Co-habiting and Inheritance

Dec 09, 2014 4 Replies
T

Hi all



Trying to pre-empt a possible situation wrt my daughter.



She is due an inheritance at the age of 25 left to her by my parents (she is 22 now). The money is currently in a Will Trust, but she has absolute right to the capital at age 25.



The question is whether a co-habiting "partner" would automatically have rights over this money.



What are the "rules" relating to shared assets in this case, and can this money be protected in any way?



She is currently at the start of a relationship, but not co-habiting as such. Don't think marriage is on the cards any time soon.


Thanks for any insight



Phil


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F

A cohabitee has no rights over the assets of a partner in all except a few situations.

The only one that comes to mind is where a partner improves a property where they might have a valid claim on the property in the absence of any pre-agreement.

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T

Thanks Fredxxx

But don't they become common law partners or whatever after a given period with resulting sharing of assets?

Phil

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R

They may well do so for many purposes - eg gossip and Christmas card lists :) But "common law partners" (like "common law wives" before them) have bugger all rights in law because there's no such thing in English law. (Scotland is another country but common law marriage was abolished there too a few years ago.)

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