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My husband says it’s pointless for him to make a will. Is he right?

Making a will really is a cheap way to ensure peace of mind and, for most of us, it takes less time than you might think

Making a will does make a difference to what happens to your loved ones when you die. Photograph: iStock
Dominic Coyle's picture
Dominic Coyle
Tue Oct 01 2024 - 05:00

I’m having a hard time persuading my husband to make a will with me. His argument is that if either of us die, the other would get everything anyway, so it’s a pointless exercise.

We have recently had a baby so I feel we really need to have our wills in order more than ever, but I don’t know what arguments I can make to convince him. Any advice?

Ms D.D.

This is just ridiculous and, for what it is worth, wrong.

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You can get a will drawn up these days for what I understand is around the price of the average wedding present. And if you have taken the time to sort out what assets you have and what you want to do with them should the worst happen, then it’s swiftly done. Any solicitor in the State could quickly and efficiently draw up a will for someone with uncomplicated personal affairs and finances.

People take more time to organise a weekend away with friends for a match than they are prepared to take to organise their affairs to ensure their loved ones are not left with a mess if they die suddenly. Go figure.

That’s not to argue with your husband’s intention. It is fairly common and understandable that a person wants what they own to go to their spouse if they predecease the spouse. But if he does not take the few hours required to set this down, then his affairs will be managed under the rules of intestacy under the Succession Act.

In your current position, if either of you dies without a will, the other spouse will not “get everything anyway” because your baby (and any siblings that child may have in the future) will be legally entitled to a third of the dead parent’s estate.

Generally, parents will provide for their children in will only after the last parent has died. That is not what happens when you die intestate. If he wants everything to go to you, he needs to say that in a will. The same goes for you – though how you divide your assets is a choice for you, not him.

His view that you would get everything of his anyway should he die would have been accurate under the rules of intestacy before the child was born but not since then.

If he doesn’t make a will, and you are both unfortunate enough that he dies, it simply makes your life more difficult unnecessarily at a time that you will anyway be grieving. So it is rather stupid and, frankly, uncaring.

For what it is worth, he doesn’t have to make a will “with you” any more than you have to do so “with him”. Some people make joint wills but there is no need to do so. Whatever he does, you should go ahead yourself and make your own will so that you at least have the comfort of knowing that your affairs are in order if the worst should happen unexpectedly. And then review it every five years or so.

You don’t need to update it every time it is reviewed but at least you can reassure yourself that it is still appropriate – that the assets you are leaving are things you still own and that the people you might be leaving things to are still alive, for instance.

[ If you’re over 18 and have any assets, you should make a will. Here’s what you need to know ]

PTSB odd-lot: sell or hold?

I have 45 shares with PTSB and I’m trying to decipher the odd-lot share offer. Basically, is it worth transferring them to my son and seeing how they do for him in the future or should I just sell and cut my losses?

Ms L.R.

Your 45 PTSB shares are worth €78.30 under the odd-lot offer under which PTSB is offering to buy shares back from investors with tiny holdings in the bank – anyone with fewer than 100 shares.

You don’t say where your shares came from. Some could have come from the free shares handed out when the Irish Life & Permanent first listed on the stock market; others could have been earned as an employee or bought in the market.

Either way, unless you are particularly attached to them, they are unlikely to hit the levels at which they were trading before the financial crash – not least when you bear in mind that your 45 shares would have equated to 4,500 shares in the business back then, before a 2015 share consolidation programme.

If you were paying broker fees to sell them, you would have little, if anything, to show for it.

Given them to your son? Well, he would have the same issue with the cost of any eventual sale – and a 1 per cent stamp duty on the transfer of them into his name.

If you think the shares are a good bet and he could do well on them down the line, fair enough. Otherwise, it might be better to cut and run, and let him make his own investing decisions when he decides the time is right to do so.

If you do want to hold on to them for him, you need to let PTSB know formally by midday on Friday.

[ PTSB is looking to buy back father’s shares but he’s dead ]

PTSB shares and tax

I assume this PTSB odd-lot share buyback will trigger a loss for capital gains tax purposes?

Ms S.H.

You might think so but for most of the shareholders affected, it won’t.

A capital-gains tax loss arises if you sell the shares for less than you bought them but most of these shareholders never bought these shares, they got them for free when the Irish Life & Permanent building society demutualised.

So even though the shares are now worth just a fraction of what they once were, they are still worth more than the zero most of these shareholders paid.

If you did pay more than €1.74 a share since 2015, or more than €0.0174 a share before that, you will have a capital gains loss but not otherwise.

Please send your queries to Dominic Coyle, Q&A, The Irish Times, 24-28 Tara Street Dublin 2, or by email to dominic.coyle@irishtimes.com with a contact phone number. This column is a reader service and is not intended to replace professional advice

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