Online wills

Uther

Uther

Uther

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I need to get my will sorted out, the local solicitor is quoting £300 for a basic one! Has anyone tried the online versions, through a charity?
 
Uther said:
I need to get my will sorted out, the local solicitor is quoting £300 for a basic one! Has anyone tried the online versions, through a charity?
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It used to be that you could pick up do-it-yourself packs from places like WHSmith. If you've got a bog standard financial situation (i.e. you die, goes to your spouse, you both die goes to the kids, no large or complicated financial holdings or businesses, etc) then they'll do the job just fine. Assuming you can still get them.
 
Have you checked via your company?

Pretty sure its part of my benefits scheme. Not sure how common that is.
 
I got 3 months with this company (lifetime legal) when I took out my house sale with my estate agents, one of the things I could get during that free period was a will , so I took advantage of it before cancelling the package before I would have to pay anything.
 
A friend of mine does wills, if you're ex-services, she gives a special rate. Happy to share the details by PM if anyone's interested.
 
Get ChatGPT to make a template? :D

Then upload it yourself to the national will register.

AI has made the expensive middlemen pointless for a lot of stuff.
 
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ChatGPT easy - create a decent prompt and then keep asking if there is anything else to add in/consider - i.e. company shares etc. Then as above upload to wills register - takes a couple of hours max. Literally zero point paying for someone else to add your details into a template they've got.
 
DJMK4 said:
I need to get a will sorted


I thought wills start from like £49 ?


Why would you need to pay £300 for a will ?
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Complexity, region, how much the solicitor wants to make per will.

A simple will can be entirely boiler plate with just the names/dates etc added in and will cost next to no time to produce, a complex will might take several meetings with the solicitor, require a lot of work to do it and will obviously cost a lot more. Then you've got location, a small firm in a sleepy village will probably charge you a lot less than a big firm in nice offices in an expensive part of the country.

My brother, father and I all did wills at the same time a few years back, as they were all basically the same just changing a few names IIRC we only got charged something like 1.5x the price of one cheap will from the firm.

IIRC there are some interesting wills that have been held up in court, including one where a farmer involved in an accident basically wrote (I think in his own blood) something like "everything to my wife" on part of the farm equipment that was killing him.
Although from what I understand, by default if you die without a will it all goes to your spouse, then children, then siblings etc.
 
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And also, things change. I used my mums as a template when I had ours done, and apart from the very old wording, there were things missed off that really need t be included these days, just to make it water tight.

This is not something I'd trust to AI or to a DIY pack from Smiths.
 
Wills are really important to get right, and a proper will writer will get you thinking about it in ways you wouldn’t have thought about previously.


Bequeathed are excellent, but if the will is of any real value, get someone to do it properly with a consultation. You’ll be thankful in the long rung.


Don’t learn it the hard way :-)
 
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