My children’s unequal futures

I am in this exact position. I’ve married a man set to inherit many millions.

When my mum came to write her will she split everything 50/50 between myself & my sibling. This was at my siblings behest as she was going to leave it all to them & nothing for me.

I would have been angry that my Mum would have made assumptions about my future. She herself was divorced and left destitute.

When the time comes I will give all of my inheritance to my sibling, assuming I’m still with my husband and don’t need it. I’d also happily help her out financially in other ways.

Would your DD be there for your DS in that way? Maybe DS will become a millionaire of his own back? My FIL become a millionaire in his 60s. Maybe DS will marry a millionaire himself.

OP you are ignoring many many responses. I feel very sorry for your daughter. If you go through with encouraging her to be disinherited then you should be ashamed of yourself.

Inheritances received before marriage are not matrimonial assets - she has no claim on her boyfriend’s family inheritance, especially given that no one has died yet. You have no idea what the future will bring and I think it’s pretty disgusting that you are effectively encouraging her to be dependent on a man.

YABU and if I was your daughters partner and got wind of this I'd be rethinking the whole marriage side of things. His future mother-in-law basing her mothers, hers and her sons finances on HIS parents money (that they haven't even left yet) is beyond distasteful.

divide equally regardless of what future you think they'll have. Too manipulative.

Did you tell your daughter when she was still at school that if she chose a low paid passion career it would eventually be subsidised by inheritance?

Dh’s mum is quite well off. Dh’s sister is well off, her and her dh retired in their 40s on bigger pensions than our wages. They live in a massive six bed detached house, have multiple rental properties.

me and dh live in a 3 bed semi and while we are ok we will be working till state pension age.

id expect my mil to leave stuff equally between dh and his sister. It wouldn’t feel right for his sister to be disinherited. Never crossed my mind that some people may do this.

Yes, the attitude of your first paragraph is very evident. It sounds very much like you admire and support your son's choices on an ideological level and want to insulate him from the attendant consequences of this 'noble' choice.

I won't go so far as to say you seem to have a very different attitude towards your daughter and her choices because you haven't entirely spelled that out, but I do wonder what story your daughter would tell the posters here, if asked. I fear there is a touch of your son being the 'Golden Child' here...

You need to reflect on why you dislike your daughter so much.

Op it’s an inheritance! Of course it equates love! It is the last legacy their grandmother/parents will ever leave for them.

It is not your job to ‘equalise’ their lives, they are not eight years old and you are dishing out sweets. You need to learn to truly respect their differences including their financial outcomes. You are inadvertently trying to level the playing field, and by doing so you are telling your son he is not good enough and needs help. Think about it.

I also sense your son is very much the favourite here, and your lasting legacy to your children will be to cause division and discord and for all the generations that follow, what a dreadful ‘gift’ to pass to them. Truly toxic.

You are so naive. Your poor daughter.

She prob means her partners parents are gonna die.

I don't think people work jobs they hate just because they want to be rich- sometimes it is the only choice to pay the bills.

If you can be bothered to read my overly long post above you'll see that's what I'm doing right now.

Maybe if I had been given a wad of cash like some of my siblings I could have worked part time/ been a housewife and spend a few hours a week " working on my passion".

Same I don't understand why your brother needs so much help.

You haven't explained this.

"About to get engaged" to someone with money. Assuming all of that goes to plan, it still doesn't guarantee that she will profit from it; there are many threads here with stories of women left borderline penniless after their relationships have abruptly ended.

Honestly, if my mum were asking me such things about inheritance, I'd say that whatever it is she feels is appropriate to leave to my child/ren, I'd want it done equally so it isn't a cause of strife later on.

I wouldn't want it left to myself to then leave to the children, because if I knew I would be leaving it to them, it should just go directly to them. Also it means I wouldn't be 'involved' in any feelings which might arise.

Your children won't have equal circumstances because they've made different choices.

You subsidising your son's choices but not your daughter's means that he alone has had the luxury of making his choices without their natural consequences.

If you choose to finacially favour your son over your daughter and find yourself standing down the line in a mess of your own making (because your children have fallen out, your relationship with your daughter is damaged or because your daughter suddenly needs help and you have no resources left to offer her) please at least refrain from wringing your hands saying, "but I was only doing my best - how could I have known?!"

Posters here have spelled out to you the very foreseeable issues and you will now be making this choice with your eyes wide open.

Yeah, it kind of sounds like you dislike your daughter. You are being completely disingenuous to pretend that giving one child something and not the other wouldn’t be upsetting for them, under the wide eyed guise of how it apparently wouldn’t upset you.
I feel sad for your daughter.

This is the same for us. It has hugely affected our relationship with the sibling to such an extent that we only see them at family events and are unlikely to have any relationship with them after the parents have passed.

Unequal treatment has destroyed our sibling relationship. The parents are still alive and would be mortified if they knew, but what can we say? It is their money and they're choosing to support just one of their children.

unfortunately sooner rather than later

Why? Why arent you overjoyed that your daughter will have a fantastic life?

My DC won’t be equal in life. DD is marrying an only child of wealthy parents, they’re both in a professional jobs. DS married a one of three to a single parent on benefits. DS however has great earning potential and DIL a good job with government pension. Who knows what the future will hold, I want more than anything for my DC to stay friends and love each other. I won’t cause a rift, both will get equal, whatever that means.

I don’t need any inheritance from my DM when the time comes, but she has split it equally despite me being the only carer for her and my first brother. I’m ok with that. Even though brother 2 lives away and IMO gets the easy ride and is asset rich but cash poor.

nothing is ever equal, but you need to treat your DC the same.

You sound like my mum!
Lots of handwringing over my Goldenballed brother. Your poor DD.
The 20s is nothing, Goldenballs (GB)and his GF were paying higher rate tax in their 20s living a lush lifestyle, my mum adored their extravagance, DH & I were in poor pay sectors.
My mum was an utter pain at our frugal wedding, she thought my in-laws were wealthy (they weren't they had a detached house in a poor area) so no contribution because she'd helped GB with a house deposit.
We have the best candid picture of GB & girlfriend pissed off at each other and they split a year later.
GB pissed away his equity then cocklodged for the next 20 years.
Of course now with his poor mental health and his ket habit he got another deposit and gets trickle charged regular amounts.
I hope your DD shakes off the guilt and the obligation towards you sooner rather than later. My mum wraps her hand outs in this faux' mother's love' bollocks like we can't see through the wrapping paper.

Your mum should split the money in four ways - her two children and her two grandchildren. Everyone gets an equal amount. If you don’t want the money then it could be split three ways.

Surely it should be split fairly? Your daughter isn’t entitled to her future fiancé / husbands money and she (and you) can’t rely on that as her future.

There’s so many posts on here where women don’t have ‘their own money’ so when a divorce happens or whatever the issue is, they are stuck high and dry. And there’s so many posts where inheritances have caused issue and so many posts where siblings have been treated differently and it’s caused issues and resentment.

Your daughter should be seen as a person in her own right and you never know she may end up needing the money far more.

This