<p>Adding, if I were this grandpa, and I knew how much my gift to my grandchildren had hurt my son, I’d immediately write a check to my son for the same amount.</p>
<p>Also, unless OP was planning to have her sons pay their own way through college, grandpas gift to her sons was really a gift to OP.</p>
<p>A view from the other side: my 3 siblings and I are helping to support my Mom (who’s in her 80s and has been a widow for almost 30 years). She only needed a little extra every month, so we tried at first to all make equal monthly contributions to her. That just didn’t work, since some siblings skipped months they couldn’t manage to pay, and the record keeping became more about guilt (with some resentment thrown in) than the money. So now my sister and I make sure she has enough money every month to not have to worry, and consider any other contributions as a bonus. </p>
<p>We’re okay with it, but we were all surprised at how deep the money = love thing could get, even when the money amounts were small. Not sure that puts me on the brother’s “side,” just saying it can get more emotionally complicated than you’d think.</p>
<p>^^I politely disagree. Brother’s temper tantrum being validated is not a great choice. Where does it end? Fighting over the furniture after the funeral? Portioning items at the holiday table? Grampa does not owe anyone a penny, and therefore whatever he gives is an unexpected blessing to be grateful for. It is Bro’s choice to be destructive about this. All the OP can do is keep that relationship door open - she can’t make her brother choose to walk through it, but maybe later he will see the light. Neither grampa nor the OP have done anything out of line nor can they control how someone else reacts to it.</p>
<p>(Cross posted, meant for Bay)</p>
<p>Bay, does that mean that if you had (say) a daughter who had three kids, and a son who had two kids, and you as the grandparent generously decided to put them all through school (and let’s just assume the schools are all equal cost), that you’d write an extra check to your son that was the equivalent of one tuition to compensate for the third tuition your daughter got?</p>
<p>I really like Bay’s last two posts. While the Grandpa certainly can do whatever he wants with his money … different people having different reactions to those decisions is quite human and reasonable.</p>
<p>We recently redid our wills and our (outstanding) lawyer gave us a questionnaire with a ton of scenario’s to consider. Will you split the money evenly between you kids? What if you’ve already spent money very unevenly (for example, paid for med school for one)? What if you kids have died and the money goes to grand kids; what if one of your kids only has one kid and another has five then do you split the money by kid or grandkid? It was an excellent exercise to go through … while Mom3ToGo and I started with a pretty similar outlooks it took us awhile to agree on a lot of the issues.</p>
<p>I agree it the Grandpa’s choice … to me it’s also clear there are many-many reasonable solutions … and that one person’s very reasonable choice may very well cause sincere hurt for someone else.</p>
<p>These situations may start as being about money, but they become more complicated. It’s only a short hop from fairness over division of assets to fairness over which adult child is pulling their weight helping care for the elderly parent and which one is abstaining. Does the split of the work have any bearing on the split of the assets? Should it? My parents, who live 20 minutes from me, give more to my family in the course of a year (with 2 in college) than to my unmarried childless sister, who lives across the country. Seems fair to me, since my children are their only grandchildren and I do a lot more for them. On the other hand, I do resent my sister’s freedom from being more involved as our parents age. I know full well that as our parents decline, the brunt of the responsibility will fall on me. Is it “fair” for a 50/50 split in the will (I know this is how it is) given the circumstances? Not sure, but not my call to make. My point is that these issues are complex and sibling rivalry is always a consideration.</p>
<p>Green button,
I understand that there are parents who feel the need to punish and control and teach their kids lessons from their deathbeds. I am not one of them. </p>
<p>PG,
Yes, I would.</p>
<p>Although I can see the points of those who argue that assets should be equally distributed, I find the grandfather’s right to do what he wants with his money more compelling. I also am a major believer in boundaries/minding one’s own business, so I have little sympathy for the brother objecting to what Dad is doing with his own money.</p>
<p>My in-laws paid for my husband to go to a state med school, back in the day when tuition was in the low 4-figures every year. His sister chose not to attend college, which they’d also have been willing to fund. They’ve told us that they plan to leave their entire estate to their daughter, because my husband has had a lot more financial success. That’s truly no problem for him, and certainly not for me. We don’t need the money (as is the case for the OP’s brother). His sister lives 20 minutes from their parents, and we live 300 miles away. She’s had to take on more responsibility for helping them out (as has the OP), so if my dh needed another reason why his sister should receive more from their parents, that’s a good one. But he doesn’t, because he doesn’t see their money as belonging to him in the future.</p>
<p>I disagree with the assertion that unless the OP was making her kids pay for college entirely thelmselves, this was really a gift to her.</p>
<p>Surely one of the biggest lessons on CC is that parents shouldn’t pay more for a pricier school than they can prudently afford, and thus students should be given a budget which might mean they turn down their prefered school because of that. So a gift from the grandfather might well mean the kids have more freedom in picking their schools, and/or have to take out less loans, which would be a gift to them.</p>
<p>This thread makes me want my last remaining parent AND my inlaws to spend every penny of THEIR money on themselves before they die. </p>
<p>We are appreciative of the infrequent gifts we receive from them. It never dawned on me that I should be keeping tabs on what the other siblings were getting. </p>
<p>It should NOT be all about the money, but sadly, it often is.</p>
<p>It’s your father’s money. From the instant your children where born, that was attention, “your half” gets more in terms of attention and gifts. They are now separate entities. How much more is entirely up to your father and none of your business or your brothers, unless your father decides to seek your opinions. Counting other peoples money is not a charactor building activity, and counting on other people’s money is worse.</p>
<p>Having gone through this mess in my own family, I would draw a distinction between money and personal items. I do pay attention to the family objects that have special meaning to each child and I know my mother has done so. Money is just money but there are special things that can’t be replaced. My sister is the oldest and has the bizarre idea that she should get to make decisions and distribute items after my mothers death. The funny part of this - and my mom thinks it is hilarious - is that mom moved in with my divorced brother when she couldn’t live alone so the stuff my sister covets actually belongs to him. My sister doesn’t attend family funerals, so we all joke that while we are at the cemetery, sis will be pulling a uhaul into my brother’s driveway and cleaning the place out! Seriously, though, my mom was a sculptor and there are several of her pieces that have deep meaning to each of us individually and I believe each should get that piece.</p>
<p>My brother is the big money in the family. No kids. He has been very generous to my kids and they are close to him, but my son is his namesake and godchild. There would be no hard feelings if he took particular care of my son. Which would flip my sister out because he is godfather to her daughter too.</p>
<p>We really have no idea how this grandfather has treated his son over the course of his life, and neither does OP. Something has made the brother angry and resentful, and it very well could be the way his father treated him, or the way his father raised him. I don’t see how anyone can judge the brother’s reaction as inappropriate unless they believe that character and values cannot be taught (grandpa messed up here), and in that case, it wouldn’t be the brother’s fault for feeling the way he does if it is an immutable, innate character flaw of his anyway. </p>
<p>Why continue to make the brother miserable when the grandfather can easily write another check? Why doesn’t OP suggest this solution to her father? Why not at least try to make peace with the family, if all it requires is money? Seems silly to not at least try.</p>
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<p>Or you could look at it that you are blessed with children and your sister is not, and that you have the pleasure of being more easily able to spend time with your parents while she cannot, and so forth.</p>
<p>I would suggest that if your parents need help with things around the house that they cannot afford to pay for, that rather than doing it all yourself and feeling resentful you discuss with your sister whether she would be willing to help pay for the services they need.</p>
<p>Bay, excellent points.</p>
<p>I really do not expect any issues with my parents estate. I am the executor and I have already let my siblings know I will screw them.</p>
<p>On topic the brother is a spolied brat and needs to be told go s…t in his hat. Maybe if he was told that earlier he would not be such an AH.</p>
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<p>Yes, that is exactly what grandpa needs to do…if he is a controlling psychopath.</p>
<p>Raise your kids to be spoiled brats, and then when they ask for treatment equal to their siblings, tell them to s**t in their hats.</p>
<p>Bay, the brother is making himself miserable. It’s no one else’s job to make him feel better – it’s <em>his</em> job. It’s certainly not his father’s job. </p>
<p>Writing the brother a check would just be rewarding bad behavior. No functional grown-up is entitled to a parent’s money.</p>
<p>Sometimes people are spoiled brats all by themselves and it has nothing to do with how they were raised.
There are too many situations where a number of the kids are fine upstanding citizens and there is one bad apple. Not everything can be blamed on the way a parent raised every kid.</p>
<p>And my answer to all of your statements, owlice, is So?</p>
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<p>Yes, as I said, it may be due to innate self-centeredness, in which case the brother can’t help his feelings, but his father has the means to allay them. Why withhold it?</p>