Executor will not file for Probate

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Nuala17

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Mum died 2 years ago leaving some cash and a house. Executor's are her Solicitor and our brother (I have one sister). Mum left our brother the house 'subject to' him paying small cash sums to myself, sister and 3 grandchildren.

It turns out our Brother has been lying about many/all his responsibilities to Mum's estate, including about not taking all the cash from Mum's building society when she died (we have proof he did) and lied about Mum signing over 50% ownership of the house to him 10 years ago. We eventually got him to admit to co-owning the house, which he mortgaged to buy his business premises (defaulted on payments for this property some years ago). Following credit and high court search (as he will not meet or respond to calls/letters anymore) a court search showed he was taken to court by a bank for defaulting on a loan payment and a vulture fund took him to court to try to reclaim the house but haven't re-possessed it yet ...

It would appear he is delaying probate to keep the house in Mum and his name and where his son lives rent free - the house looks so run down now. Our brother as executor simply will not sort out Mum's affairs, will not pay the monies he promised Mum he would give to all of us or give us access to our family home to have any small family mementoes and lies about proceeding with probate whenever we have managed to contact him previously.

The Solicitor executor is just angry with us whenever we call and says he can do nothing it is all with our brother!

Can we sue our brother/is it worth it? He removed himself as owner of his business installed his son instead and one would surmise he has probably has done this with all his assets.
 
Do you feel he has the cash to pay you? I would get a solicitor to write to the solicitor who is executor and ask for an update and press for closure. Is it clear in the will that he has to pay you and the others ( promises are no use - it must be in the will) How did your brother manage to withdraw money from your deceased mother's building society account - that should have been frozen when she died. If he is trying to delay probate to keep the house could you put pressure on him to pay you out of his own assets until everything is sorted. Depending on the amount involved it may be easier to walk away but I would try and put pressure on him before deciding.
 
If the small cash sum to you is only a few thousand euro I would just walk away if I was in your place.

All that should concern you is your part of the cash benefit, the rest, the house, the account etc is noise that is creating a lot of mental strife for you but will be totally ignored if you follow a legal route to get your money.

The only thing that you should consider is spending a few hundred euro getting your solicitor to write to the solicitor that is a joint executor with your brother, saying you were willed €x by your mother who died 24 months ago and when will they send on the cheque. Getting further involved legally may cost you more than you would have received and so you should let it go.

I get that in your eyes your brother is behaving very badly and is not carrying out your mother’s wishes. You must be very angry. But while I am sure you would like your brother to be held accountable in law for the mess he is creating, it will cost you too much money to get justice. So my advice is walk away.
 
It sounds like you're unlikely to get much joy from pursuing your brother. However, if you want to get things moved along why do you not focus on his co-executor, the solicitor? Contact them in writing, ask for an explanation as to why they have not yet filed for probate and warn that you are considering making a complaint to the Law Society.
 
Clamball said:
If the small cash sum to you is only a few thousand euro I would just walk away if I was in your place.

All that should concern you is your part of the cash benefit, the rest, the house, the account etc is noise that is creating a lot of mental strife for you but will be totally ignored if you follow a legal route to get your money.

The only thing that you should consider is spending a few hundred euro getting your solicitor to write to the solicitor that is a joint executor with your brother, saying you were willed €x by your mother who died 24 months ago and when will they send on the cheque. Getting further involved legally may cost you more than you would have received and so you should let it go.

I get that in your eyes your brother is behaving very badly and is not carrying out your mother’s wishes. You must be very angry. But while I am sure you would like your brother to be held accountable in law for the mess he is creating, it will cost you too much money to get justice. So my advice is walk away.
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Thank you for your reply, the cash sum is a five figure sum to 2 of us and 4 figure sums to the 3 grandchildren. The will stipulates our brother inherits the house 'subject to' paying each of us these cash sums.

A year ago our brother said he had the money but had to pay late payment income tax fine - his automotive business has very healthy turnover so we asked for goods to hold/in lieu of the cash amounts but he wouldn't agree .... He could remove the cash from Mum's credit union as he was already a named person on the account when Mum couldn't get there anymore due to ill health.

Agree the only focus is trying to get payment for everyone - we already engaged solicitor to write to both brother and solicitor executor (cost over £1K) but had no replies even when followed up with more letters.

I guess there is nothing more to do just so unfair the law does nothing to protect the beneficiaries of wills and our brother inherits everything without us receiving what our Mum stipulated he was to pay to get the house and contents.
 
The aggregate sum sounds big enough for you all to join together and take further action. Issue proceedings. Be vocal about it. Put pressure on him.
 
Nuala17 said:
Agree the only focus is trying to get payment for everyone - we already engaged solicitor to write to both brother and solicitor executor (cost over £1K) but had no replies even when followed up with more letters.

.
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What did you own solicitor advise? Very odd the solicitor written to didn't reply.
 
The Solicitor executor replied to our solicitor's letter stating he 'had not received any response from his client' (our brother) - this is now a year ago and when we call the Solicitor his manner is less than professional and insists we must take it up with our brother!
 
So the solicitor is not the executor. He is acting for the executor, your brother. It's up to you to take this further. Or not.
 
The Solicitor is joint executor, though obviously frustrated by our brother never delivering any information requested, including the deeds to Mum's house.
 
"just so unfair the law does nothing to protect the beneficiaries of wills "

It does protect beneficiaries. But at a cost.

Reading your posts, it seems:

1. There's a will and you know what is in the will.
2. You know that there is a house and that he is a co-owner of the house.

Note: if he is a joint owner, the house does not form part of the assets in the estate. We can assume that your own solicitor was able to establish whether your mother and brother were joint owners or Tenants in Common.

3. There's very clear whiff of major financial difficulties here- transferring assets, vulture funds, loan repayments but his company has a healthy turnover? That does not really compute.

You've been given very good advice here - either pursue the matter, with major expense that you may never recover.

Or walk away.

mf
 
mf1 said:
Or walk away.
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Or pursue the co-executor solicitor who appears to be neglecting his duty.
Through the Law Society at little/no expense.

Not saying it will be successful but best option I'd say.
 
llgon said:
Or pursue the co-executor solicitor who appears to be neglecting his duty.
Through the Law Society at little/no expense.

Not saying it will be successful but best option I'd say.
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An executor is not obliged to act and certainly this estate sounds like an absolute nightmare.

The solicitor executor can renounce- that will effectively take him out of the picture but then the OP is left with only the brother to deal with.

mf
 
Correct me if I'm wrong but once the executor begins to act he can only renounce by application to the High Court.

The executor should protect the assets of the estate and arrange their distribution in a timely manner. So two years after the death, there are questions which the solicitor executor needs to address, even if he wants to go the High Court and try to renounce his role, going forward.

Nuala17 said:
The Solicitor executor is just angry with us whenever we call and says he can do nothing it is all with our brother!
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This doesn't sound very professional or accurate.
 
This thread points out a glaringly obvious flaw in the existing law. Seems to me that it should be part of any programme of law reform.
 
+1 advices in previous posts.

One additional thought occurs to me. Is the errant executor brother committing a theft offence by acting in a calculated way that deliberately seeks to permanently deprive the beneficiaries of their money. I am assuming that there were sufficient assets in the estate to satisfy the beneficiaries legacies including the sums charged personally to the brother in the will. Whilst the position of executor does confer legal authority to deal with certain funds in the capacity of executor it does not authorise theft.

I would be asking brother dear if he wants to settle with the beneficiaries now or would he prefer to explain it to the Gardaí.
 
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