Severance Of Joint Tenancy

This depends on whether you and your spouse co-own the property as joint tenants or tenants in common. If you own it as joint tenants, your spouse will inherit the entire property by virtue of the ‘right of survivorship’. If you own it as tenants in common, however, you’ll need to make sure that:

• Your Will names them as the sole beneficiary, or
• They will be the sole beneficiary under the rules of intestacy.

The rules of intestacy come into effect if someone hasn’t left a valid Will and could upset your inheritance plans if you’re not prepared. 

If your spouse or partner owns a share in the property, they’ll still have a right to live there even if your share has passed to someone else. However, this can be complicated if the new co-owners don’t want them to stay there – for example, if they’d like to sell the property.

Planning is essential to make sure you and your spouse or partner are both protected if the other dies. We’ll be able to advise on the best way to structure your assets to minimise tax but also ensure you don’t lose your home.

Some of the things you need to think about when changing from joint tenants to tenants in common:

• How much of the property will each of you own?
• How will these shares be taxed, and is it cost-effective?
• Does this affect the rest of your estate in terms of succession planning and tax planning?
• Will you be able to make sure your spouse or partner can continue to live in the house if they want to?

Our expert team will be able to discuss your situation and evaluate whether severing your joint tenancy is the right thing for you. In each case it’s important to have a complete understanding of how this change will affect your estate as a whole, as well as the loved ones you want to provide for.

Depending on your assets, you may qualify for funding support towards care home fees from NHS or your local authority.

Given that the average stay in a care home is 4.5 years and fees can cost thousands each month, whether or not you can get financial support could have an enormous impact on your estate.

If you have a joint tenancy with your partner and one of you dies, the surviving co-owner will inherit the whole property. This means they would probably not qualify for financial support, as their assets would be well above the assessment threshold.

By planning ahead with a tenancy in common, you could ensure that you or your spouse (whoever survives the other) still qualifies for financial support and doesn’t have to sell the home to pay for fees. This also protects your assets for your children or anyone else you want to inherit from your estate.

Joint tenants have something called a ‘right of survivorship’. This means that when one co-owner dies, their share of the property automatically passes to the other.

With a tenancy in common, each co-owner has their own separate share of the property. This share doesn’t automatically pass to the other co-owner upon death, so if you wanted your co-owner to inherit you would have to specifically name them in your Will.

Alternatively, you could leave your share to someone else or even set up a trust to protect the capital. With the right planning you can make sure your spouse or partner gets to keep living in the house without being faced with an unmanageable tax bill or losing out on funding for care home fees.