Thousands of homeowners thought they were protecting their homes for their children by using a trust scheme. Instead, they lost legal ownership and have been fighting for years to get it back.
In 2023, Joyce Gifford discovered that she no longer owned her Cornwall home. She had signed it over to a “family protection trust” five years earlier, believing it would shield the property from care home costs and ensure her children could inherit it.
The trust was sold by McClure solicitors, a Scottish firm that has since collapsed. A representative visited Mrs Gifford’s home in 2018 while her late husband was suffering from declining health. The couple were warned that, without using a trust scheme, the authorities could force them to sell their home to cover care expenses. They paid £4,486 for the protection.
What Mrs Gifford didn’t realise was that creating the trust meant she and her husband were no longer the property’s legal owners, just beneficiaries. Their names disappeared from the property deeds, replaced by McClure’s trust corporation.
Lee Jackson from Truro had a similar experience. After paying £5,000 for a McClure trust, he spent an additional £12,000 in legal fees to dissolve it and restore his ownership. He says the salesperson frightened them with warnings about inheritance taxes and care home costs; fears his solicitor later called “nonsense.”
Mr Jackson founded a Facebook group entitled “Victims of McClure’s” with over 3,000 members sharing nearly identical stories.
Legal experts warn that asset protection trust schemes often don’t work as intended. Local authorities can view them as an attempt to deliberately hide assets and will challenge them anyway. They also don’t prevent inheritance tax in most cases.
Andrew Robertson, McClure’s former director, denies wrongdoing, stating the trust was designed to protect against care costs and that clients signed ownership transfers willingly. He claims over 20,000 trusts were arranged and most clients were satisfied.
Scottish police investigated McClure but found no criminal activity. However, the Solicitors Regulation Authority criticised the firm’s handling of affected clients and implemented compliance requirements for Jones Whyte, the firm now managing the trust files.
Meanwhile, many home owners continue their costly legal battles to reclaim what was already theirs.