Sp my mother passed away recentlu and left my brot her and sister and me as the 3 executors of her estate. Now my brother and I are keen to push ahead with sorting out the estate and selling the house, but my sister is creating roadblocks in every situation, as if she doesnt want anything sorted out at all, its extremely frustrating.
Anyway, my mothers car is parked on my drive and has been for 3 months at least, and tax and MOT are due up in August. Now is the logical time to sell it. Have been offered about 8k for it, and have advised the other two executors of this. My brother is in agreement, my sister is maintaining radio silence on it, as expected, so no unanimous consensus on selling it.
Trouble is, after the death, my sister helped herself to all the documentation and paperwork re the estate, and so she has the physical V5 document. Do i legally need her consent to sell the car anyway? I assume the car is still registered in my mothers name. Will I need the physical V5 to sell to a dealer ? Anyone have any experience with this? Cheers.

You have a legal duty as executor to maximise the estate. Use that as keverage on your sister

Why does she not want things sorted?

Because she is either in denial about our mothers death, is out of her depth regarding dealing with closing the estate down, or some other reason I dont know about , such as “feelings”, “memories”, or just not being bothered becauae she is financially secure. When I try to broach the subject she dismisses it out of hand and goes into silent mode, ignoring all communications. Its getting on my tits, tbh, its gone on long enough now and things need to start mving along.

This covers selling a car after the (previous) owner’s death. Vehicle tax doesn’t transfer, so it’s already untaxed though you may be able to get a refund.

Obviously it would be better to get your sister onboard.

You have a legal duty as executor to maximise the estate

Your sister also has a duty as a co-executor to do as the will says.

You need to look at the will and see if as executors you are to act “jointly” (everyone must act together) or “jointly and severally” which means one or more of you can act with or without the others. These terms can refer to the whole will but they can also be specific to particular aspects of the will.

If you can’t agree on things then you can take legal steps to get someone removed as executor if they are standing in the way of the will being enacted.

Keep in mind though that its quite natural to be sentimentally attached to possessions in a time of grief so I guess you need to work out if you’re actively being opposed in your efforts to execute the will or whether she’s struggling emotionally with what she’s tasked with doing. From your perspective she’s obstucting, from her perspective maybe you’re rushing. Wills set out the tasks the executor has to do – what assets go to who – they don’t typically set a timescale for doing it.

Why not charge storage costs to the estate. Will focus the mind of your sister. Anything you make, split with your bro

If she was upfront and open about being emotionally tied to stuff I would have more sympathy, but she is just ignoring all communications that dont suit her, using the house as her own personal memory museum and storeroom , and I need this car off the drive and some money in the executors account as I have plans, and my brother is keen to get cracking too. None of us siblings are close to each other, well as far as I know, and having to deal with her obstructing things is making the situation much more difficult.
For example, all communications regarding amounts in my mothers bank accounts, etc , have been ignored, but she is obsessing over things like bags of my fathers shirts. My father died in the 90s. Also old Christmas cards, etc.
She, as far as I can tell, has no intention of selling the house and is actively avoiding filling in the probate form,making excuse after excuse why she cant make it that day. My wife even carries a spare probate form in her bag , as a few times she has “forgotten” the form when we have arranged to meet to fill it in.

Also, she kicks off big time if I suggest working on the house, she wants a company to come in and do it. I kept my mothers house going when my father died, but suddenly it isnt good enough, it needs to be done by a firm and charged to the estate. A third of which is mine, and I disagree. My brother though can do no wrong in this.
I have a suspicion she intends to buy the house for herself, but on her timescale. Nothing said, but its a feeling I , and others , get. I,obviously, want this sorted ASAP as I have the rest of my life to get on with.

She, as far as I can tell, has no intention of selling the house and is actively avoiding filling in the probate form,making excuse after excuse why she cant make it that day.

Look at the will and see if you can do it without her. I know executor / probate stuff can be straightforward enough to DIY but if you don’t have one maybe engage a Probate Solicitor, more than anything to do the job of making it clear to everyone what they’re duties are. You each have a duty its to act in the best interest of the deceased and also in the best interest of the beneficiaries – if those beneficiaries (such as yourself) are incurring cost or the assets are depreciating then an executor can be held liable for those losses if they’ve acted incorrectly.

, she kicks off big time if I suggest working on the house, she wants a company to come in and do it

I think its unlikely the will requires anyone to work on the house, I think its more likely it requires you to sell it and tells you what to do with the proceeds. Do what the will says, don’t interpret it.

Isn’t probate needed to sell the house though. All of you would need to agree the price is she was to try and buy it. Any work done would potentially increase the value.

Thanks all for help so far. So, if assets are depreciating, such as the car, I can legally act in the best interests of the estate by selling it without her permission then? Does the execution of the will to get maximum proceeds out of the estate supercede any legal challenge she might or might not launch at a later date?

@nixie,
Exactly my thoughts re the house. I think she either wants work done chargeable to the estate because the hit is being taken by my brother and me as well, or else the little jobs which need doing drive the price of the house down should she decide to buy it. Hate to think that about family, but like I said I am a pessimist and seeing her reluctance to fill us all in on the full value of bank accounts, investments, etc, despite being prodded several times , and her reluctance to fill in probate forms, I think someting is fishy here, hence my eagerness to get cracking and sort stuff out.

Does the will specify that the executors must act jointly? In other situations it is quite normal to allow actions to be taken “jointly or severally” ie individuals can do things themselves. Eg when Powers of Attorney are given to more than one person. Disagreements can still occur but that doesn’t seem to be the case here, you just have someone you’d like to bypass as they are not responsive.

You need to lawyer up. Tell her you are going to do so and that all legal fees resulting will be taken from the estate. That might get her attention.

Sorry for your loss, a very familiar story. Do you know exactly what your sister wants.

‘re sale of house and car, you have to prove fair market value. I suppose you achieve this by getting a few quotes, particularly if there’s any iht exposure.

If there is a house, investments etc, then I guess it’s quite likely you’ll be paying inheritance tax. From what I remember, you have to settle the tax bill before you can get probate and until you get probate you can’t do anything else.

It may well be that you’ll have to sell the house to clear the inheritance tax bill. You’d also have to get a valuation of the house for inheritance tax purposes, which might clarify things (she won’t be able to buy it cheap from the estate on the QT). Also, you only have 6 months from the end of the month your mother died to pay inheritance tax. If you don’t pay, you start clocking up interest on the tax bill, and that is certainly not in the best interests of the beneficiaries.

This sounds like something from judge Judy… If you are all joint executors, and family members then probably the best thing to do is liquidate everything and split the difference.

Unless the estate is over a million there’s probably no tax to pay (and unless it’s well over a million, there won’t be very much).

I thought inheritance tax kicked in at £ 375000

I think the three of you need to go out for dinner and a couple of glasses of plonk, get yourselves reacquainted without all this being the focus of attention every time you meet.

This will be much, much easier and much, much cheaper if you can get her onside. If it gets adversarial, the only people that ever come out quids-in are lawyers.

Iht is on estates over 1mn now, unless there were any deductions from the fathers estate on death. It’s 350k allowance for the house, 175 each, plus 350k each.

There ‘re some conditions on the house allowance at 350k, it tapers down over 2mn, plus the house has to be left to children.

I suspect any estates of significant value will be scrutinised.

On the car front I think one of you should have changed the registered keeper (though not ownership). That was the first thing I had to do with my mother’s car even though the estate was to be split between my brother and I.

Go and park the car on her drive so she can sort it, job done.

I think you’re maybe being harsh about this, grief does all sorts of things to people and some folk just can’t deal with stuff. Your sister sounds like my sister in law after her mum died, she ended up needing counselling as she just couldn’t cope. Focussing on the silly things rather than Stuff That Needs Done. That, of course, may not be the case but she may well be sitting on Mumsnet complaining about her brother that just wants to get all his money out the estate and sell everything without even going through it all.

On the car front I think one of you should have changed the registered keeper (though not ownership). That was the first thing I had to do with my mother’s car even though the estate was to be split between my brother and I.

Nope, no need to do that. As long as it’s not being driven it can sit there quite happily.

And post the keys to her.

I think you’re maybe being harsh about this, grief does all sorts of things to people and some folk just can’t deal with stuff.

I have been thru this. For 4 months i could do nothing towards sorting julies estate. Just paralysed by the enormity of it all.

There is a whole can of worms here,you really need to be absolutely clear what probate means and what the whole process entails,everything has to be gathered together,all accounts,premium bonds etc and everything has to be valued before you can move forward both for probate and IHT..In my view(recently done all this) you and your brother need to appoint a solicitor to administer the estate, take control and deal with your sister,otherwise you 3 are just going to end up fighting over this.It will also take time,far longer than you think,ours was 15 months and that that was considered fast.
If you sell the car now where does the money go?..your Mum’s accounts should all be frozen at death(tell me they are ?) so that’s going to be a point of friction as well.
It all worked well in my case as the solicitor became the point of contact for everything and everybody,yes its a cost but in the big picture its worth it for your own sanity if nothing else (my niece works in this field and some of the stories are difficult to believe,when there is money involved everything,family ,loyalty ,morals ,it matters not ,it all goes out of the window)…don’t get dragged into this.
For me the grieving process was helped by being able to disperse Mum’s estate as she wished,leaving the house neat and tidy for the new owners and tying up all the loose ends so her and dad could be at rest,it felt like closing a book.

I feel your pain. We just sold my dad’s car this week (he died in Dec 2019) for £330. If we’d been able to do it quickly while it still had MOT it might have raised £400!

Well I have suggested to her that if she is struggling with it , to hand the task over to myself or my brother, or both, but she wont so I have little sympathy here, help is there if she wants it but stubbonly refuses to even answer us. It seems everything has to revolve around her and her needs. I have access to a solicitor who could expediate matters for not much cost, but she maintains radio silence . My patience wore out long ago, she says she has accesed all the accounts,etc, but wont tell us how m uch is in them. I would like to know as I have had a horrific 15 years financially and would like to start making plans on enjoying life again. My brother feels the same way, according to his partner.
There is apparently an executors account which she set up in order to hold the proceeds of the estate, but currently only she has access to it as she set it up and has not distributed the info. Seems dodgy, no?
There is other stuff involved too which makes it a lot more suspicious to me, but for now I only want to know where I stand on the car issue. The proceeds of the car would be deposited in the executors accpunt out in the open for everyone to see, but I dont get the same respect back off her, so I haveno desire to pander to her whims any more. It wasnt just her who lost a mother.
Im feeling more and more that appointing a solicitor is the way to go here.

My patience wore out long ago, she says she has accesed all the accounts,etc, but wont tell us how much is in them

There is apparently an executors account which she set up in order to hold the proceeds of the estate, but currently only she has access to it as she set it up and has not distributed the info. Seems dodgy, no?

All of this is screaming that she has already emptied the accounts…

My Dad and my aunt had a fair falling out when it came to selling my Grandfather’s house when he died. My aunt wanted everything done sharpish, my Dad was like “oh yeah, I’ll get around to that…” although there was never any squabbling over the finances, that was all very open.

At risk of being a touch heartless…

Speak with that solicitor you mentioned and do it soon. You need to wrestle every bit of financial information about the estate from hew sole knowledge and you need to make bloody sure she can account for every penny in (and out) of that executors account.

It all sounds dodgy AF. She may be paralysed by grief, but that should leave her open to offers of help. To me alarm bells are ringing to me suggesting she is expecting to gain unfairly from this.

When I try to broach the subject she dismisses it out of hand and goes into silent mode, ignoring all communications.

Well I have suggested to her that if she is struggling with it , to hand the task over to myself or my brother, or both, but she wont so I have little sympathy here, help is there if she wants it but stubbonly refuses to even answer us.

You are doing this comms by WhatsApp / SMS / Email aren’t you? It might be 2022 but I’d suggest this calls for face-2-face with all three of you. Once you talk face to face you might progress to phone calls. She might be the problem – but don’t rule out that your approach is the problem too.

PS – if she doesn’t want to sell the car before the MOT and Tax are up and she has the V5 then remind her that she’ll need to Sorn it or she will be liable to automatic fines. (Technically its probably more complex who is liable – but I assume she’s not up on the technicalities).

Sounds to me like you need to engage a solicitor to sort the probate and estate out. Not sure if it needs all 3 executors consent though.

It will cost you a few grand but could be money well spent.

We did this when my wife’s mother died a couple of years ago. There is an estranged sister who could have challenged the Will and we needed everything done to the letter.

As it turned out she did try and challenge but was knocked back with one reply from the solicitor.

If you are having this much trouble over a car, then god help you when it comes to the conveyancing!

Sounds to me like you need to engage a solicitor to sort the probate and estate out.

I’m not sure a solicitor will actually help. They’ll do the admin, they’ll point out the obligations, and liquidate bank accounts and do most of the effort for the house but they either won’t touch the movable stuff or if empowered just to get it sorted will send in a house clearance company who will only upset the sister more. The only way a solicitor actually resolves this is if it forces the sister to enter into dialogue. I’d say there’s an equal chance that “her crazy brother has now brought the solicitor in because he just wants his hands on mum’s money” comes out and before you know it she’s appointing her own solicitor to write you stupid letters.

Maybe this helps..

What Should I Do About a Hostile or Ineffective Executor?

If she can’t handle/doesn’t want to be involved maybe she would be willing to give up being an executor?

Im feeling more and more that appointing a solicitor is the way to go here.

It probably is.

I did a LOT of legwork after my dad died, probably far more than I should have (considering what the solicitors were being paid) but I still felt utterly lost when it came to Confirmation (Scotland). Plus dealing with companies that were dragging their heels was best left to someone else.

What you can’t expect is for this to move quickly. Even after you think you’re done an interested party still has 6 months to register an interest in the estate before it can legally be wound up. It took about 9 months from my dad dying to everything being finalised and that was a relatively simple case of everything going to my mum, not a 3 way split with a potentially hostile party.

We’re going through this with MIL’s property. It’s been left empty for 3 years as MIL was in a nursing home. We couldn’t get any of them (three sisters) to agree on work to be done during the time MIL was alive, but they are all doing little bits now to clear the house. Some sentimental stuff has ‘vanished’ and there are little arguments about who has which bit of junk (nothing of value). I’ve been brought in to do the heavy work – removing disabled access ramps, gardening etc – other BIL has stayed away with the excuse of a dodgy ticker, although that’s his excuse all the time.

We are getting there at clearing it, and painting it as the council ‘want’ their money for care fees. The will is straight forward, split 3 ways. SIL’s have raised issues about money to grand kids and great grand kids, but the will says split 3 ways – what you do with their share is upto them – fortunately, there are equal number of grand kids so 3 ways is how it goes.

Does sound dodgy that she won’t let you see the accounts. My wife is handling the money side for her mum, and keeping receipts. We’re not at probate side, so we have no access to her mum’s money, and my wife has already spent over £1k in various fees which will have to come from the estate eventually.

You also need to find sister’s intention about the house – SIL wanted to buy the house ‘cheap’ but you have to best protect the assets, so we said no. TBH, why she’d want a 4 bed house when it’s just her and her son, and the running costs. Any decoration costs must come from the estate. This is all just costing you in time and effort – does need sorting. We’ve had a few fall outs, but we are making slow progress. House has had a freshen up etc. ready to sell. Just needs the years of junk clearing.

We get this situation a lot with executors who cannot face the process of dealing with the estate of a loved one.

There are a couple of options that she might agree to if she can’t face the prospect of acting as an executor.

Firstly she could renounce her appointment, this means giving up her duties and leaving the job to you and your brother.

Alternatively she can reserve her power to act meaning that whilst she technically remains an executor of the estate she acknowledges that she is not taking an active part in the administration. This is often a more palatable option and means that she could technically become involved later down the line if she chooses to do so. (This almost never happens).

If you can get her to agree to that then you should be able to progress everything.

As far as selling the car goes, it is a chattel and as such you can dispose of it before probate is granted, unfortunately the V5 will be needed to transfer it as you will be signing it in your capacity of an executor.

Hope that helps. If you need anything more you can message me. Email is in profile.

Nick.

NJA, Last year my step father died and in the will I was responsible for “Goods and Chattels” the local dealer who he bought the car off bought it back off me after contacting the solicitor that I was entitled to do so, no change of V5 required.

The long and short of it is a solicitor is going to make everything easier IMO, I am also of the same opinion OP that your sister is trying to pull a fast one?