Dying without a will

If someone dies without making a will, strict rules govern who will inherit their property, including money and personal possessions. If there is no will, the person is said to have died ‘intestate’, and the law decides who gets what. Under the rules of intestacy, only a husband, wife, civil partner, children and blood relatives are entitled to inherit, decided under a complex formula.

In England and Wales, since February 2009, even spouses and civil partners are not automatically entitled to inherit everything if someone dies intestate. They will automatically inherit a proportion of the estate and, depending on the circumstances, the remainder will be divided between children, grandchildren, surviving parents and siblings. The rules of intestacy for England and Wales are set out on the Advice Guide website produced by Citizen’s Advice.¹

The rules used in Scotland and Northern Ireland are different, but equally complex.

For each UK jurisdiction, HM Revenue and Customs website has an online tool to calculate who will inherit in cases of intestacy.²

It is especially important that people who are not married nor in a civil partnership make a will, especially if they have a partner they’d like to provide for. Without a will, the partner would not have an automatic right to inherit anything, however long the relationship, even if they lived together, and whatever the true wishes of the person who has died.

In England and Wales, if a surviving partner feels that they haven’t received reasonable financial provision from the estate, they may be able to make a claim under the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975. If they were not a spouse or civil partner, they would need to show they were “maintained either wholly or partly by the deceased”, which can be hard to prove. They will need to make the claim within six months of the ‘grant of letters of administration’ (made by the probate registry) and will need the help of a solicitor, which will incur costs.

In Scotland, the Family Law (Scotland) Act 2000 allows a surviving "cohabitant” to apply to the court within six months from the date of death for a capital sum or for a property transfer order from the deceased's estate.