# Solicitor's fees for probate



## moll jennie

Just wondering how much a solicitor costs  approximately, per hour, these days? Trying to decide whether I could do some of the work myself concerning probate. Have no legal background. Any advice?


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## Vanilla

*Re: solicitor's fees*

Solicitors normally charge a flat fee for an overall probate, depending on the amount of work involved, rather than on an hourly basis.


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## Auntie

*Re: solicitor's fees*

My parents both did the probate themselves for their second deceased parent. This was over 10 years ago so things may have changed now........

They both found it easier cheaper and quicker to do it themselves. Even if they had employed a solicitor, they still would have had to go and gather all the documentation themselves. They also said that the people in the probate office were extremely nice and helpful.


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## Paddylast

*Re: solicitor's fees*

ring the Probate office and they will send out forms for filling out. Then they make an appointment for you to go in to see them to finalise everything. They will tell you what docs you need to bring in with you e.g. death certificate.  They are very helpful.  I did this myself about 5 yrs ago and found it very easy process. My advice would be to talk to the people in the Probate office first and then when you get your date for appointment make sure you have the full day free to carry out all the bits and pieces. You will need to take docs from the Probate office over to Dublin Castle to have them registered and then back again to Probate office -again a simple process.  Good luck with it.


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## pat127

*Re: solicitor's fees*

I'd agree with what's been said. I took a will to Probate myself 2 years ago. I'd say though that if you have any doubts about doing it yourself or you think the will wasn't been drawn up properly, or is complicated, it might be false economy not to use a Solicitor.


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## moll jennie

*Re: solicitor's fees*



Vanilla said:


> Solicitors normally charge a flat fee for an overall probate, depending on the amount of work involved, rather than on an hourly basis.


Many thanks for your reply. New to this site. Just learnt how to reply now.Sorry for the delay. Was told by a friend it was several hundred per hour. Could possibly do some of the job myself but need a solicitor for the rest. All the replies were very encouraging though. Thank you for your advice and time! Will let you know how I get on.


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## Vanilla

*Re: solicitor's fees*

Well it would be different if you were doing the probate yourself and just wanted say a half hour consultation with a solicitor here and there- then it would be time costed. You are probably looking at at least €75 per half hour in normal working hours plus VAT plus an additional fee for witnessing documents as commissioner for oaths.


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## Ravima

father dies, leaving all he owns to wife. All he owns consists of dwelling house, in his sole name, where wife now lives and where they both lived for 40 yrs to as well as a joint acount with €18K therein.

solr has written letter to wife giving detials of fees, which are 3.5% of value plus VAT.

is estate the value of house and bank account, or bank account only? 

if both, then fee at 3.5% seems very high.

any comments??


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## sam h

Assuming the deeds of the house are all in order, this is as straight forward as it comes.  She may not have much to do if the house & account are in joint names.  If she calls the probate office, they will tell her exactly what she needs to do, it really is very straight forward and I'm sure you could give her a hand.  The probate office are particluarly helpful.

3.5% seems very high, I think I was quoted 2%.  This is normally on the final probate value for the estate (assume €250k for the house & €18k in the bank, this would be a bill of €9380).  Half her saving!?!


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## ClubMan

In _Ravima's _case does it really need to go to probate? My father died and the situation was similar. The will never went to probate and my mother assumed ownership of the assets (including assets not held in both names - e.g. non joint accounts). Is this storing up problems for the future?


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## Ravima

Thanks Sam.

was thinking the same myself. Having looked at OASIS and CIS sites, it seems a simple straight forward process. All left to wife, no problems/objections from adult children.


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## sam h

> In _Ravima's _case does it really need to go to probate?


 
Was thinking the same but wasn't sure....remember my dad just getting us to sign over our portion but my mum died intestate (doesn't seem to be the case here).  The probate office should be able to tell her for definate.  If Clubman's right....then 3.5% is definately OTT.


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## Stifster

Ravima said:


> father dies, leaving all he owns to wife. All he owns consists of dwelling house, in his sole name, where wife now lives and where they both lived for 40 yrs to as well as a joint acount with €18K therein.
> 
> solr has written letter to wife giving detials of fees, which are 3.5% of value plus VAT.
> 
> is estate the value of house and bank account, or bank account only?
> 
> if both, then fee at 3.5% seems very high.
> 
> any comments??


 
The "estate" for fees is usually the total value of the assets, 3.5% is high alright. It is a straightforward estate (on the information provided). I mean if you are talking about a 600k house then then entire of the cash is gone....

I would have thought €2-3k plus VAT and outlay would fairly reflect what has to be done.


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## Madangan

Ravima,

Every case is different so fees can vary substansially and with justification as amount of work can vary substansially.
in your case if house is in joint names as joint tenants and only other asset is a joint account then probably no need for a grant of probate.

You mentioned however house was in sole name..if this is correct then grant is needed. This is why many solicitors including myself usually encourage couples(usually elderly as joint ownership now the norm for young/middle age couples) to put property into joint names.

If all needed is to take out grant and then draft a deed of assent to have property put into mothers name then 3.5% is excessive. And most solicitors will do it for less than 3.5% in those circumstances in my experience.
One caveat to that is that I have always practised in Dublin where based on property values in recent years 3.5 % of your average house is a whopping sum so it may be different in certain rural areas. i.e whether 3.5% is fair depends on what it is of! Shop around or go back to original solicitor explain all that is needed to be done and negotiate a realistic reduction in fees.


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## MOB

Most solicitors outside the large firm are not terribly good at keeping timesheets.  Forthe ordinary conveyancing and probate work, the profession is in a transition from percentage based charges to flat fees.  While solicitors undoubtedly are in a better position than clients to estimate the amount of work on a file, they still get it very wrong very often, and often they do not even know that they got it wrong.  The result is that some files end up losing money and some files end up with perhaps excessive profit.   

In a typical rural practice, I kept very diligent time sheets for one year.  It was a real eye-opener.  I can remember, for example, that in a probate file with decent but not huge assets (a little over €1m - mostly from the sale of a farm) the fees based on the time spent more than matched the fees which would have been charged on the old percentage basis.  At the outset, if asked to quote a flat fee, I would have quoted substantially less, and would have lost a lot of money on the deal. This is just one example, but not atypical.


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## Ravima

Thanks to all.

Spoke to solicitor and pointed out that if the fee was to be paid, then survivor would have no money at all and in fact could even end up in debt!!!

Now agreed at at €2K.

It is a substantial reduction and probably high, but given that solicitor was family solicitor, no one wanted to take the job from him!


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## dodo

It is straight forward to do the probate yourself.My friend in similar position to you a while back did it,He said the revenue people where great in helping and would not hesitate to do it again, he was been quoted 2000E plus expenses


moll jennie said:


> Just wondering how much a solicitor costs  approximately, per hour, these days? Trying to decide whether I could do some of the work myself concerning probate. Have no legal background. Any advice?


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