Inheritance threads seriously wind me up......

Your family sounds lovely!

I think it's rarely a case of 'fuck you'. If my dd was a multimillionaire and my ds had next to nothing, I'd be speaking with dd to ensure she understood my reason for leaving ds more, and that she fully understood it was no measure of my love.

My gran did that - us grandchildren got a fixed sum each, all the rest went to her child

I agree with you OP.
Even if the person is ‘playing favourites’ or whatever - doesn’t matter. It’s their money and they should choose what to do with it.

Step parents can be vile scum once there husband/wife's pass away.

If a will differentiates between children who have been given the same opportunities (etc), I find this appalling. I don’t buy into the argument that a child who’s done well ‘doesn’t need it’. There is more to a will than absolute cash. People leave behind possessions too that can be very meaningful to children if not valuable and this needs clarifying. My mother has told me she has left all her jewellery to me because she wants it to stay in her direct female line (eg my brothers might give it to their wives). My father has made similar provisions for his valued possessions, with most of it going to my brothers.
Another aspect people don’t mention is being left out of a will when one parent dies and then the living one remarries. I have seen this happen so many times, including to my husband. Now the new partner has a say in everything. This is why inheritance laws were started in Europe which state children cannot be written out of wills.

We have to be realistic, though. I used to be a tax accountant, a long time ago. I realised during that period that many people and businesses will pay a lot of money to save tax, some high earners will leave the country, and many others will risk breaking the law to avoid paying tax, if tax rates are high. If tax rates are perceived to be at a reasonable level, far more taxpayers will just cough up, albeit with some grumbling.

I agree unless, perhaps, where there is one child or more who is disable and requires long term help.

I’m the other side - I can’t believe how awful people are with how they leave their money. I think money should be left equally between offspring. I cannot fathom why people like to pit people against one another.

I am a meritocratic individualist and therefore believe that how well-off a person ends up in life should entirely depend on their own ability.

I would tax inheritance at 90%.

I realise I am in a vanishingly small minority on MN which - as befits a parenting forum, perhaps - is obsessed with the passing-on of wealth within families (aka unearned privilege), such that a complete no-hoper who popped out of a wealthy vagina will live a better life than a genius who had the bad fortune of being born to poor parents.

It's a total minefield when you're separated but have funds that the spouse wouldn't be entitled to in a divorce (like an inheritance). They'd get a good share of it regardless of your wishes. Not great.

Money also feels like it equates to love. If one sibling (golden child) is favoured in a will then that just confirms the feeling that you are somehow less and not worthy of the deceased persons love, respect or money.
I'm currently updating my will and leaving everything split equally among DC (if it's not gone on my care in later life). There's been much heartache and fallout in previous generations in our blended familys because of unequal distribution of assets.

Wills cause a lot of bother don't they. My parents loved talking about their will to me and sibs. Often threatening to cut out whoever had fallen out of their favour. They were always going on about the sacrifices they'd made to save this pile o cash.

My mother has said she looks forward to dying without a will so she can look down from heaven and laugh at her offspring fighting over her "legacy" as she calls it. I've been NC with my family a number of years and probably wouldn't even know.

On the other hand I know someone who has been really upset and angry at recently "losing out" on 200000 they felt entitled to after a relative died.

No one has a right to inherit anything from their parents! It’s the parents money to do as they see fit with it!

my fil disinherited 2 of his daughters - his choice….they had nothing to do with him for the last 15 years of his life so they got nothing! That was his choice.

I absolutely love reading inheritance threads.

AIBU to robustly support the freedom of the assets holder/s to leave money to whoever, whatever they choose

or

AIBU to robustly support people making judgements about their family members, assumptions about what they will encounter in their futures and hurt whoever they want with their money knowing that they won’t be around to deal with the consequences?

When people treat their family badly, by telling them that they don’t deserve as much help as another family member or the local stray cats, it hurts them. So yes, people have the right to leave what they want to who they want, but when that doesn’t mean they are always doing the right thing or that their choices won’t affect other people’s feelings.

It depends if its blatant greed and entitlement then I’m with you

but there things like a vulnerable adult pressured into changing will or a step parent swoops in and takes the lot by default

I hear this a lot on MN - that you do not have the right to inherit from your parents…..Yes you do have the right to inherit. It should be built in to law actually. It should be equal.

Yes, but it gets complex when people leave assets according to bullshit reactionary ideas. Like my grandmother left her sole asset, her house, to her son, purely because he was a man, and left nothing to my mother and her sister. My uncle has left the house to moulder, uninhabited and neglected, for more than 30 years because he can’t bring himself to renovate it or sell it, and his son doesn’t want it. That’s beside the point that my mother and aunt looked after their mother for the last two decades of her life. But no, they were girls.

It can get murderous in terms of perceived favouritism. There was a hideous case not far from here a few years ago. A woman who had inherited the family farm from her father had a husband and two adult sons. Terminally ill, and being threatened by her husband about how she would leave her land, she decided to leave the farm to one son. The disinherited son and his father, on receipt of the solicitor’s letter setting out the division of assets, then shot dead the son who was going to get the farm, and went out and shot themselves, leaving a note saying they were leaving the wife/mother alive ‘as a lesson’. She lived for six months afterwards.

I get on very well with my MiL and I dread her dying. I'm afraid she will leave the house entirely to BiL and not to be shared with DH. I know it will devastate dh. BiL has always been the favourite. He always had to wear his brother's pass me down clothes and his older brother always got everything new. He's mentioned this to me so many times about not feeling as loved as his brother. DH's Dad always said both sons would get half each but he's died now and I'm afraid Mil will leave the house to BiL. She has randomly mentioned on the last 3 times we've seen her 'you have paid off your mortgage now haven't you'. 3 visits in a row. It makes me think she'll favour BiL yet again. BiL doesn't have a partner and will be alone in life after his Mum dies except for my dh. I'm worried if DH is excluded he will be so hurt he won't want anything more to do with BiL. It's made worse by MiL telling me I will inherit her jewelry along with DGD's.

What's legally acceptable and what causes hurt for those left behind are sometimes two different things though.

Often it's not about the money, it's about parents playing favourites.

For example, if Child A has worked hard all their life, always felt on the edge and watched as Child B didn't work hard, expected hand outs and mooched off their parents throughout life as the golden child then it's probably going to hurt if their parents leave Child B more than Child A.
It isn't about the money itself but that they made a conscious decision to make their final act to reinforce their preference for one child over the other.