KEEP IT IN THE FAMILY

At 40% above the threshold, IHT is one of the biggest threats to family wealth.

HMRC is forecast to collect £8.4 billion in Inheritance Tax in 2025/26, rising to £14.3 billion by 2029/30 — paid by ordinary UK families, not just the wealthy. With the right structures in place, much of that can be kept in the family. We help you build them.

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WHY THIS MATTERS

Inheritance Tax is not just a wealthy person's problem any more.

The Nil Rate Band — the threshold below which no IHT is payable — has been frozen at £325,000 since 2009. Property prices have risen. So has every other asset class. Most UK families with a home in the South East are now above the threshold without realising it.

The Treasury Office for Budget Responsibility forecast IHT receipts to rise from £8.4 billion in 2025/26 to £14.3 billion in 2029/30. That growth is not coming from billionaires. It is coming from ordinary families whose homes, savings, pensions, and life insurance payouts have pushed them over a line they did not know they had crossed.

The cruelty of IHT is not the tax itself. It is how preventable most of it is.

WHAT IT IS

The UK IHT framework, in plain English.

Every UK adult has a Nil Rate Band of £325,000. Anything you leave behind under that threshold is free of IHT.
If you leave your home (or a share of it) to your direct descendants — children, grandchildren, stepchildren, adopted children — there is an additional Residence Nil Rate Band of £175,000.
That gives a single person up to £500,000 before IHT becomes payable.
A married couple or civil partnership can transfer unused allowances on first death, giving up to £1 million combined before IHT.
Above the threshold, IHT is charged at 40%.
If you leave 10% or more of your estate to charity, the rate on the remainder drops to 36%.

That is the framework. The strategies sit inside it.

HOW WE WORK

The strategies that actually work.

STRATEGY ONE

Spouse exemption.

Transfers between married couples or civil partners are free of IHT. The most basic shelter — but it also wastes the Nil Rate Band on first death if not structured properly. Wills drafted with a Nil Rate Band Trust capture the first allowance.

STRATEGY TWO

Life insurance written in Trust.

A policy that pays out into a Trust sits outside your estate. The full payout reaches your family without IHT. This is one of the single biggest preventable IHT failures in the UK.

STRATEGY THREE

Trust structures.

Discretionary Trusts, Nil Rate Band Trusts, Bare Trusts, Bypass Trusts. Properly structured, Trusts hold wealth outside your personal estate while still benefiting your family.

STRATEGY FOUR

Business Property Relief.

Shares in qualifying unquoted UK trading companies held for two years or more can attract 100% relief from IHT. For business owners, this is structural, not optional.

STRATEGY FIVE

Lifetime gifting and pensions.

£3,000 per year annual exemption. £250 per recipient small gifts. Wedding gifts. Gifts out of normal expenditure (no upper limit if affordable). Potentially Exempt Transfers — larger gifts that fall outside the estate after seven years. Most UK pensions sit outside the estate; nominations and Bypass Trusts matter.

The right strategy is rarely one of these on its own. It is usually a layered combination, designed around what you have, who you love, and what you are trying to protect. This is what Trust First means on IHT. The legal kind of trust — the structures. The relational kind — the conversations that mean nothing comes as a surprise.

We do both. Every time.

WHO NEEDS THIS

Anyone whose total estate is approaching or above the £325,000 threshold.

Homeowners in London and the South East
Anyone with significant savings, investments, or pension wealth
Business owners (BPR optimisation is structural)
Anyone receiving an inheritance themselves (your IHT exposure compounds)
Married couples wanting to use both Nil Rate Bands properly
Unmarried couples (no spouse exemption applies)
Anyone in a blended family where IHT planning needs to coordinate with bloodline protection

If you have wealth, IHT planning is not optional. It is the structure that keeps what you have built where you want it to go.

A NOTE ON REGULATION

Inheritance Tax planning sits across several disciplines.

Legal (STEP, SRA), tax (HMRC, ICAEW), and financial (FCA). Legacy Creators is not directly FCA, SRA, or STEP-regulated. We coordinate with appropriately regulated specialists — solicitors for documents, accountants and tax advisers for HMRC matters, FCA-regulated advisers for pensions and life insurance.

This lets us offer joined-up IHT planning without crossing regulatory lines.

HOW IT FITS THE BIGGER PICTURE

IHT planning sits at the centre of everything else.

Wills — structured to preserve the Nil Rate Band and Residence Nil Rate Band
Trusts — hold assets outside the personal estate
Life Insurance written in Trust — keeps the payout outside the estate
Pension nominations and Bypass Trusts — pensions usually sit outside the estate for IHT
Business Succession Planning — BPR optimisation
Lifetime gifting strategy — PETs, normal-expenditure gifts, annual exemptions

We do not just calculate the IHT bill. We help you structure your estate so the bill is as small as it legitimately can be.

PRICING

Bespoke. Explained in plain English before you sign anything.

IHT planning is bespoke. Cost depends on the structures involved, the size and complexity of your estate, and how much architecture needs to be put in place.

The Free Legacy Review is always free. We look at what you have, identify what your family actually needs, and tell you the cost in plain English before you sign anything.

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