Loved ones could be losing out due to inheritance tax threshold freeze – but financial advisor’s free seminar will help prevent this

PEOPLE who have lost loved ones are getting stung with higher tax bills to access the assets they have inherited.

Inheritance tax, also referred to as IHT, is paid when a person’s estate is worth more than £325,000 when they die, or £500,000 in some cases, which can also include money given away by the deceased person

The standard rate of the tax is 40 per cent, and inheritors have to pay this before they can access the estate.

In the Budget, Chancellor Rishi Sunak announced that this threshold, which usually increases as the economy changes, would be frozen for five years, to allow the Government to claw back some of the money lost during the pandemic.

This could mean that the amount that people leave to loved ones could be significantly reduced.

Independent financial advisor, Ian Batterbee, is offering a solution to help those who have estates over the threshold to explore options on how their loved ones can pay less tax.

He is running a free event to educate people on ways to lower the amount their loved ones will have to pay when they die.

He said: ‘With the cost of living rising, the last thing you want to be faced with after losing a loved one is a huge bill just to access money that you’ve inherited. It’s important to plan ahead and do what we can to avoid our loved ones having to go through that.
‘As financial advisors we have a toolkit of resources we can offer people to help them lower the amount of tax they pay. Whether it’s gifting, equity release or something else altogether, there are a lot of options out there to make things easier when the day does come.

‘The trouble is that not a lot of people know about it and often nothing is done and people have to find tens of thousands of pounds before they can even access a penny of the cash their relatives have left for them. In 2021, £5.32bn was raised by inheritance tax – that’s a huge amount of people who have had to find cash up-front.’

Ian’s free two-hour seminar will take place at the Solent Hotel in Whiteley on July 21 and will cover ways to plan your estate to benefit loved ones down the line.

He said: ‘We just want to educate people on the ways that they can save money for future generations, how inheritors can get less and pay more and how the whole process can be smoother for everyone.’

You can find out more details about the seminar at https://sterlingandlaw-hampshire.co.uk/financial-seminars/wealth-preservation-seminar/