Deceased died intestate leaving a girlfriend and daughter (age 12).
He left lots of debt which his girlfriend has cleared (to the best of her knowledge)
He was a bit of a bad boy and was in trouble with loan sharks which has caused much stress on the family and he was in prison relating to Proceeds of Crime.
Property was owned as tenant in common 50/50 with a restriction.
Girlfriend has removed deceased name from the title and wishes to remortgage.
My thoughts are we would need a Grant and this should be taken out in the name of the girlfriend as the one with parental responsibility of the the sole beneficiary (daughter) and the deceased mother.
They could then both sign the RX3 to remove the restriction and allow the remortgage to proceed and a Declaration of Trust could be done afterwards regarding each share.
The issue now is that the mother and the rest of the deceased family do not wish to have the responsibility of a PR.
The girlfriend risks losing the home as the mortgage payments are too high.
Does anyone have any alternative views on how we can proceed?
There is no need for the second administrator to be related to the deceased. I have had similar estates where the mother of the minor beneficiary/beneficiaries, who was either never married to
or divorced from the deceased, appointed one of her own relations to be the co-administrator. This is in fact provided for in the NCPR 1987.
application under s.116 Supreme Court Act 1981 for an order appointing someone in place. The registrar may well be happy to appoint an independent solicitor directly, so parent may not need to be involved.
The mother of the child can appoint someone to act with her, it does not need to be a member of the deceased’s family. They have no standing in an intestacy since they are not sharing in the estate.
You can double check this with the Probate Registry before doing so, but I believe the decision as to who to appoint rests with the mother of the minor child. If she felt it was appropriate she could appoint a partner from your firm if she wanted professional assistance in the administration or she could appoint a suitable friend.