No will, no direc­tion: The estate of Liam Payne and under­stand­ing law of intestacy

When Liam Payne sang ​“nobody can drag me down” we did­n’t think he was talk­ing about his aver­sion to sit­ting down and draft­ing his estate plan­ning doc­u­ments. How­ev­er, after leav­ing no valid will on his death, the dis­tri­b­u­tion of the for­mer One Direc­tion star’s for­tune is up to the rules of intes­ta­cy. But what does it mean to die ​‘intes­tate’, and what would hap­pen if you fail to exe­cute a valid will before you die?

The entire world was in shock and fans were dev­as­tat­ed when news broke in Octo­ber 2024 of the sud­den pass­ing of Liam Payne after falling from a hotel bal­cony in Argentina.

It was lat­er found that Payne had failed to pre­pare and sign a valid will, mean­ing that he died ​‘intes­tate’. Under sec­tion 102 of the Suc­ces­sion Act 2006 (NSW), ​‘intes­tate’ is defined as ​‘a per­son who dies and either does not leave a will or leaves a will but does not dis­pose effec­tive­ly by will of all or part of his or her property’.

This led to his for­mer part­ner and moth­er to his only child, Bear, Cheryl Tweedy, com­mon­ly known as Cheryl Cole, along with music indus­try lawyer, Richard Bray, to be appoint­ed as co-admin­is­tra­tors of Payne’s estate. How­ev­er, Tweedy and Bray’s author­i­ty over the dis­tri­b­u­tion of the estate assets is extreme­ly lim­it­ed, hav­ing only been giv­en author­i­ty to man­age the estate assets.

In accor­dance with UK suc­ces­sion law, the child of a deceased per­son dying intes­tate will inher­it the entire­ty of the estate, if there is no sur­viv­ing spouse or de fac­to part­ner. This means that the entire­ty of Payne’s estate val­ued at USD $32.2 mil­lion (approx­i­mate­ly AUD $50.3 mil­lion) will be placed in trust for Bear as he is still a minor.

Order of intes­tate dis­tri­b­u­tion in New South Wales

But what about New South Wales suc­ces­sion law? If you die intes­tate in New South Wales, this trig­gers a strict order of dis­tri­b­u­tion gov­erned by the Suc­ces­sion Act, which is depen­dent on the fam­i­ly sit­u­a­tion of the deceased per­son. Part 4.3 of the Suc­ces­sion Act out­lines the order in which an intes­tate is to be distributed.

Spouse or de fac­to partner

If the deceased per­son is sur­vived by a spouse or a de fac­to part­ner, the entire estate is giv­en to the spouse or de fac­to part­ner if that spouse is also the par­ent of the deceased’s chil­dren (or there are no chil­dren of the deceased). If the deceased is sur­vived by chil­dren from a pre­vi­ous rela­tion­ship, the estate is divid­ed between the spouse/​de fac­to part­ner and the deceased per­son­’s chil­dren. The spouse/​de fac­to part­ner receives the per­son­al effects, a statu­to­ry lega­cy (cur­rent­ly approx­i­mate­ly $580,000), and half of the residue of the estate, while the oth­er half is shared among the deceased per­son­’s sur­viv­ing children.

Chil­dren

If the deceased per­son is not sur­vived by a spouse or de fac­to part­ner, but has sur­viv­ing chil­dren, the entire estate will go equal­ly among the sur­viv­ing chil­dren. This was the case for the dis­tri­b­u­tion of Liam Payne’s estate.

Par­ents

If there is no sur­viv­ing spouse, de fac­to part­ner or chil­dren of the deceased per­son, the estate will go to the deceased’s par­ents equally.

Sib­lings

If the par­ents of the deceased per­son are unable to inher­it, sib­lings of the deceased are next in line to receive the deceased’s estate in equal shares.

Extend­ed family

If all the above­men­tioned options are unavail­able for dis­tri­b­u­tion, the next course of action would be for dis­tri­b­u­tion to the extend­ed fam­i­ly of the deceased per­son. This fol­lows nieces or nephews, to grand­par­ents, to aunts and uncles, or even cousins of the deceased person.

The State

If no eli­gi­ble rel­a­tives are found to dis­trib­ute the deceased per­son­’s assets, the estate is claimed by the NSW Government.

Although you’ve got to ​“live while you’re young”, that does­n’t mean that your estate plan­ning should be put on the back­burn­er for when you get old­er. Life is unpre­dictable and the mat­ter of Liam Payne’s estate is a reminder that no mat­ter how old you are, ensur­ing your estate affairs are in order is impor­tant, espe­cial­ly if you have an estate of sig­nif­i­cant val­ue. If you want to ensure that your tes­ta­men­tary wish­es are hon­oured and those you care about are accom­mo­dat­ed for fol­low­ing your death, mak­ing sure that you have a valid will in place should be high up on you to do list.