My cousin’s husband (J) asked me to look at a letter he’d received from his brother’s (B) attorney. The letter demanded that J, as the power of attorney for his father (alive and about 90) immediately inventory all the safe deposit boxes and the residence of the father and to start giving over the stuff their mother had left to B and B’s children. A copy of the mother’s will was attached. J and my cousin have been married for 20 years but have no children (and will have no children).
The first line of the Will left everything to her husband if she died first (she did). It then went on to list china and silver and jewelry that was to go to her grandchildren but of course all that was void because it had all passed to her husband upon her death. Brother was demanding all this for his children NOW. Um, did Brother and his attorney miss the first line of the will? It was pretty clear that it all went to the husband. I also had to point out that being a POA for someone does not give the POA the right to open safe deposit boxes, ransack the house for jewels and silver, start making distributions under the will (I don’t even know if he’s the executor under his father’s will). The POA was so he could help his father with the taxes, banking, etc. Both father and J live in NYC and B lives in Pittsburgh, so I’m sure they just set it up like that for convenience. J is a school teacher, B is a doctor - who do you think has more money? I suggested that they perhaps see if the grandfather had also left these items to the grandchildren (who are probably in their 30s by now) and if everyone agreed, they could distribute the items early. My cousin and her husband have no interest in those items, but I believe the estate divided other things equally between the brothers and if B’s children were taking things early from the father’s estate, there should be a notation of that and an accounting. I’m sure the father’s Will, also drafted a million years ago before J was married and when the grandchildren were much younger, mirrored the wife’s, so the grandchildren will still get the china and silver and Auntie’s ring.
I really felt the tone of the letter from the attorney was wrong, that he was demanding things B and children had no right to (at least no right to NOW). If the attorney had asked nicely, I think J would have agreed and just turned things over. Play nice
Once when my parents were visiting my dad said they were trying not to spend too much money so they could leave plenty for the grandkids. I said they should spend more on themselves and not worry about the grandkids (my parents have a good amount of money but live pretty frugally). My dad’s response was, “If you feel that way I won’t leave anything for you.” Ok then, I guess that was our talk about the will!
We have created a family trust, set up such that the provisions can only be changed while we are both living. When the first spouse dies, only half of the estate goes directly to the surviving spouse. The other half goes into trust with specific provisions. It cannot be changed after the first death. When the second spouse dies, the remainder of their assets goes into the trust as well. So only 1/2 of the estate could ever be given away to other parties, and only during the surviving spouse’s lifetime. Once that person dies, whatever is left must go into the trust.
We are meeting with lawyers and financial planners this week to do some serious estate planning. It’s fairly simple insofar as things are to be divided equally amongst our kids, but the tax implications and how / when to structure the transfers will require some thought. So this is timely!
My family everything was set up equally among the 4 of us. Even though there are different levels of wealth, who is to say down the road there won’t be a turn of events?
Hubby’s family is a disaster. His parents have a home on a 100 acres that several family members feel very emotional about and wand to keep in the family. After hubby’s sister got divorced parents decided to let her have a few acres, in the middle of the property, to build a house. She remarried almost instantly and has just deeded the house to her new husband who has children no one knows. Her children want the grandparents house and property and are devastated about this. Sister may put the house up for sale as well and the parents will probably buy back what they gave to her to keep it all intact.
I knew it was a mistake at the time when they called, but it really wasn’t for me to say anything beyond, are you sure you’re thinking this one through?
Wow, in the middle of the property! Hopefully, they will accept a reasonable price when the family buy back. We are all even steven among the starving artist and a wealthy doc. I keep telling myself money isn’t worth the animosity it could create.
@Nrdsb4 I hate irrevocable trusts. Maybe you have a better setup for it.
That is about THE most selfish thing I have EVER heard! @-)
Currently my in-laws do not spread the largesse around equally among their three kids (one of which is my H), so I don’t think it would be distributed equally in the will, either. But it’s largesse-unanticipated money coming our way at random times, so whenever it shows up in whatever amount, we’re happy for it. Sometimes I feel a twinge of crankiness at the uneveness, but that’s my problem, not theirs.
Our will splits our assets equally between the kids. Keep it as simple as possible, because to my mind “fair” is in the eye of the beholder. Although one turns 18 this year, so I think we need to look into trusts and disbursement techniques.
Here’s my question: In-laws have 5 children (all married with kids, all doing well). When they die, the assets are to be divided evenly among the 5 kids, unless one of those 5 kids has died. If one of the children predeceases the in-laws, their share is to be split among the surviving adult siblings, not given to the decease’s heirs. I think this seems odd . Am I wrong or is this a common practice?
It’s not irrevocable until one of us dies. The whole thing was set up in order to protect our children from creditors and future ex-spouses, and to mitigate tax obligations. There is nothing not to like about it.
The money should go to the children of the deceased spouse imo. They’re essentially cut out if their parent dies. What we did with my mom’s modest estate - all four siblings agreed on the same dollar amount to give each of her grandchildren - regardless of how many kids each of us had because mom loved them each individually. Then we split the rest 4 ways. No hard feelings. It helped some pay bills, helped others bulk up savings or travel or whatever. I put the money in savings while I decided what to do with it.
FIL split the money equally among his 3 kids, but specified that the money passed in trust was for the benefit of his kids and their descendants. Three trusts are now being set up, one for each kid. If there is money left over in the trust once the kid dies, it goes to that kid’s descendants, if any. If there are none, it gets split between the other siblings (or their descendants).
So where this gets interesting is that two of the kids have descendants. The third has a wife who has kids, but those kids are not BIL’s descendants, so can’t inherit the trust assets. The wife is in a major hurry to get the trust set up so she can make sure they drain it fast so that she doesn’t lose out on the money.
There’s a lot to not like. Circumstances change and you don’t have the flexibility to change. We’ve had two irrevocable trusts both with a corporate trustee. Maybe that was the problem. It’s up to them to safeguard but at some point corporate interests interfered with fiduciary duties… We dissolved one and the other is still feeding their greed.
I would think this is the norm unless distribution was already made to surviving spouse and children.
@igloo, so fill me in on “the a lot” not to like. Perhaps you can bring up something valuable while our trusts are still revocable that our estate attorney didn’t anticipate. We spent a lot of time and thought setting up these trusts. The “irrevocable” protects our children’s inheritance, as well as the surviving spouse’s needs. There is no corporate trustee, and no way for a trustee to benefit in any way financially from the trust. But I’m open to suggestions.
The estate lawyer ran through the disadvantages of a corporate trustee, primarily, the difficulty requesting consideration for additional funds (say, D2 got to the point where she wanted to deposit on a home purchase.) I would want her to be able to dip in for extra money under some circumstances. The problem is finding friends not too old, themselves, to successfully handle the responsibility.
My H is one of 3 children. Years ago, he and FIL had a major falling out. (For perspective, H traveled to Florida on business, where my IL’s have a home. My FIL forbade him to come to the house. My MIL snuck out and met him at a restaurant. When they were back up north, my FIL would come take our kids out for ice cream. H would stay upstairs and I would greet FIL at the door, make small talk and hand the kids over to grandpa. To say this was all utterly ridiculous is the understatement of the year.) In any case, at that point, we are pretty certain that FIL wrote H out of his will and left everything to his sisters.
H and FIL have since reconciled and have a good relationship - indeed, they now go on annual fishing trips of the two of them and my son. Nonetheless, we have no idea if he’s been reinstated in the will. I, of course, want to know these things, but H isn’t interested in finding out. He just has washed his hands of the whole thing and feels - if that’s how he wants to be, fine, I know I’ve always taken the higher road, and I don’t need his money, I can take care of myself. I have to say, it’s really the healthier way to live.
On one side of my family, for three generations, the deceased parent’s will split assets equally among children. Then the children went back to the attorney and made arrangements to be sure more went to the sibling who needed it most. This wasn’t just pure unselfishness. It was clear to the better off siblings that they would be responsible in the long run and it was easier to deal with this eventuality while the resources were available.