If you get an inheritance during an IVA you may not be able to keep these funds. The money will first be used to pay off your debt.
Included in this article:
- What happens if you get inheritance during an IVA?
- Can you keep any of the money?
- Will your IVA be paid off early?
- Should you delay starting an IVA?
Want help to start an IVA? Give us a call (0800 077 6180) or complete the form below to speak to one of our experts.
What happens if you get inheritance during an IVA?
Inheritance is categorised as a windfall. If you receive a windfall payment while you are in an IVA this must be paid into the Arrangement for the benefit of your creditors.
As a result your creditors will receive more overall and have to write off less of your debts. You will still have to continue with your agreed monthly payments.
You cannot hide the fact that you will receive inheritance from your IVA company. The solicitor dealing with the estate is legally obliged to inform your Insolvency Practitioner.
Struggling to get your head round all of this? We can help. Call us (0800 077 6180) or complete the form below. The advice is free and confidential.
Can you keep any of the inheritance money?
One of the most common questions about an inheritance payment received during an IVA is whether you will be able to keep any of the money to help pay for urgent expenditures.
The rules say you should pay all the inheritance money you receive into the Arrangement. However your insolvency practitioner does have the discretion to allow you to keep some of the money. This could be if they feel you have a reasonable requirement.
You might really need some cash to repair your car or perhaps your boiler at home. It is possible that your IP will allow you to retain the necessary cash to pay for this. However this is by no means certain and will depend on the individual circumstances surrounding your situation.
You must not spend any of your inheritance money before getting agreement with your IP. This could lead to the failure of your IVA.
Will your IVA be paid off early if you get inheritance?
Normally when inheritance money is paid into an IVA the agreement is not paid off any faster. You will have to keep on making your regular payments until the end of the Arrangement.
The extra inheritance money will simply increase the amount that is paid back towards your debts overall. The amount written off is reduced.
The only time your IVA would be completed early is if the amount received is very large. There would have to be sufficient to pay off the total of your original debt (less the payments you already made) plus the insolvency practitioners fees plus interest charged at 8% pa on the debt from the start date of the Arrangement.
In these circumstances the Arrangement would then come to an end immediately and there would be no requirement for you to continue making your monthly payments.
Should you delay starting an IVA if I know I will get inheritance?
If you receive an inheritance payment before you start an IVA it will be yours to keep and you can do what you want with the money. As such, you can use some or all of it to pay for pressing expenditures if you wish.
The one thing you must not do if you are still planning to start an IVA is pay off any of your creditors (especially friends and family). This would be considered a preferential payment and could mean your remaining creditors reject the IVA proposal.
If you think you will inherit some money but are not exactly sure when, you might want to delay starting an IVA. However you will still be under pressure from your creditors. In this situation you could use a Debt Management Plan (DMP) to manage your debts temporarily while you wait for the inheritance payment.
Received inheritance during your IVA and need help? Call us (0800 077 6180) or complete the form below. The advice is free and confidential.
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Hi James , Our IVA completed in March 2016 and we have the letter of completion – the IVA company are still applying for and taking our PPI refunds – £11k so far – this leads me to my question my mum unfortunately has just passed away (June 20) and I’m worried that they will try and claim the inheritance ?
Hi Samie
Sorry to hear about your Mum. If she passed away after the date your IVA was completed you have nothing to worry about. The IVA company do not have a claim on any inheritance you might get if someone dies after the completion certificate is issued. They would only have a claim if the person dies before the certificate is issued. They have a claim on the PPI because the opportunity to claim already existed at the time the IVA was in place….
We have a debt management scheme but have been advised we can go foIVA…. I did get a little bit of cash from when my mum passed away a year ago but want to know if IVA will take this money?
Hi Ahal
If you start an IVA you should really declare all your assets including any savings you have. The cash left to you by your Mum would fall into the category of savings. If it is more than a few hundred pounds, then yes, you would be expected to pay this into your IVA.
If you think about it, you can’t expect your creditors to write off money for you (which they often do in an IVA) if you are not prepared to do everything you can to repay as much of your debt as possible (which of course includes giving up any savings you have).
One of the advantages of staying in your debt management plan compared to an IVA is the flexibility. In a DMP you can keep the cash you have and make your own decision about what you use it for.
Our mother died this year. Her property is inherited by myself and my sister. My sister has an IVA. Can her creditors claim against our shared property that we will both be living in? There was little cash left and it paid her debts (funeral, credit card etc). She has a poor credit score (obviously) and would be unable to raise a mortgage or loan. What can they do? Should she declare bankruptcy? Can she do this during an IVA? Please help us, thank you.
Hi Teddycat
Normally if you get inheritance during an IVA, it would be considered to be a windfall. As such the money inherited would have to be paid into the Arrangement over and above the normal monthly payments.
In your situation, your sister has inherited 50% of a property. Clearly it is not easy to turn this asset into cash. However, as a windfall your sister must still report it to her IVA company. The Insolvency Practitioner managing her IVA has a duty to her creditors to maximise the money returned to them. But under normal circumstances they can’t force the sale of the property to get their hands on your sister’s half. So what is likely to happen?
Ultimately it will be down to the discretion of the IP to decide what to do. However one possible outcome would be that they introduce an equity clause into the agreement. In other words your sister would have to try and release equity from her half of the property in the 54th month of her IVA. That said, given you would also have to give your consent to this (which you are unlikely to do), equity release is unlikely to be possible. Therefore as an alternative, the inherited property would be ignored and her IVA payments would be extended by 12 months instead.
Note: If mutual agreement regarding the property can’t be reached, your sister must NOT go bankrupt under any circumstances. If she did this the official receiver would have the power to force the sale of the property to release her half of the equity. This option must therefore be avoided. In this scenario, she would be best off allowing her IVA to fail and then managing her debts with a debt management plan.