What to do after you buy a house in the UK
After you buy a home, make a will, check whether you own it as joint tenants or tenants in common, put your life insurance in trust and set up lasting powers of attorney. A trust for the house is usually a second conversation, not a first-week job.
The short answer
- Make a will first. Unmarried partners inherit nothing under the intestacy rules in England and Wales, however long they have lived together.
- Check how you own the home. Joint tenants: the survivor takes it all, whatever the will says. Tenants in common: your share follows your will.
- Write mortgage life insurance in trust so the payout clears the loan without waiting for probate.
- Make both lasting powers of attorney. A will does nothing if you lose capacity.
- A lifetime trust of a newly bought, mortgaged home needs the lender’s consent and is usually early. A will that leaves your share on trust does the job for most new buyers.
What's on this page
Completion day feels like the end. You have the keys, the solicitor’s bill, and a house in your name. For estate planning it is the start. The Land Registry title is now the asset your family will argue about, wait on, or lose a share of, if you do nothing else.
You do not have to put the house in a trust the week you buy it. You do have to decide, while the move is fresh, who should have it if you die next year.
The first weekend, not the first hour#
Aisha and Ben, 34 and 36, have just bought a £265,000 house in Stockport with a 10 per cent deposit. They are tenants in common already, because they put in unequal deposits and the conveyancer recorded the shares. They have no wills. If Ben dies, the intestacy rules decide who gets his share of the house. Many couples assume the surviving partner inherits. That is only true for spouses and civil partners, and Aisha and Ben are not married. Unmarried partners do not inherit under the intestacy rules in England and Wales, however long they have lived together. With no children, Ben’s share would go to his parents. Aisha could have to negotiate with them to stay in a house she lives in.
That is the emergency a will solves. A trust is the second conversation.
What should you sort out after buying a house?#
- A will, even if the house is the only asset. Name executors. If you have children or expect to, name guardians. Say what happens to your share of the house. Sign it properly, with two witnesses who are not beneficiaries. A will you meant to finish does not count.
- Check how you own it. Joint tenants: the survivor takes the lot, whatever the will says. Tenants in common: your share follows the will. If you want a trust to hold your half, you must be tenants in common. Changing this later is a restriction on the title, not a new purchase.
- Decide whether outright inheritance is safe. Married couples with children only from that relationship, who trust each other completely, sometimes leave the house outright and review the will if life changes. Anyone with children from another relationship, a shaky marriage, or a realistic worry about the survivor’s care fees should price a will trust before they decide the simple will is enough.
- Life insurance that pays the mortgage. A decreasing term policy is often a condition of the loan in spirit if not in the offer. Write it in trust so the payout clears the mortgage without waiting for probate. Tell the lender nothing mystical is going on; a trust of the policy is standard.
- Lasting powers of attorney. A new homeowner who has a stroke cannot sign a transfer, claim on the insurance, or remortgage. A will does not help. Both types of LPA — property and financial affairs, and health and welfare — are the documents that do.
- A list of the boring accounts. Energy, council tax, insurance, the broker who arranged the life policy. Executors spend the first month hunting for these.
“Put it in a lifetime trust the moment you buy”#
You will see that advice. It is sometimes right and often early.
A lifetime trust of a house you have just bought, with a 90 per cent mortgage, needs the lender’s consent. Many lenders refuse, or treat it as a reason to review the loan. You will pay to transfer the title twice in a month if you are not careful — once to you, once to the trustees. If you live in the house and can benefit, you have usually not moved it out of inheritance tax. If you are 34 and healthy, care fees are not a foreseeable need, so deprivation is less of an issue, but you have bought a structure you may not need for decades.
A will that leaves your share on trust if you die, and a review at remortgage or at the birth of a child, does the job for most new buyers. Revisit a lifetime trust if you are older, widowed, or holding a mortgage-free home you want managed for children now.
If one of you died during the move#
Solicitors ask, quietly, what happens if you die between exchange and completion. Your will should already exist before exchange if anyone else is on the mortgage or the contract. After completion, update the will so it refers to the new house, and check the life policy covers the new loan.
The cost of a straightforward will is small next to a conveyancing bill. The cost of dying without one, as an unmarried co-owner, is a share of the house going to relatives your partner has never planned around.
Related: how much a will costs, dying without a will, property protection trusts.
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Frequently asked questions
Do I need a will after buying a house?
Yes. A home is usually your largest asset, and without a will the intestacy rules decide who gets your share. That matters most for unmarried couples, because an unmarried partner inherits nothing under those rules.
What happens to a jointly owned house if my partner dies without a will?
It depends how you own it. As joint tenants, the survivor automatically owns the whole house. As tenants in common, the share of the partner who died passes under the intestacy rules — to a spouse or civil partner and any children, or to parents and other relatives if you were not married.
Should I put my new house in a trust straight away?
Usually not. A lifetime trust of a mortgaged home needs the lender’s consent, and if you still live there it does not normally take the house out of inheritance tax. For most new buyers, a will that leaves their share on trust is enough, reviewed at remortgage or when a child is born.
Should mortgage life insurance be written in trust?
In most cases, yes. Written in trust, the policy pays the trustees directly, so the mortgage can be cleared without waiting for probate, and the payout sits outside your estate for inheritance tax.
This is general information, not legal advice. Everyone's situation is different — speak to a qualified adviser before acting. KeepTheLot is an independent information service covering England & Wales. We are not a law firm.
Part of our guide to wills.