Blog
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I’ve Been Appointed as an Executor, What Do I Do?
An executor is a person or persons who are named in a Will as having the responsibility of carrying out the Will-maker’s wishes. While some people name a solicitor or specialist trustee company as their executors, it is also common to appoint a family member or trusted friend. If no executor is named in the […]
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Getting a Power of Attorney for Your Parents
If you have elderly parents, you may want to ensure they have arranged to have Powers of Attorney in place. An Enduring Power of Attorney is an important part of estate and succession planning. It operates when a person is no longer able to make decisions for themselves, for example due to cognitive decline or […]
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Read This Before You Decide to Co-own Property With Family
Many happy memories are forged by families spending time together at the family home, a holiday house or the family farm. Many well-intentioned will-makers in planning their estates envisage the next generation continuing to enjoy the benefits of family properties through co-ownership long after the parents are gone. Given that real estate often forms the […]
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Thinking of Challenging a Will? Here’s What You Need to Consider
Challenging a Will can be difficult. Have you been left out of a will? Claims can be made for further provision from a deceased estate if relatives or loved ones believe that insufficient provision has been made for them. However, not everyone is entitled to challenge a Will. To be entitled to challenge you must […]
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Case Study: The “Cheap” Will That Cost Half a House
Case Study: Jeffrey a 77-year-old widower was diagnosed with a terminal illness. He considered that his affairs were relatively simple. His de facto partner had died before him and he wished for all of his estate to be gifted to his de facto’s son Roger (with whom he was very close and who he considered […]
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Probate and Estate Administration Goes Online
In Victoria, the probate office of the Supreme Court is going fully electronic. From 15 April 2020, the Court is launching a new online system for the electronic filing (eFiling) of all probate matters. The Court will no longer accept applications or other documents in person or by post. All grants of representation (probate or […]
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Wills in the time of the coronavirus
“Social distancing” is a new term entering our vocabulary in recent days. As business adjusts to the requirements of staff working from home and meetings are moving to online platforms, how do we manage social distancing and the formal requirements of properly executing a will? The use of e-signatures has become commonplace in recent years […]
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“Life is uncertain; eat dessert first”
American author Ernestine Ulmer is credited with this quote which no doubt is particularly appealing to those of us who have a sweet tooth [the writer included!]. In these uncertain times we live in, it also reminds us that we should not put things off in life. While no doubt the author had in mind […]
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Why you need to keep your will up to date
It’s not just enough to have a will. If you don’t want to burden your family with unexpected surprises, you need to make sure that your will stays up to date. Again and again, we see what happens when people fail to do this. We had one case where a man had just recently passed […]
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The easy-to-miss detail your will needs to include
A lot of the “defective” wills we have to deal with weren’t created by careless people. Most of the time, these wills were created by people who were doing their best, but they ended up missing a few important details. One of the mistakes we see a lot is the failure to appoint alternative people […]
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