Estate planning involves organising and managing an individual’s assets to ensure their distribution aligns with their wishes upon death. In Scotland, this process is crucial due to specific legal frameworks, such as ‘Legal Rights’, which ensure that spouses and children cannot be entirely disinherited from the movable estate.
Family inheritance
Family inheritance involves passing on assets, property, or wealth to loved ones through wills, trusts, or estate planning.
A will is a crucial legal document that outlines an individual’s wishes concerning the distribution of their property and assets after their death. In Scotland, this document is of paramount importance due to specific Scottish laws like ‘Legal Rights’. This law ensures that a spouse or children cannot be fully disinherited. Thus, even when a will excludes them, they are still entitled to a portion of the deceased’s ‘movable’ estate. Therefore, a will in Scotland provides a legal framework for the management and allocation of an individual’s estate, ensuring a fair and intended distribution.
A life interest trust in Scotland, also known as a liferent trust, is a legal arrangement where assets are held in trust for the benefit of a person for their lifetime (known as the liferenter) and then pass to another person (the fiar) after the liferenter’s death.