Below are some of the terms used in a Will with explanations as to their meaning and importance:

Executors: You have the choice of friends, relatives, solicitor, bank or any combination. Banks tend to be the most expensive choice. Solicitors also charge for their service to act as executors. If you appoint lay executors it is always advisable to appoint at least two, to share the burden. Of course your lay executors can always ask a solicitor to assist with the actual administration.

Guardians: You can use your Will to appoint guardians of any children under the age of eighteen. It is always advisable to ask both guardians and executors if they are willing to act before appointing them in your Will.

Legacies: These are specific gifts of personal items, cash or property.

Residue: Most people leave the residue to their wife or husband and failing that to their children. Your Will should always have a clause relating to residue because there are bound to be items in your estate which you cannot account for in specific legacies.

Infants: Apart from appointing guardians, you need to think at which age you would like children to inherit. If you do not stipulate an age they will inherit at eighteen. However, you may wish trustees to retain control of a child’s inheritance until he/she reaches the age of twenty-one or even twenty-five.