When someone you love passes away, sorting out their last will and testament is a priority for you as a member of their family. However, in rare cases, a will can be lost before it is executed leaving the whole estate of the deceased person in a state of limbo with no one being able to move forward.
If you have found yourself in this unfortunate situation, then this article will be able to help you know what to do in the coming weeks and months so that you and your family can get a successful result to be able to get on with your lives and have the time to grieve.
When you find out the will is missing
When you first find out that the will in question is missing, you need to know what to do, to begin with, so that you can help to resolve the situation as quickly as possible. First of all, you need let the family know that you cannot locate the will and ask all the relevant people to ask them if the deceased said anything to them about where the will was kept or who it was filed with. If this doesn’t turn up anything, then you need to move on to an in-depth search.
How to search for the document
The most practical thing you can do once you establish that no one can locate the will is it to think of how to find a will that has been lost. This will include doing a thorough comb through of all of the deceased’s belongings, from both their last place of residents and in, for example, the old family home or anywhere they have stayed for a long period of time.
One good idea is, if the deceased had a lawyer you know about, you need to get into contact with them as it is highly possible that the will was stored in their legal records for safe keeping.
However, sometimes even with the most thorough of searches a will still cannot be located, so you need to enlist the help of a legal team to help you resolve the issue.
Help from the legal experts
Hiring a lawyer who specialises in inheritance law is a great way to help you and your family move forward and resolve how the assets and estate of the person you lost will get divided up fairly and to the right people.
The Inheritance Experts are a good place to start, as you will be assigned a personal caseworker who will stay with you from the very start to the finish of the whole legal process and will be able to walk you through the different scenarios that can occur, as well as helping to locate a copy of the will.
Don’t forget about you: As you are trying to deal with all the legal implications of a lost will, don’t forget that this is still a time where emotions are running high, and you need some support.