Power of attorney and the Local Authority

[Lotty123]

Hi, I am trying to find out what is the best course of action, following our Mother's recent passing. The local authority managed our Mother's finances, as she had told them that my sister and I should not be told anything, this was 4yrs ago, her dementia was already advanced at that point and she was paranoid that we were taking advantage of her (we most definately were not). Her house was never sold by the LA although we believe they did seek to do so by the court of protection ( the LA tried to get us to sign a docum6ent about this last summer, we did not). The LA have now told us the House will be signed over to us, along with monies in our Mother's bank account, which we find really odd. If there are considerable care home fees due, why would they do this? Surely its in their interests to sell the property and then give us the minimum amount they can (we believe its £14.5k) The house is in a terrible state, we would estimate it only being worth £45-50k, which would be far less than the care home fees. If they are able to force us to take responsibility for the house, and for us to sell it surely it would be in our interest to sell it as fast as possible, either by auction or a house for cash company, if that realised only £20k the LA would only be entitled to £5.5k. We will be talking to a solicitor on Monday, but any advice you can give would be greatly appreciated. We also wonder if the LA haven't made some huge mistakes and are trying to cover their tracks, perhaps it would be worthwhile registering a complaint?

 

[thistlejak]

Whilst the LA managed your Mum's finances when she was alive that arrangement stopped as soon as she died.
The Executors of your Mum's will now take over and if there is no will then you can apply for Letters of Administration to deal with things yourself - check out the Gov website it lists the order of people who can apply.
The LA are correct in passing everything over to the Executor or NOK (if they are going to do Probate themselves)

 

[nitram]

The LA have now told us the House will be signed over to us, along with monies in our Mother's bank account,

They are not signing anything over, everything that was your Mothers is now her estate and has to be administered by a personal representative (executor or administrator). Nothing belongs to the LA which will invoice the estate.

The LA are reasonably assuming that a member of the family is an executor or will apply for letters of administration,