The problem with leaving something to the surviving spouse if your child dies is that he/she might remarry and leave it all to his/her new spouse. I want y $$$ going to my direct descendants.
I have one unmarried brother. If he should get married and pass away before my mother then his share would go to other siblings, not to the wife. If I should pass away before my mom then my share would go to my kids. The lawyer didn’t have to put in additional language, just per stripes.
Would you make specific conditions in your will that the descendants were not to spend any of your money on their surviving parent? Just to make sure?
@somemom I hear you…but my inlaws were very clear…blood line only in their wills.
My Inlaws were of the same mind as VH. They strongly feel,that their blood descendants should inherit whatever they have…and not those,who marry into the family.
Of course, if the die, and my husband inherits, his inertia nice would come to me as surviving spouse first.
But if something happens to DH, my kids will be next in line…not me.
You know what? Honestly I would rather see my kids in line anyway.
FIL tried to make sure it went to his descendants and not their no-good spouses, but he didn’t get it done quite right. His will and trust both say that his estate goes to descendants, but he put his kids as beneficiaries of his IRA, which was by far his biggest asset. Once it was split into equal pieces to divide among the kids, they each get their own Inherited IRA, and they can put whoever they want as beneficiary. At my insistence, DH put our kids as beneficiaries of this IRA, with me as contingent, so I hope never to see any of it. I’m guessing DH’s siblings put their spouses as beneficiaries, if they have even bothered to name any.
With FIL’s trust, it’s also kind of a mess. The trust specifies that at his death it will be split up, in trust, in equal pieces, one trust for each kid. And the successor trusts pass to that kid’s descendants, if any, else to that kid’s siblings. However, it also says that trust can be dissolved and the assets distributed free of trust if the trust gets under a certain value. It’s over that value now, but when split into pieces each piece will be under that value, so I think that will mean that all the successor trusts can be dissolved. We’ll see when we get there. Since the executor is married but has no descendants, and since his wife has been in a particular hurry to settle the estate, I’m guessing they’ll try to dissolve his share immediately.
I’m leaving everything to DH and vice versa. If I die and he remarries and leaves everything to that gold digger of a new wife, and she leaves it all to her no-good kids, that’s on him. He knew better. But I’m not going to tie him in legal knots to make sure it goes to my kids, nor am I going to tie it up in water tight trusts to protect it from my kids’ future creditors or ex-spouses. They need to manage their own lives.
Not at all. That would be my grandchildren’s choice. If I’m giving money to my grandchildren (which I am, in my will, if my child predeceases me, held in trust until they’re 25), then it’s their money. But they would have control over it, not their parent, my child-in-law.
To the surviving children of the child who died.
I do this all the time. 99% of people say per stirpes, and the richer they are the more they distrust their children’s spouses. (There are a few exceptions. I had a client once who insisted on making a meaningful gift to her children-in-law when she died, although her husband was furious about it. And I know another family where a son predeceased his father by many years – actually, a drug overdose – and the son’s widow wound up living with and taking care of the father after his wife died. She – not just her children – inherited.)
Generation-skipping tax (a) Does not apply unless you are talking about serious money to the grandkids, in excess of $5.5 million. If you have to worry about GST, you should not be getting legal advice on the Parent Cafe. (b) Does not apply at all to bequests or insurance to grandchildren whose parent (your child) died before you do. So it’s a complete non-issue if you are talking about making grandchildren contingent beneficiaries of your insurance or, 401(k) if their parent dies before you.
We found the wills of the original owners of our house, from the 1870’s. The both leave everything to their children, with the surviving spouse having lifetime benefit, or usufruct, unless or until they die or remarry. At the first person’s death there was an inventory of the community property that the surviving spouse would hold for their children. An interesting way to provide for a surviving spouse while insuring that children are not cheated.
Well, since your husband will be required to take his Required Minimum Distribution every year, you are going to “see” a certain amount every year. And have it taxed as income. Hopefully he will be able to empty it over the years doing things for your children - tuition, weddings, grad school, family vacations, etc so that you can feel like you didn’t take any money from someone who didn’t want you to have it.
I have spent some time editing this to remain neutral about what I think of your FIL’s opinion of you…
True, @dragonmom, DH will be taking RMDs every year on FIL’s birthday. And FIL was ok with me, but 2 of his DILs had the inheritance spent in their minds before he was even pronounced. One of DH’s brothers was pretty much insolvent before the inheritance, and probably will be again in a year or 2. And he had substantial savings before he got married. The other SIL got out of her car the day after his death and said, by way of greeting: “We have to get the house sold. We can’t settle the estate until the house is sold.” So there’s that.
I happened to find a copy of the life insurance policy tonight. Grandma is the owner and the insured. The policy states that if any beneficiary dies before the insured, that beneficiary’s share will revert to the owner. I assume that means that Grandma’s share would go to her estate, which either goes all to Grandpa if he survives or goes to the trust if Grandpa does not survive. Then that amount, along with other trust assets, would be divided equally among the surviving children.
Oh my… I feel really lucky in my sibs’ and in laws’ choices. While there are things we disagree with, money has never been one.
My parent’s will has as the beneficiaries myself and my brother. My brother died. Therefore, the lawyer tells me that whatever is left in their estate when they die, 50% goes to me and 50% goes to my brother’s children. This seems fair to me. Apparently, they did not need to change the will.
Per stirpes is pretty common and standard, as was posted above. That’s what our estate attorney recommended and that is what we have done–we are each other’s primary beneficiary and then the contingent beneficiary/heir is to our kids and their descendants, per stirpes. Right now, neither of them is even in a serious relationship, so who knows how things will actually work out.
I would have said per stipes, until recently, when my grandmother died and my cousins who had not seen my grandmother in close to TWENTY YEARS inherited equally to her surviving children, including my mother who provided back breaking daily care in her final years. My cousins’ father died young and they didn’t bother to keep in touch with my grandmother after his passing. They didn’t even come to the funeral.
Her estate was small, so it was not about the money, but I, a grandchild who saw my grandmother at least once every other week and who contributed significanly physically and financially to her care, felt quite resentful when the absent cousins inherited (and I didn’t – but I wasn’t expecting to). In that circumstance, I think it would have been much preferable for my grandmother to amend her will to leave her modest estate to her surviving children with whom she was in daily or weekly contact, but there was NO WAY that she was going to specifically DISINHERIT her beloved deceased son’s children.
Seriously, they could at LEAST have shown up for the funeral.
ETA: so in my view, the preferable course would be to consider the relationships, not only the degree of relations.
Or she could have given them a smaller share.
People tend to leave their wills unchanged for decades. It’s hard to fix in the will what time has changed in our circumstances, especially when you are old and frail.
“My cousins’ father died young and they didn’t bother to keep in touch with my grandmother after his passing. They didn’t even come to the funeral.”
If the father died young, were his kids also young? If so, was it that they chose little contact, or did his surviving wife not foster contact? A somewhat similar situation happened in my family with my half-siblings, who were 2 and 4 when their (our) father died at age 34, and their mother basically cut off contact with their deceased father’s family. It wasn’t really their fault in any way for not having contact with their (our) paternal grandmother. Just curious.