Can anyone Help with this?

Andrew Leak · Post by **Andrew Leak** » Wed Oct 27, 2010 11:37 am

Dear all,

My best friend Jim, and co-owner of our aircraft project died last week and as I don't want to approach his family with all the potential legal holes I need to fill so soon, I would be grateful if anyone can give me a pointer or two of the steps I need to take if you have had similar experience. Obviously the value of the project needs to be taken into account and this is where it starts to escape me into how legal it's going to get and whether I go through my friends family solicitor to tie this up, or not. I presume that the CAA has to be informed of his demise via the aircraft register, it was a straight 50/50 ownership, but as I don't know the process of who has to sign what, any help there would great too.

I talked to my inspector the week before Jim passed away and he said I needed to talk to him about what happens to aircraft if the inevitable happened, trouble was it did and was quite a shock, and I didn't manage to discuss it with him in time. So here I am, asking for a little advice.

Thanks in advance.

Andrew

J.C. · Post by **J.C.** » Wed Oct 27, 2010 5:25 pm

I got caught up in something similar when I was asked to be the go between in a similar situation.
Being friendly with both parties I found it very difficult.The deceased's party then went to a solicitor and as soon as they mentioned aircraft he immediately started thinking Lear jet prices.
Good luck sorting out this minefield, I would talk to his familly ASAP.

Nick Allen · Post by **Nick Allen** » Wed Oct 27, 2010 7:27 pm

Sympathies. This might prove tricky, but need not if your friend's family is reasonable. (I had to do something similar when one of our syndicate died, but he had at least set things in motion before he passed away.) First thing: check if your insurance, if you had it, is still valid -- if it was jointly insured, then you need to confirm that the policy continues with the death of one of the parties. As J.C. says, talk to the family as soon as you feel able. If you want to take over the project (i.e. buy out your late friend's half), then you need to get a value for the whole thing. If you can agree that with them, then you can simply pay his estate half that amount. No need for any lawyers. If the family insist that it is valued "professionally" for probate purposes, then (a) everything will grind to a halt for a while; and (b) they will probably get a lower value than the number you came up with. And it might be worth gently pointing this out to them if they are dithering. Good luck.