Why should I seek legal advice if I am administering an estate?

If you have ever acted as an executor or an administrator of someone’s estate, you will probably appreciate that this can be a very difficult and demanding job.  It can also be a role which is fraught with personal risk.  In many ways, dealing with someone else’s assets is more problematic than dealing with your own.

There are various reasons why it might be preferable/comforting to have the benefit of legal advice/assistance if you find yourself dealing with the estate of a relative or friend.  For example:

• Executors/administrators can be personally liable to pay any estate debts out of their own pockets if these only come to light after the estate has been distributed (although action can be taken to limit this liability).
• Claims can be made against an estate by certain disappointed relatives/dependants in certain circumstances, and again executors/administrators can be personally liable if they do not act prudently/cautiously.
• H M Revenue & Customs can impose financial penalties on executors/administrators if they have not made full disclosure of all relevant matters (including any relevant lifetime gifts made by the deceased).
• The Department for Work and Pensions has powers to claim back any overpayment of benefits which may have been made during the last few years of a person’s life. If the estate has been distributed in the meantime executors/adminstrators can be personally liable for any refund due.