A will written in 1988 and a family that has changed twice since

An old will is still a valid will. The trouble is rarely that the document has expired. It is that the family it describes no longer exists.

A will from 1988 may leave a share to a brother who has since died, name an executor who is now eighty four, and divide a house that was sold in 2004. None of that makes it invalid. All of it makes it slow.

Where a beneficiary has died before the testator, their share usually fails and falls into the residue, unless the will says otherwise or they were a child of the testator. Where an executor cannot act, someone has to renounce formally before anyone else can apply.

The fix is not complicated and it is much cheaper than the argument. A will should be read again after a death in the family, a divorce, a house move or a birth. Four events, and most people have had two of them since they last looked.