03/04/2026
April Newsletter
Spring is here, Easter & lighter evenings just around the corner, happy days 😎
This Month:
They Stole My House: 1000's Of UK Estates Unclaimed: My Way.
They Stole My House:
“Declared Dead and Locked Out of His Own Home”: Inside the £550,000 Property Scam
On January 24th 2023, What started as a routine visit home turned into a surreal and costly ordeal for Stanislaw Sokolowski — who arrived at his west London property to find strangers clearing it out, only to be told it had already been sold.
At the point Sokolowski discovered the men disposing of his belongings, he had not set foot in his house for some weeks. He was mostly staying at the nearby home of his son. Described as warm, generous and hardworking by those who know him, the long-time divorcee was also idiosyncratic. He had developed hoarding tendencies and the house he had bought for about £110,000 in 1990 might have looked overgrown and unloved to some.
Even more astonishingly, official records showed he had died years earlier.
At the centre of the scheme was a man calling himself Peter Petrovics, who exploited a little-known weakness in the probate system.
In June 2022, he contacted the probate service, the part of the courts system that grants probates, the legal right to deal with a deceased person’s money or property. Petrovics said he was getting in touch about “John Sokolowski”, a man who, according to documents easily found online, as well as a death certificate, died in Blackburn in 2007. Stanislaw and John had no connection. Stanislaw would later confirm that he had never heard of him. Nor did he have any link to Petrovics, if indeed Petrovics was a real person.
Petrovics took a gamble. He uploaded a forged Will for John Sokolowski, "also known as Stanislaw Sokolowski” — merging the identities of two people, one dead, the other living. He identified a real person with a similar name who had genuinely died in 2007, then combined that identity with Sokolowski’s — effectively creating a paper trail that suggested they were the same individual. He also listed the Brentford property as the address of the deceased. Petrovics said that, in his role as executor, he was administering the Estate. His application was approved by the district registrar. He received a grant of probate, the key document, after a short time. Using the document, he applied to transfer the house to himself. The Land Registry updated the deed for the house, saying it belonged to Petrovics. The registry did not query the suspiciously low valuation of £270,000 he gave for the property, a ten-minute drive from Kew Gardens. It seems he did this to avoid any IHT issues, making it easier for the grant of probate to be issued.
Once the title had been updated, the property could be sold on as if everything were legitimate.
It was quickly purchased, in December 2022, by Joseph Akinwale for £550,000 in a fast-tracked deal that bypassed typical checks. The purchase was largely funded through a mortgage from Together Commercial Finance, a lender known for higher-risk lending. The speed and informality of the transaction meant the sale completed before any serious questions were raised.
For Sokolowski, the discovery triggered a long and exhausting fight. Despite contacting authorities, the situation wasn’t immediately treated as a clear-cut criminal case, as official records showed the property had legitimately changed hands.
The case sat in a grey zone where criminal and civil law meet. On one hand, it appears he was the victim of a brazen fraud and theft. On the other hand, the Land Registry had consented to a change in the title. The name that appears on a title has considerable legal force in its own right. In such cases, no arm of the state, from the Land Registry to the police, is likely to intervene unless they are compelled to do so.
It is for this reason that, according to police, organised crime gangs are increasingly engaged in probate fraud. Locked out of his own home and forced into a legal grey area, he spent nearly three years and more than £150,000, his lifetime savings and some of his son's money, proving two things: that he was alive, and that the house was his.
A judge ultimately ruled in his favour, describing the Will as fraudulent and restoring ownership. However, his belongings were gone for good — and no one involved in the scheme has been held accountable.
The case highlights how so-called probate fraud is being used to exploit gaps between different systems — from probate to land registration — particularly targeting properties that appear unoccupied.
One simple precaution? Signing up for property alerts at Land Registry will provide email prompts if there's a shift in your property tile or finance is taken out against the home.
Click on the link below to be taken to the government's property alert service where you can set this up for up to 10 properties, including monitoring a property of an elderly relative:
https://bit.ly/4c0XeVh
1000s Of Uk Estates Unclaimed:
Ever wondered if there’s a forgotten fortune out there with your name on it? Well, you wouldn’t be alone. Across the UK, there are currently thousands of unclaimed Estates just sitting in limbo—adding up to a jaw-dropping total of nearly £1.5 billion.
Yep, really.
As of early 2026, more than 5,000 estates are still waiting to be claimed. When you consider the average UK house price (around £270,000), it’s no surprise the total value quickly climbs into eye-watering territory.
So, who might be in luck? According to research by legal experts, certain surnames pop up time and time again. If your last name happens to be Smith, you might want to pay extra attention—it tops the list by quite some margin. Names like Jones, Brown, Williams and Taylor also make frequent appearances, suggesting some families could be sitting on long lost legacies without even knowing it.
Location plays a big part too. Unsurprisingly, London leads the pack with the highest number of unclaimed Estates, thanks to its large and ever changing population. But it’s not just the capital, areas like Surrey, the West Midlands, and even West Yorkshire aren’t far behind, each with hundreds of Estates still awaiting rightful heirs.
Interestingly, many of these Estates have been unclaimed for years—sometimes decades. In fact, one dates all the way back to the 1970s. It’s a stark (but gentle!) reminder of how important it is to keep your affairs in order and make sure your loved ones know where they stand.
One final twist? More than half of the areas with the most unclaimed Estates are in the south of England, hinting that higher-value regions may naturally have more wealth left behind.
To find out if your relatives have an unclaimed Estate in the UK, you can search the official Bona Vacantia list on GOV.UK, which is updated daily. This list contains Estates of people who died without a Will or known family.
So, whether you’re a Smith dreaming of a surprise windfall or just someone who likes to stay organised, there’s a takeaway here: a little planning today could save a lot of mystery tomorrow. Not only does a well prepared Estate Plan safeguard your assets, but it also offers peace of mind to those you leave behind, without room for doubt or legal dispute.
✅ Simple & Affordable Estate Planning
Let's talk - give us a call to discuss further.
My Way:
We’ve all heard of Frank Sinatra aka Ol' Blue Eyes. What makes his Will interesting is that he made a very clever inclusion in his Will.
Since he had married 4 times and had a considerable Estate worth over $100 million, he knew that there would be disputes over his Estate. He added a provision that if anyone contested his Will, they'd be automatically disinherited. Clever, right?
Well, he certainly did it his way!
That's all for this month folks. Have an egg-tastic Easter.
See you next month.
