This International Women's Day, we're highlighting the journeys, challenges, and experiences of our female lawyers. Their stories show the importance of diversity, resilience, and empowerment in shaping an inclusive legal community. Claire Thompson, Solicitor in our Wills, Trusts,sTax and Probate team, shares her thoughts below.

if you are deemed to require residential care, then the Local Authority will carry out a financial assessment to determine how much, if any, of your care you will pay yourself. Your property is likely to be your main asset and it is normally what clients want to protect the most. If you jointly own a property, there is something that can be done to protect half of the value of the property.

Buying a property together is a milestone for any couple, but for unmarried partners, it comes with it’s own unique considerations. If your relationship is not legally recognised by a marriage or civil partnership then your contributions to a jointly owned property can be particularly vulnerable in the event of a separation.

It’s often said that the only certainties in life are death and taxes but, while taxes may be a certainty, the amount of tax you pay isn’t set in stone. Effective tax planning can be used to ensure that your tax liability is minimised.

If gifting a buy-to-let to let property, shares or investments is something that you are considering you might want to make that gift sooner rather than later!

A gift of a property shares or investments is considered a disposal for Capital Gains tax purposes which means that even though you don’t receive any money from the person receiving the property, Capital Gains tax can still arise.

McClure Solicitors went into administration in April 2021 and many ex-clients are now concerned about the legal documents they prepared previously through McClures. We have been actively helping a number of ex-clients of McClure Solicitors where, upon the advice of McClures, “Family Protection Trusts” were put in place and these types of legal documents in particular may not have been in the best interests of those clients