Inheritance in a blended family

Goodness I’d love to see that collection!

Could you reframe it to your son as no one can expect an inheritance, but his siblings have been exceptionally lucky?

Could you also talk to him about the good that has come to yours and his life from stepfathers family? The better quality of life he has, his education, they are not to be sniffed at! And it sounds like he was better off having his stepfather in his life, even if he won’t inherit quite as much.

I think in the future you then also need to explain to your younger children how you personally leaving so much more to their brother isn’t a sign that you love him more.

I am the son in your situation. Two brothers, one blood, the other not. All my grandparents from my mothers side totally embraced and treated us all equally. Been a blended family since we were 2,3 and 4. Two very small inheritances from my mothers side, shared between three. My brother will inherit close to a million soon from his mothers side (grandparent).

Totally accept the situation, it is what it is. I wouldn't say it is jealousy I feel. It's more about being told throughout our lives that we are all considered 'equal', to treat each other the same, share everything, we all 'get the same'....except this is all totally false and as I got older, I resented being told it. Yes it's life, life is unfair, I just hated being told all the time we were equal when we weren't (and as a kid having to share my precious hard earned stuff with someone I knew had 10x the amount at their 'other' house....but you know, always share because we are all 'equal').

If it really is just about balancing cash between them, leave everything to your son in your will on the basis the other two have been taken care of. The other two will accept because life is unfair, as your son has been told.

This is a really good point Ive copied here @iwanttoholdyourhand

Make sure you have a will that leaves things to DS25 now because if you die first he could be left with nothing like my DH.

MIL died first and DH has now been cut out of the blended family's lives. What makes it worse for me is they brought nothing to the table due to leaving it all to his ex wife and kids and he walked away with a house and all her money before breaking all ties with DH and BIL.

Any parent who has more children with a second partner runs the risk of situations such as this

It is a very naive view to think that everyone will be running around like the Brady Bunch with no issues whether it’s financial or emotional

”Me and DH will split our asses 3 ways between all 3 children.”

Unfortunate typo there @iwanttoholdyourhand

Your son has been hard done by as he was left out of his father’s will, that must hurt. And now he’s getting left out again, in a sense, though you can’t really blame your MIL. In your situation I’d absolute give him the rental property, and I’d probably also start putting away extra money for him.

Ultimately you’ve no idea who will die first and last out of MIL, you and your husband. Things could change.

I think some people are being incredibly harsh about your DS, I can totally understand why he's upset about it, I'd feel exactly the same and I bet most people would. It's a kick in the teeth to be part of a family for your entire life but you get left nothing and your two siblings become millionaires.

She can do what she wants with her money and he can feel resentment over it if he wants to. Most people would.

They could could be set up for life. It's tough for young adults.

But of he has a property he has a head start on most.

If things with ds’ father’s family had been different, would you have expected his paternal grandparents to name his half siblings in their will, because this is what you’re expecting your MIL to do?

Ah the blended family nightmare. As others have said, blended families are only blended until crunch time when it's a case of looking after your own.

I have a story where my DH lost everything through 'blended family politics'. I wont go into it too much as its outing but MIL's new partner got everything after her death as they had 'mirror wills' where the successor got everything and then on the survivors death it was split between DH and new partners kids.

Guess who was out of DH's life asap after her funeral....

I blame the MIL to some extent but cant help but feel she was 'guided' by her new partner as she had a life limiting illness.

Your DS is NBU at all to feel sore about this. Blended families are hard and they are particularly hard on the first children, especially when as in this case there has been a lot of trauma around the break up of the first relationship.

I am guessing that you and your DH will also inherit a significant amount? So DS will be the only family member whose financial situation will not be transformed? If so, that's really hard.

It is what it is and I think unfortunately you will just have to accept that this will inevitably impact the siblings' relationships. How could it not? It will have a huge impact on their lifestyles in so many ways, so it's not something that can just be brushed under the carpet.

It’s just one of the reasons I think blended families are a fool’s errand. The parents (usually mother) want to pretend the new family unit is lovely and embracing of the existing child but in reality it sets up inequality and it’s just a bad idea.

You can have relationships but do you have to have more children? I don’t think so.

It's open to the 11 and 13 year old to share their inheritance with their stepbrother, if they choose to, though I don't know if they'd have to be over 18.

We had a somewhat similar situation in my family and the biological grandchildren agreed that the terms of the will could be varied so that they and their stepbrother inherited equal amounts. (It wasn't anything like a £2m inheritance at stake in our situation but it was still a life changing amount of money).

I'm not saying the grandchildren should do this necessarily or feel obliged to, just that it's not solely the MIL here who has the power to create this situation.

The MN divide is interesting. All children must be treated equally but once they are am adult stuff them. This is why you shouldn't be letting or encouraging your children to view your new husband as a father figure or his parents as grandchildren. People seem to just sleepwalk into these situations without considering long term consequences. It absolutely great for children to have loads of caring adults around them but don't pretend they are family

I would ask DS25 what he would do in your shoes and what he thinks is fair. He might then see that you’re doing what you can. It sounds as though he is in a good situation.

I’m pretty sure people are free to feel whatever way they like about the above too. Whether I personally like it or not is irrelevant.

Do you feel the same way about ethnicity and race and belonging?

I think the MIL is the villain here.

So she's known this kid since he was 10ish, but she's rather give the "blood children" a million each than split it three ways so they all get 6 figures?

Yeah I know its her money she can do what she likes yadda yadda yadda but its pretty trashy

Yes, he’s an in law. A member of the family, but not a son or a grandchild. They aren’t all equal to her, no, given that two are her grandchildren and one isn’t.

So what if he isn’t biologically related? Biology doesn’t have to matter to you, but it does indeed matter to a lot of people, if not the majority. It’s fine if someone wants to consider their stepchild to be their child, but equally it’s fine if they don’t. You don’t get to demand that anyone else conforms to your preferences, regardless of whether it upsets you or not. That is entirely a you problem.

I agree that all children should be treated equitably day-to-day. So they all get the same dinner, all treated warmly, and all get some kind of present at Christmas (if they are there). This is totally different to distributing inheritance.

However the stepfather and especially the stepgrandmother does not have parental responsibility for the 25yo, because he is NOT their son/grandson!

I doubt he would be caring for them in their old age, or mourn their death when the time comes.

I would not expect a step grandmother to distribute anything, let alone equally, in her will.

It is all a bit grabby to be talking about it now. I have a half sibling who’s been in “our” family since he was 2. I also have a wealthy grandfather who is biologically mine but not blood related to my half sibling.

I expect we’ll all be treated the same in my grandfathers will, but I would be absolutely disgusted if he (or my full sibling) were asking about whether we’re written into the Will or not. I’ve got no idea if we will get anything or if it’ll go to parents and would not have the audacity to ask that because it’s not my money and it may well be all spent before by grandfather dies.

I think as a set of cousins, if my half sibling was left out entirely we would re-share it evenly between us. We would almost certainly do this as a set of siblings.

And my brother will probably inherit from his dad too, just not as much.

The time for this conversation is when you know how much there is to inherit and after MIL has died. Not trying to redistribute HER money while she’s still alive.

I have experience of family where there were not biological children and the treating differently is a shitty thing to do, causes untold grief and lasting damage well into adulthood. I couldn't do that to a child, I just couldn't. If there is more than enough money to go round, share it. What difference does it make, other than to make clear feelings that a particular individual isn't/wasn't viewed as having the same worth? I'd like to think the 2 'real' grandchildren will be big enough to not carry out the grandmother's wishes and share it, but given many of the comments on here, its probably wishful thinking.