Will Writing Across the North East of England

Looking after the North East since 2008

Will Guard's North East team has been quietly drafting wills, lasting powers of attorney and trusts for households across the region for the better part of two decades. We started out visiting clients in Whitley Bay and Tynemouth on weekends, and now have consultants based from Berwick-upon-Tweed in the north right down to Stockton-on-Tees in the south. The diary is busy, the kettle is always on, and we still do not charge for the visit.

The North East has a particular character when it comes to estate planning. Property values are lower than the national average — the average home in County Durham sells for considerably less than the same house in the South — but pension pots, business interests and a lifetime of careful saving still push many estates close to the inheritance tax threshold. Add in second marriages, blended families and the ever-present worry about care home fees eating into a family home, and the conversations we have around North East kitchen tables are anything but simple.

We work with first-time will-makers in their thirties who have just had a baby, retired couples in their seventies who want to protect their bungalow for the children, business owners on the Team Valley and the Cobalt, farmers in the Tyne Valley, and grandparents who want to ringfence something for a grandchild with disabilities. Whatever your situation, you will be sat with a consultant who has heard it all before, who explains everything in plain English, and who works to a fixed fee agreed in writing before a single document is drafted.

What North East clients ask us most

Two questions come up in almost every kitchen we sit in. The first is about the family home and care fees: "If one of us has to go into a home, will the council take the house?" The honest answer is that it can — but a properly drafted will containing a Property Protection Trust can ringfence one half-share of the property, so that whatever happens, the other half is protected for the children. We explain how this works in plain English and only suggest it where it makes sense for your circumstances.

The second question is about probate. The North East is served by the District Probate Registry in Newcastle, and although the formal Probate Service is now centralised, local appointments and document witnessing remain. A typical estate in the region — a paid-off semi, a small ISA portfolio and a workplace pension — usually takes three to six months to administer. We can act as professional executor or simply hold your will safely in our bonded storage until the day it is needed.