Money in a joint account - whose is it when someone dies?

I cant understand my brother because he had everything he demanded - the house to live in. Half the money. The house as his when I die. Not to mention that he was also my only family and beneficiary of my house and my savings when I die - and since he is younger than me, that would have seen him into his old age. I cannot understand why he suddenly wanted to change the agreement over this joint account , really for no gain - because I am now looking to ensure he gets nothing more . I am nothing if not loyal. Everyone who knows me knows that. I am true to my word . But if you cross me I also ensure you no longer figure in my life as he wont now.

He spoke to me on Saturday about wanting £17.5K more money in respect of my joint account with mum. He shook me because the last time we spoke about it was back in March when I changed it over from joint names to mine ( same time as he got his settlement from the estate money in mums bank accounts.). I did tel him about the account just before Christmas when I applied for letters of administration. I told him then what the money had been for and why mum gave it me - and he agreed then it was my money.

After mum died he asked me if I was happy to share the money in mums bank accounts equally and take a fifty per cent share of the house but allow him to stay there as he didnt want to move and couldnt afford to move anyway. I agreed that I would share the bank account money with him ( £55K each) and I would not press to sell the house as long as it was put in our joint names and that way, he would get the house if I died ( and vice versa) so wouldnt have to sell it then either.

That agreement ( verbal) stood up until last Saturday when he suddenly demanded extra money for the joint account I had with mum.

My husband had a stroke caused by the hospital mis medicating him when he went for an operation back in March . He has since had a second stroke six weeks ago. Thats the only reason I had not completed changing the title deeds of the house into our joint names and had not finalised my own money from my mothers account ( putting it into my account). Had I not had that interruption all the change overs would have been made and I would probably be in a worse position as his name would be on the deeds. ( as it is they are still part of the unfinished business of my mums estate) . At least I can say I want the house sold so I can have my money . But that will cause discord I am sure. As it is I dont want to speak to him again at the moment as I am upset. I am guessing, since I was so taken aback and said nothing, he thinks I am going to pay up and all is hunky dory.

I have other idea now. I would probably have got a solicitor to change the house title deeds anyway as it happens.

Have you actually spoken to him about the money in the joint account? He has no claim on it. I would let him know that you plan on carrying out your mum's wishes as originally stated by her, and if he doesn't like it, then you can go the route of assessing the house and going to a lawyer.

i think your aversion to solicitors and wills and proper legal process is misplaced.
it's like someone saying i could never live in an odd numbered house, because my aunt, cousin, uncle, were all burgled when they lived in odd numbered houses.
rather than having a security review and fitting good locks etc.
so you reject that house
even though in all other regards it would have been perfect for you.

Rented properties are few. My brother spends all his money anyway. He lived rent free with mum since 2011 when his marriage broke up. He has just bought a new car - a brand new jag. He went on holiday . He has always spent and lived for today. Mum did want me to take care of him and ensure he wouldnt be homeless ( again verbal agreement). He wouldnt be able to pay a mortgage as he is 60 already and wont have the years to pay it back and wont manage the repayments.

He wanted cash . He wanted me to keep the house - not sell it so he could live there. That was what we agreed and I was OK with that even though it left me with little actual inheritance ( half a bungalow is little use to me really). I didnt ask for rent - unlike him asking for my money. Cheapest houses here are knocking £200K ( and more) . Even new builds ( two bed on estates are asking for £350K . If we had the top dollar of £350K for the bungalow ( which we wont as it is in need of modernisation and is non traditional build) he would get £175K and he couldnt buy anything for that. I know, I have looked.

Before I have to pay out for a solicitor - are there any other ways I can set the house up so that it has to be sold on my death rather than going to my brother . Making him sell up when mums cat is still alive is not the way I want to go. I promised mum and the cat is 18 years old.

I doubt if I keep the house he will pay me rent even if we agree it. He wanted solicitors kept out and thought we could agree it ourselves . Which we did until last Saturday, when having had his share , got his feet in the house , he now wants the additional money. I have no idea why. He knows I had not finished closing the account for myself and that the house title had not been changed yet. Indeed I would have thought, any one with common sense would have waited until their name was on the deeds. As it is, I could force a sale if I ask a solicitor.

Cossy

Callistemon213

GSM, calling GSM, come in GSM. please put us right
Yes, where is GSM, aprilrose needs some advice?

The house would be worth more than the savings bond and is a very important consideration. Whose name is it in?

I’ve been a bit worried about GSM, I do hope she’s ok x

I, too, am worried about GSM. I hope everything is okay with her.

also, if a 3 bed house can be bought in that area for under 400K, and a bungalow! which is always sought after due to rarity, then surely your brother who is still working could afford to buy or rent a suitable flat in that area ?
why assume he would be homeless.

Judgejane - the agreement when he first mentioned wanting to keep the house was that he would live there and we wouldnt sell it . The house was to be transferred to joint names and on my death he would get the house ( indeed, assuming that I survived my husband, not only would he get the house, he would get my house and my savings too as my only relative ( husband has no family - his parents died when he was 11 ( mum) and 21( dad). Sister has gone too.

I know he knew why I had that £70K . He knew I worked the shop ( he lolled around posing whilst I did the work as the skilled florist - it was a flower shop. Mum wanted him to learn the trade but he wouldnt go). It was mum running the shop and me doing the arrangements, the wreaths, wedding bouquets etc. The shop paid its overheads but not enough to pay a full time employee and mum and dad lived at the back of the shop - it wasnt a fancy set up. Then we had a second shop together ( me and mum). Then she retired and I left the trade.

But to lose money over that. I can see here I will end up paying more to get a solicitor than I will actually end up getting.

Again, you are second guessing and I’m afraid show a very distorted view of wills and inheritance. You cannot possibly implement what you think a person might have wanted if they have not put it in writing and had it properly witnessed.
Your suspicion of the legal system is going to cost you - but why the “doom and gloom”f your brother becoming homeless, never speaking to you again, a lonely and miserable old age?
Get this dealt with by an impartial and properly qualified person.

your brother would not have been able to use the assets of the estate to challenge any will; i realise there was no will.
but it seems you and your mum really needed to use a solicitor, as you are now in a muddle, partly because you are not a solicitor, so lacked the expertise to understand all the ramifications of the legal problems.
i think it was a false economy not to use a solicitor.
they would have advised your mum and drawn up a will to ensure her wishes were clear.
protect your position now, as best you can, by engaging a solicitor, before the situation deteriorates further.
all the best.

Then I will pay my brother out of my own pocket if you think he has some call on the money as I do not want to give him the money in the bond. Its all I have from mum and it was half mine anyway as I worked in the shop for ten years. I got up art five am , went to work, worked until midnight ( well past shop closing time ) , seven days a week. £70K isnt much for ten years of that. When that money was put in our joint names we both spoke of it as my payment. The only reason she had the interest was to supplement her income on her pension.

So did my brother see a solicitor to get his information? Well kit is clear neither of us will get anything because I will not give him the house, whatever it costs now. I will close mums last account and transfer the money to me and then see a solicitor to sell the house from under him. That is going to be the only answer. Lifting the best part of £20 of my savings from me and my husband so he can holiday and buy fancy cars is not my idea of inheritance. he had his money. He is now coming f or mine. How do I prove my mum paid me nothing for ten years when it was in the 1970's/80's? There is no one left to attest that.

If so he does sound grasping

Does he know you are happy for him to have the house?

Its my belief that had my mother written a will my brother would have arranged it so he had 2/3 of the inheritance for him and his son - ie the house and half the money which is effectively what he is trying to get now. He had asked her to do this and she had said no and she wouldnt write a will as a result. Wills can be contested ( and cost). Intestecy is what the law says and cannot be contested - and since she wanted what the law said, it wasnt a problem in her book.

I know this because mum told me before she passed away. She had several bad experiences with wills herself where in one case, the will was ripped up , in another things were just taken from the home before anyone had a chance to stop it and that left little or nothing for dispersal. Even my husband lost most of an inheritance from an aunt because of a will that was "Disappeared" - that involved a house in trust. My aunt, having had the same thing, left no will and effectively we all ended up with more than with a will.

So, you see wills do not always solve anything.

Effectively what is going to happen is a result of greed ( which is always the case I suspect) . It will cost. The house will be sold. My brother will be homeless. I will get a reduced amount from the sale and that is that. I dont suppose he will speak to me again and since I have no other family at all except my husband , I will be facing the future alone.

You need a solicitor. That is for sure.
The Bodach and I had a joint account, ‘either or survivor’, which only needed one signature, and when one died it transferred to the other. Some joint accounts need both signatures, but please get proper legal advice.

Joint accounts are ordinarily subject to the standard rule of survivorship – upon the death of the first, the entire account passes to the co-owner absolutely. This is common and convenient for married couples but not so beneficial to parent and child, if the remaining child(ren) see the only asset of their parent pass by default to the one child whose name appears upon the account.

That is the situation you now find yourself in over the £70,000.

Joint accounts that are deemed to pass by survivorship “pass” outside of a will. It would therefore be irrelevant if your mother had made a Will gifting everything between her two children equally.

However, when one person alone puts money into joint names, there is a presumption of a Resulting Trust in favour of the provider of the funds.

(A Resulting Trust is a type of trust that is imposed by law. It returns the beneficial ownership in the trust property back to the settlor.)

As that is there case here, the funds were from your mother and she enjoyed interest from them, your brother does have a claim - not to a quarter - but to half of the funds.

However, the presumption could be rebutted if you can show evidence that your mother intended to transfer the beneficial interest in the fund to you. The burden of proof rests with you to show what you have described here about the fund being in lieu of past work done and the business partnership.

Under the laws of intestacy, if there is no surviving partner, the children of a person who has died without leaving a Will will inherit the whole estate. This applies however much the estate is worth. If there are two or more children, the estate will be divided equally between them.

In this case it will be half of the estate after deducting the £70,000 if you can provide proof as described for the joint account.

Technically, you brother is now living in a property half of which is yours. I doesn’t sound as though you want to force the sale of the house and make him homeless but, at the very least, you need to get the title deeds put into joint names. You need form AS1 for you as administrator of your mother’s estate to assent i.e.transfer the title into joint names with your brother.

www.gov.uk/government/publications/whole-of-registered-title-assent-as1/guidance-how-to-complete-form-as1

The it’s up to the two of you to come to some arrangement over how you each benefit as equitably as possible now from your inheritance, for example, whether he pays you some rent in lieu of the cash you have given him.

He needs to be aware that if you were to predecease him, then your beneficiaries (should you leave your estate away from your brother) could force the sale of the house unless you write something into your own Will that leaves him a life interest in your half.

That leaves you in a strong bargaining position at the moment as regards the £70,000 and getting some rent.

I hope that makes sense.

Without wishing to sound unkind, this is a mess and could so easily have been avoided if there had been a will.
You must see a solicitor but I fear it will come in a lot more expensive than the Will would have.
Your brother should share this responsibility and whatever the outcome you need to draw a line under this.
It should be a potent warning to you and your DH to have your affairs in good order while you are mentally and physically capable of seeing to them.

Debbi58. I am entitled to half the house. Any agreement we may have come to would have been at the beginning ( back when mum passed away in October) when my brother actually approached me and said he wanted half of everything ( which was fine as the law says that anyway).

I had thought prior to that ( as did mum) that he would take the house and give me the money in both bank accounts ( essentially £110 K ) - if you like, a settlement where I was selling him the house for what she had in the bank , which was less than the house was worth if we sold it and divided the proceeds.

Mum, I think having worked it out long ago figured that if she gave me that £70K - which I was owed anyway , it would make out for the loss of the house. Mum left £110k in her bank accounts ( she had spent a lot on doing the house up between 2011 and now) and she gave me £70K in a shared saving bond back in 2011 - for services rendered one way or another - helping sort my aunts estate, money I was owed because I worked for free for ten years and money from the shop she and I had together for around four years. When we sold the shop, I did get another small amount of money which I used to put down as a deposit on my house - it was £7K ( we sold the shop in 1989). Mum retired and bought her house ( with dad - it cost, as I remember around 60K but she had a second shop and a house which she also sold at that time to buy the house. I got another job.

We valued the house ( as in average of three at £350K - which for a 3 bed bungalow in reasonable condition is the going figure where I live but I did feel it was a price on the high side as the construction was not taken into account and the house would fetch £290K on the market at best as its non traditional build ( Woolaway) and cash only buyer. There are lots around my village - all in the 250/ 300K range as it has a good size plot.

Had my brother taken the option of having the house, I would have sorted any difference in cash to him if needed or took a loss on it if the money in the bank was short fall. But he wanted to split the money half and half and to split the house half and half with him staying in the house as any money from selling it wouldnt buy him anywhere else here to be frank.

I would have liked mums house myself but I agreed his proposal as I didnt was any argument and I wasnt going to make him or my mums cat homeless.

The money in the saving account with mum was mine and I thought he had accepted that when we discussed it back in March - when I changed it over to my name only and put the interest, paid monthly into my bank account. Then suddenly on Saturday he told me he wanted £17.5 K as that was half of mums share of the money ( as in £35 was mums and £35 was mine and half of the £35K was owed him). But that is not the way the account worked and was not what mum intended . That £70K was in both our names and was for me alone as I would have to give my brother the house at a reduced price - as in what she had in the bank - and she knew that. He doesnt have any savings, another house or anything.

But now my brother wants half the money mum gave me , for me and me alone .... and thats why I am stroppy. Mum never gave me anything in life. Never once. I paid my own way. I worked for nothing . Everything I have I brought with my job after she retired or we ( hubby and me) bought with money we saved and worked for - hard work. The £70K was the payment . It effectively came from the inheritance she had from my aunt anyway as she never had a lot saved either.

But in the light of events, I want my inheritance. Actually all I wanted was my £70K untouched. It means more than the money. Mum gave it me. She gave me that and Christmas 2022 she gave me a very nice expensive watch. Thats all I have.

But if my brother is going to play games, then I want everything tied up and my money to come to me one way or another. I know he cannot afford to buy me out of the house and the money he has had from mums legacy has pretty well been spent I suspect ( £55K or so I gave him back in March). I am wondering if someone ( like his new girlie friend?) has put him up to this now? I thought it was settled. The saving bond was mine. The money was split 50/50 and the house was to be put into our joint names with the intention that the survivor would inherit the other half . But I wont settle for that now. I want my money - my half of the house for me, for the cats and dogs home or my husband or anyone else I want to give it to. Sorry about the rant.

Sorry for the ramble

I agree with you that money in a joint account belongs to the surviving account holder when one party dies. I don't think there is any doubt of that.

Pretty sure you're entitled to half the house, with no will . He will have to buy you out, sounds like he's taking advantage of your good nature . Instruct a solicitor to deal with if o your behalf, let your brother now, everything needs to go through your solicitor, as you're busy caring for your sick husband

Absolutely get a solicitor ASAP. Yes, that is legal advice. Have a Google for local firms in your area and see if any of them specialise in older people, or inheritance issues.

It may have been unlikely he would win had he contested a will but he would have ensured there was no money left as it would have been eaten in fees. He had no money or savings . I have some savings ( because I have never been on holiday or had anything new and I have worked much of my life too and tried to save). I am sure he would have got the house anyway as he lives in it.

Get a good solicitor and do it now.

Your brother may have contested a Will, but it’s extremely unlikely he’d have won.

Good luck and act now!

I agree with other comments - you definitely need to see a. solicitor. Collate all the documents that you are holding and if possible get a carer to look after your husband when you go to the appointment - that way you will be able to concentrate on the legal stuff and not stress about your husband.
Make notes before and during the appointment to ensure you ask all the questions that you wish to and also have notes to refer to later on.
I do hope you get this all sorted out