Inheritance Wars: “One Day This Will All Be Yours” — The Family Farm Promise That Ended in Court

Families do not always make promises about inheritance in writing

Sometimes the promise is much simpler:

"One day, this will all be yours."

That type of assurance can be particularly important in farming and family businesses, where children may spend decades working in the expectation that the land or business will eventually pass to them.

Winter v Winter [2023] EWHC 2393 (Ch), upheld by the Court of Appeal in [2024] EWCA Civ 699, provides a striking example.

The Winter family operated a successful market-garden business in Somerset. Three sons — Richard, Philip and Adrian — became involved in the family enterprise.

Their parents had, over many years, given assurances to the effect that the family business and property would ultimately pass equally to the three sons.

But after the mother's death, family relationships deteriorated. Their father changed his will.

Instead of dividing his interest equally between his sons, his 2015 will left his share of the business to Philip. Richard and Adrian received nothing from that part of the estate.

They went to court. And won.

A lifetime built around a family business

This was not simply a dispute about what somebody had said during one conversation. The assurances had been made over many years.

Richard and Adrian contended that they had structured their working lives around the expectation that the family business would ultimately be divided equally.

One particularly striking feature was evidence that Adrian had considered joining the Royal Marines but instead remained in the family business.

By the time the dispute reached court, the brothers had spent much of their adult lives working within the enterprise.

The question was whether promises made by their parents had legal consequences despite the terms of their father's later will.

Proprietary estoppel

The claim relied principally upon the doctrine of proprietary estoppel. Broadly, proprietary estoppel can arise where:

• a sufficiently clear assurance is made;
• someone reasonably relies upon that assurance;
• they suffer detriment as a consequence; and
• it would be unconscionable for the person who made the assurance, or their estate, to go back on it.

Claims of this kind arise frequently in family farms and family businesses.

The difficulty is obvious. Families rarely conduct these conversations as commercial negotiations. There may be no contract. There may be no formal written promise. Nobody necessarily says: "If you work here for the next 35 years, I contractually undertake to leave you precisely one third of the business."

Instead, there may be dozens of conversations over decades. "You boys will have this one day." "This is all for you." "You'll inherit it between you."

The court may later have to reconstruct what was actually promised and what the claimant did in reliance upon it.

The High Court decision

Mr Justice Zacaroli found that assurances had been made to Richard and Adrian that they would share equally in their parents' interest in the family business and its property. The brothers had relied upon those assurances.

An important issue was whether they had actually suffered detriment. After all, working in the family business had not left them destitute. They had themselves obtained significant financial benefits from the successful enterprise.

But detriment in proprietary estoppel is not simply an accounting exercise. The court recognised the significance of committing an entire working life to a particular course because of an assurance about the future. Richard and Adrian had lost the opportunity to make different choices about their lives.

The court found the requirements of proprietary estoppel established and gave effect to the assurances. Their father's interest in the relevant family business was therefore to be divided equally between the three brothers.

"But they did well out of the business"

Philip appealed. A central argument was that Richard and Adrian had prospered from their involvement in the business and therefore had not suffered the necessary detriment.

The Court of Appeal rejected that approach.

Where somebody has made a life-changing choice and spent many years working in reliance upon an assurance, the court does not necessarily require them to prove precisely what alternative career they would have pursued and exactly how much money they would have earned. The lost opportunity to lead a different life can itself be important.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal.

A will is not always the end of the story

Winter v Winter illustrates an important point about inheritance disputes. Reading the will does not necessarily tell you everything about the deceased's legal obligations.

There may also be:

• proprietary estoppel claims;
• beneficial interests under trusts;
• partnership agreements;
• contractual promises;
• mutual wills;
• lifetime transactions; or
• claims under the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975.

A person may therefore make a perfectly valid will but still leave behind an estate which is subject to rights arising outside the will itself.

The family farm problem

These disputes arise particularly frequently in farming families.

A child may work on the farm for relatively modest remuneration. They may turn down other employment. They may remain living near their parents. They may invest their own labour and money in the enterprise.

They may do all of that because everybody in the family understands that "one day the farm will be yours."

Years later, relationships can change. A parent may remarry. One sibling may fall out with another. A new will may be executed.

The informal family understanding then collides with formal testamentary arrangements. That is fertile territory for litigation.

Could mediation have helped?

Proprietary estoppel cases are particularly suitable for considering mediation because the litigation is inherently uncertain.

The court must evaluate conversations and conduct stretching back many years. Witnesses may remember the same events differently. The person alleged to have made the promise is often dead. Even if an assurance is established, difficult questions can remain about reliance, detriment, countervailing benefits and remedy.

And the court ultimately has to impose an outcome.

At mediation the family can consider something broader. A settlement might involve:

• dividing land;
• transferring particular properties;
• restructuring ownership of the family company;
• buying out one sibling;
• allowing one family member to continue operating the business;
• retaining particular assets while selling others;
• staged payments;
• tax planning with appropriate professional advice; or
• an agreed division of the estate and litigation costs.

These are often practical family-business problems as much as legal problems.

What is a lifetime worth?

Winter also demonstrates one of the most difficult features of proprietary estoppel. How do you put a financial value on a life not lived?

Someone who remains on the family farm may have earned money and accumulated assets. But perhaps they would have built an entirely different career elsewhere.

Adrian's abandoned ambition to join the Royal Marines made that issue unusually vivid. After several decades, nobody can reconstruct the alternative life with precision.

That is precisely why these disputes can be difficult to resolve through conventional litigation.

The lesson from Winter v Winter

The obvious lesson for families is to document succession arrangements properly. If parents genuinely intend children to inherit a business in return for committing their working lives to it, leaving that understanding to informal conversations creates enormous scope for future conflict.

But once the dispute exists, there is another lesson.

A family can spend years asking a court: "What exactly did Dad promise us?"

Mediation allows them to ask another question:

"Given everything that has happened, how should we divide what the family built?"

For inheritance disputes involving farms, businesses and family property, that may ultimately be the more useful question.

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Inheritance disputes are increasing substantially. Read our analysis of the latest probate dispute statistics.

See also Clitheroe v Bond: testamentary capacity, delusions and a disinherited daughter.