. But then she died of a brain hemorrhage and never got to court. Oh, my God. Savage end to the story. And that's the end of that. And that was the end of that. Well, there's a claim. Yeah, yeah. Next.

45:01That was unexpected. So one claim became two. So it kind of worked. So that's where it was. Again, I have to say, but it was a first sign. I knew she'd have got home on it, is the truth. And that's what went after. You think she would have won? I think she'd have got that because it was so clear. And this is the conversation piece with parents, is that clearly there were undertones. They were, parents invariably will want to try and help support their kids. What I would say to any of your listeners and followers and scrubbers is to say, look, if you are receiving those payments, have a dialogue with your parents.

45:34Try and codify it. Try and get something from them, our best witness, that will say what the terms of that advance are. if for no other reason it means that you can produce that further down the line if it then falls into a dispute i got i got maybe like a thought for for you in your situation that might apply why don't you go to your parents and go i'm writing my will i would like your advice and i would like you to witness it and then you just at least open the dialogue around wills you know you then you're at the table going like how have you done yours or like how have you thought about this or just rip the band-aid off and do two and well you say like you go to them people love giving advice don't you yeah of course and if you go to them going I'm sure you've got a really well thought out will I'm thinking about doing mine you know my dad would love that he'd be like yes let's have a meeting that's what I mean bring a cigar and have a whiskey with him and like make it a nice event how would you divvy it up but I'm serious hypothetically yeah but I'm serious so that's a good way to get in two come one don't have too much to drink otherwise the will will be invalid is point number one if you're not got testimony correctly the second thing is is that just a variation of that which one of the suggestions i was going to make is if you go to them and say in all in all truth i am doing my own will and i'm looking at how i provide for my child because i'm expecting to be i want to make sure that it doesn't all flood down to them and if something happens to me and they suddenly get a lot of money they can't control i want to make sure he gets it but i need to do that i need to make sure what you're doing so it dovetails so he it's not about you it's about your child he then doesn't have to or he's not at risk because if you're leaving stuff to him i need to make sure that that we dovetail yeah and i think if you get that bit right then that's a conversation that's not even centered about you it's about how do we look after him and that and if you can do it that way then that because if they left a generous amount to him you might be like oh it's real just what i'm doing and like you know blended families yeah you know i i've got my partner has a son who like i'm a big part of his life so there's provisions there and obviously you know your your situation is like there's other people in your life that you care about you might say like well if if my kids taken care of maybe there's i can spread it about in the different areas give a little bit back to dama get some cash back yeah yeah cash back deal write me into the will yeah yeah one pound for David yeah yeah based on all the times he's made fun of me yeah yeah and a million for being a legend there you go there you go one thing that like comes to mind randomly then not I'm going to do this to you but do you remember like the Harold Shipman case yeah where he was yeah I'm a comfew yeah yeah everything to David you're like psych I'm more interested than you what the link might have been yeah yeah yeah no that's what I was thinking I was thinking if he cuts me out I just get it written in that way.

48:30No, but Howard Shipman, the interesting thing there was he was coercing people to put him in the will, wasn't he, and then killing them. Yeah, yeah. And like, how was that not spotted through this process? How was that seen as normal? Well, there's two things. One, you need to know there's a crime that's been committed, first of all. Without any crime, it could be gifts given. I do see wills, and they can be challenged on the grounds that suddenly you get carers very often. So you'll get somehow somebody's isolated. The classic example is older person on their own, isolated away. Carer comes in.

49:07Suddenly the carer's getting money and nobody else is. It's all going to my carer. Yeah, because, you know, it's a measure of everything they do for me. And some of that might be genuine. Quite frankly, testamentary freedom. You should be able to give what you want to what you want. If someone's been in the house for five years, looked after me, and my kids never come round, you know, why can't you? But no surprise, the kids will probably challenge it and argue some kind of undue influence. The thing about how a shipment case is, the thing to remember is that you can't, there's something called a forfeiture rule.

49:31You're not allowed to benefit from a crime in relation to an inheritance. So if you murder your wife and under the rules of intestacy or her will, her estate comes to you. No, the forfeiture rule will step in. So like shipment, as soon as he got convicted, steps in and you're treated as if you're not in there at all. So you've got to get away with it, basically. You've got to get away with it, basically. But weren't there lots of disputes from the children of these people at the time? Was that not like a sign early on? I don't know. Because it seemed like it all came out. It was always just killed hundreds of people potentially and been sucking up their words.

50:05I don't know individually the cases, but it seems to me that any circumstances in which somebody in a position of care and authority like a GP, and lawyers as well actually drafting the wills, if they are constantly learned as beneficial, or even just once in your own family situation, I will be asking questions. And people will come to me. And at that stage, we're saying, right, you must have unduly influenced that individual to do that, because there's no way they would have done that but for you doing what you did. So you're right, it's that you can challenge as a parent coming through. One extreme example of this is, again, just before Christmas, there was a case that was heard about assisted suicide.

50:43So imagine the forfeiture rule that says you can't receive victims of crime. Now, this particular chap took his wife to Dignitas and was charged with assisting suicide. So he didn't get the rule because it's a crime? Forfeiture rule. Didn't get anything? Well, but he took it to court and the court decided that they would waive. They basically said the forfeiture was not going to apply to you in this particular case. Because she wanted to do that. But it's still crime. The point is crime triggers forfeiture. Where would the money go then? Is it to the intestacy rules and it's like next down the line?

51:14Yeah, which is bizarre because if you don't have children under the rules of intestacy, you then got to dig out the family tree. It might be going to second cousin twice removed, you know, by the time you're looking at that. And what's the situation where it ends up going to, say, like the crown or whatever? Is this... It doesn't. Or the government. When did the government... Well, the crown gets it, actually. So if you can't find anybody all the way down the tree, then it will drop into the crown's coffers. Convenient. Because they need a little bit more cash, don't they? Yeah, and that's another industry.

51:40Yeah, clearly. So the crown will actually publish a list of all the estates they think are going to drop into their coffers. And they're like, hey, that's my great, great uncle. Hold on, hold on. Oh, so you can come forward. And you get lots of people. Well, you think it would be something, yeah, coming forward. But no, actually, what comes forward? You're all the air hunters. I was going to say, is there some fake IDs and some... No, it's the air hunters. So it's actually the companies, the businesses. Oh, we're quick on the draw there. Air hunters are, it's on TV, which is why I'm using that description.

52:08It was a series about it. But there are lots of companies that will help you track and trace beneficiaries. So what they will do, there's two different types, mainly. One that will say, I'm going to track and trace this one. I found you. You know, you've got two million. You are the second cousin twice removed. You've got two million quid coming your way. But before I actually tell you how much you've got, I want you to sign this piece of paper that says I get 10 % or 20%. And you're like, I'll give you that for my two million. And you sign it. It sounds like an email scam. Yeah. Like you get like the Nigerian prince wants to give you a million quid.

52:40You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not the one with Nigerian princes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Got one right here. Yeah, thank you. There you go. So that would – but they're two types. So you sign it and you get it and then they get the money. We've run arguments successfully against that kind of campaign simply because we say what's called an unconscionable bargain. It's basically a bargain. I'm in a bargaining position where I know what that's worth. You don't. Don't they have to tell them how much? No, no, no, they don't know. So it could be 10 grand or it could be a million. And you disagree 20 % or 10 % or 20%.

53:10And you don't know. And because you don't know, you're signing it. If they didn't do it, you wouldn't know about it. Yeah, that was the defence we got. Yeah, it's a bit like the no win. Would you rather have 80 % of something or a whole load of nothing? Yeah, yeah, I can. No win, no fee. Can't you just go, no thanks, I don't want to find out, and then call up some government body and go, I'm that person. Well, the other way you could do it, of course, is some companies will do it and they'll just charge for their time. So they'll say, we've got this, please sign this, we're going to charge for our time, this is how much it is and this is how much you're going to get coming through.

53:41Thank you very much for signing it. And they spent three years getting it to you and just bill you for a time. We've got solicitors on every side of this. 72 lawyers we've got to sign to your case. I can see I'm not going to convince you on this one. As a, you know, we don't really get involved, but that's when it goes to crown. So you will find that everybody will jump into that list and see if they can track and trace. And as you say, it's not a bad thing. Someone's getting money, best of that, than the crown. It's just the methodology sometimes. Do you know how much kind of money is fed to the crown?

54:10I don't, no. No, it won't be a small amount. changes obviously causes yeah um because this idea that's millions yeah i was gonna say the idea that someone dies completely alone with no one around them is probably not that rare you know like i mean it's rare but when you're talking to the population of the uk there's probably a lot of people every year that are just or baby boomers particularly i think i think it will be less so as the years go by yeah i think baby boomers think about emigration as well is that that families have gone abroad some people stay you know if you think about australia new zealand canada all the kind of commonwealth countries where families have all oh my family's canadian they've all gone over there so there's nothing left there's one or two hanging around and if you lose contact and there's no way of tracking and tracing them you can see how you can die quite isolated at times so now we're having less kids so yeah in the future there's going to be a lot of yeah yeah a lot of people that's true in the situations with the care where there are people around and one person's living in canada but the other person cares for the person for 10 years until they die.

55:08And they ultimately protect the value of the estate because if they weren't there caring, it would just get bled out by care homes. What's fair then? That's a good question. And the short answer is whatever the particular judge that's hearing your claim will decide is. I hope he's had a good lunch. Yeah, or he's not had a bad experience with a carer. You know, joking side, but that's ultimately, it's down to judges to actually make that call. and this was never better, you know, demonstrated to me with a case called Islay versus Mitson, which was a famous case. Daily Mail ran loads on it. Islay was...

55:42You love the Daily Mail, don't you? Yeah. In fact, I've had two headlines in the Daily Mail with cases I've had. One was, I think, man leaves his dinky toys to wife and nothing else, something like that. Anyway, they kind of ran with it. But in terms of where I am... Islay versus Mitchell? Yeah, Islay versus Mitson. And his island, thank you, is a case where half a million pound estate, she dies, had no relationship with one daughter. This one daughter was living in supported accommodation. She had a number of kids herself, didn't get on, and she got left nothing. So she left half a million pounds all to a charity.

56:20She then got a barrister in Leeds, actually, a chap called John Collins, who's now a dad, sadly. He took it on as a pro bono. So he said, look, I'm going to try and get you something. Even though you're an adult and an independently financial testamentary freedom, I'm going to give it a go. So he gave it a go. And he won at the core of first instance, 50 grand for her. So 10%, he got 50 grand. Result, actually, considering it's not been done before. The problem was that he turned down an offer that was more than that before trial. And as a result, if you turn down an offer that you don't bid at trial, then you are responsible for the offerer's costs from the date of that offer all the way through to trial.

57:00So what happened is he gained 50 to lose about, I don't know how much it was, but it would have been more than 50. So it was a negative number. So he had no choice but to appeal. Now the lawyer that actually, the judge that made that judgment about 50 grand just looked at it and said, I think it seems about fair, 50 grand. So when it went to the next appeal court, both sides appealed. One appeal saying I need more because I've not beaten the offer. The other one says, well, actually, we're going to say you shouldn't have had it in the first place. They did the second appeal first and rejected it and said it's discretion of the judge.

57:31That judge decides. Second appeal came through and we as lawyers were expecting it to be struck out because nobody was getting these awards coming through. £180 ,000 was ordered. This judge decided that actually they needed£180 ,000 as reasonable financial provision. Again, it comes back to this idea. Three times, four times. That then gets appealed by the charities to the Supreme Court. And by this stage, it's televised. So we can all watch the Supreme Court dealing with it. That's how exciting my Saturday nights are. Watching that and the same barrister run it, the pro bono guy, all the way through, he can be seen on the TV.

58:07And the Supreme Court turned around and said, one, 180 is too much. Two, the original offer of£50 ,000 was fine. It was the discretion of the judge. We're not going to interfere with it. back to the regional order, 50 grand. It took 10 years. The legal costs involved, reportedly, over a million quid. No. To argue about a 50, and you were exactly back where you were at the beginning, 10 years ago. Well, you're negative. So you've got, yes, you've got 50 grand. But apparently what happened with the costs is they became such an important point, is that charities, and again, I think this is right, decided that they would fund it on both sides' costs because it was so important because they were worried about losing money coming to them, I think, was the idea behind it.

58:50Why did charities fund it? Because they want some kind of precedent of the situation? Or not a precedent. So what they didn't want is charitable gifts because some of the comments that were made in the first instance, certainly in the second court, is because there was no real connection between mum and charity is that she just literally picked the charity out of a book because it could go anywhere as long as it didn't go to the daughter. And they thought that was important, whereas the Supreme Court didn't take that view and said you can't do that. And the reason why the charities, I think, probably argued it was because they don't want that sitting on a case where it says you need a connection to the charity of some sort.

59:30Because most of us, you know, we're given to charity, you might have a connection if someone's died, Macmillan nurses or whatever. But a lot of people pick four, five, you know, list them all, Donkey Sanctuary, whatever it is. No connection, but I just like the idea of it. You know, whatever it is. That's a great idea. or i'm covering my back side so i'm gonna give something to every religious charity you know i'll cover all bases 10 grand to each of them one of them's gonna be right you know hopefully and away we go so it's that kind of idea so valuing is really difficult really difficult there was a story in in the brief where you talked about someone who was too generous for charity and they ended up giving away too much yeah that was sad really sad because this this chap had provided inner will for his wife this is important keeping up to date with you and he'd what he'd done he's sat down, worked out how much his wealth was based on his investment portfolio.

1:00:16A big chunk of his money was that. And then he decided to give percentages to his wife and to charity. He'd worked out and sat down with his wife and said, if I give you 40%, for example, that's the house and a lump sum of cash, you're covered. I'll give the rest to charity. He died about five or six years later and the portfolio had dropped to a point where 40 % of the entire estate didn't even and cover the property so as a result she the charity is picking everything up and if we hadn't have interfered she would have had to sell her house you know exactly not what her husband would have wanted but but that's just because they weren't keeping on top of investments and advice and checking you know goes up goes down doesn't it do they have to execute if you've got something like a stock portfolio do they have to execute it when you die or like like you said the value drop can you not wait for it to like you know what give it five years it'll be back up and then when it gets back up, sell it.

1:01:11Can you do that? Well, that falls on, I don't want to put people on doing wheels, okay? But as an executor, and I know I'm sitting here with you, you are an executor. Executors have personal liability for the estate. Jeez. So if you're holding the portfolio and it goes down while it's in your control. Yeah, but the duty is just to act in a reasonable way. So if you, it's sort of the clapper momentous kind of idea is that you've got to sit there and go, what's reasonable in these circumstances. What you'll find most law firms is they'll instruct on big portfolios and instruct the right people to advise on the right moment to sell, the right moment to pass on and do that.

1:01:50Others will just simply sell at the moment of death and we'll get what we get. What you're supposed to do as an executor is what's called preserve the estate if for the benefit of all the beneficiaries. So you need to act fairly sensibly. If that means sitting on it because in two years there's no penalties and it's going to be sold, then you can turn around and say, well, that's what I'd like to do. Do you all agree, beneficiaries? At which point you cover yourself off and do it that way. So there's flexibility. But again, conversations need to happen because if you've got one kid that's saying, oh, I need my money now, and another kid that's saying, no, no, let's sit for the two years, and the executor has to act in the best interest of all beneficiaries, that's both, what does he or she do?

1:02:34Can't sell half? Yeah, possibly. Yeah, if you do it, sell half and keep the other half in there. Creatively try and do it. If this may be a bit of a selfish question, but I like the idea of setting up some kind of trust that then carries on for centuries. So in like five or 600 years, they're living off the demo fund. Yeah, yeah. Is this the thing? And they'll be asking, who was this demo? Yeah, yeah. They'll know. Yeah, yeah. They'll know. Every time they access it, it'll be my face. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. It was me. It'd be AI demos. so if you can't have it yeah yeah yeah enjoy that yeah yeah yeah but are you here again yeah yeah is that a structure I can set up yeah you know even if it's got like 10 quid in it I'm just literally having the same conversation with my wife yesterday about for our kids the same thing it's a legacy point isn't it yeah and then they can take 3 % a year or 4 % a year and it stays invested point your trustees I mean even better than that is you can set up in life and you become the trustee you know so you can be the trustee of your own trust but in the generations to come I always quite like that you know the Daymo Family Settlement Trust.

1:03:34You know, it's got a nice, it is a legacy point. Maybe it's a ego, but I don't know what it is. But I like the idea of it because I think it demonstrates that somebody somewhere along the line has taken a view that, actually, I'm going to provide four generations to come. I'm going to be careful about this and do it. That's that discussion you can have with your parents. Let's create something like that. Yeah, like a legacy that feeds through that anyone within, you know, the Akarelai family can benefit from and no one can squander. Like, that's the point, isn't it? You know, that my son doesn't just, like, destroy it.

1:04:03Yeah, we were talking earlier about a fund. What was it called again? It's like the UK fund or something, which was set up by a random donator. He donated half a million pounds for the purpose of paying off the national debt. And it was donated in the 30s or the 40s, post one of the wars when there was like a plea to millionaires to leave money to the state and their will. So he left half a million and he said, you can only use it to pay off the national debt. it's worth 600 million today it's never reached the point where it's become enough and now they're going through the the courts to say can we just use the money yeah um but he was like nope only if it clears the point so the debts just kept going and going it's called i think it's called the uk fund or the the wealth fund or something and it's like you know they really it's a charity and yeah what sorry the national fund look that up like it's fascinating and they report all of what it does and its activities and it's just building and building and building just i wonder if they lend against it.

1:05:02Yeah. They've got to be doing something with it. Yeah, they've got to do something. You've got to be watertight, haven't you? Because my son would figure out a backdoor to that. He would be in there in a second. Excuse me. Yeah, me screws in. Excuse me. Yeah, me screws in. Yeah, me screws in. You just get that. Yeah. And the hard thing, of course, is that time doesn't stay still, does it? No. So needs and it's just going to change over time. So it needs to move on. So settlements do get wound up eventually, but there's no, you know, there's nothing to stop you. I think lifetime creating that kind of family discussion is a good idea.

1:05:35Because then you start talking about don't pay it to me, don't pay it directly to the kids, pay it into that settlement trust because that's set up for them. And they're like, you know, your parents are like it as well, this idea of, you know, if you're very clever, put it in their name. It's the so-and-so, so-and-so settlement trust. So they get the kind of feeling and help that, yeah, I'm providing. Because it's true, they are. They are providing. the boomers and the gen x's have got that opportunity to they've got that legacy as well because if you if you have like a million pounds in assets you can probably draw like 30 grand a year off that for a pretty long period of time but you can be beneficial you can you're not losing the right to take capital out you know you see you're not going to be in that situation where i put it all it's not like um you know universal wealth you probably heard about universal wealth is a big scam scheme that they told everybody put all your money into trust your property your own house into trust, it will shield it against everything.

1:06:28And of course, it doesn't. And when they try and sell their property, of course, they don't realise that they don't own it, the trust owns it. And they lose all their principal property relief on tax. So suddenly they're paying CGT on their own home, selling it. So we managed to get sort of orders rewinding that out. But that kind of situation needs to be managed. You know, it needs to be managed. I think, for me, I think the way to go is is trusting life and talk with your family even if you don't set it up even if it doesn't happen it's provoked a conversation that says we as a family have talked about this so it's not just about you giving to me it's about planning for the future yeah plan for the family get get get yourself a will and try and have a conversation with the family about yeah legacy and planning legacy do we think we've got enough there yep i don't know what the time is yeah you tell your dad that you want to start like the carol a like fund fund he's gonna love that man who will love it it's just it's a way isn't it i just think it's a way don't make it about death you're not making about death you're talking about actually making him immortal yeah you are isn't it or you can if you'd be clever call it the i don't know your father's name but so and so immortality trust fund that's what david will call his because he wants to be compounding forever he thinks he's if it ever gets out.

1:07:46Get out fund. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don't touch this shit. Yeah, yeah. Answer fund. Mine. Yeah. Mine. Yeah, I would call it something funny. Yeah, yeah. Told you I was ill fund. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Told you I was ill fund. Yeah, yeah. That's funny.

1:08:03Please remember, this is not financial advice. Like we say a lot on the podcast, investments can fall and rise. In fact, it's pretty much a guarantee. Past performance is no guarantee of future results. So your money is at risk with investing and other fees may apply. As with everything financial, please do your own research. We really encourage that because no one cares more about your money than you. I'm Damo. Banti. This was an episode of Making Money from Our Company Most. It was filmed and edited by the team at Flowspire, Jack and Ben. It was produced by Ruth Edwards and brought together by Will Stollerman.

1:08:34What about Ruth and Toothless a Dog? Yeah, shout out them too.