Do 'blood relatives' Trump all when it comes to wills?

Do whatever you want with your own money. You'll be dead and unable to hear the greedy, entitled whingers anyway.

It's your money, do what you want with it. Waste it and go on holidays, eat at fancy places, buy new clothes, new car. Buy a house, sit on it, leave it to the pets!
It's no one else's business what you do with your money.

I'm sorting out something similar. Apart from a couple of bequests to family (no children) I'm leaving the bulk to those things that have brought me joy.

One of my friends is in this situation - no spouse, no kids of his own. His sibling and their spouse are expecting to get everything, even mentioning what they intend to do with various articles when they get hold of them. I can never get over the cheek of them... don't know why they think he'll go first, either!

I keep reminding him about writing his will to ensure that his estate goes where he wants it to, it's one of things that's hard to get around to. So @Inbetweenie993 make sure you do it asap - none of us are guaranteed a tomorrow, awful as it sounds to say.

I'd leave it to the people or institutions that you want to have it.

Definitely leave to the community. I am in the opposite situation, I wish my relative would leave the money to the community but it will go to my sibling. I have a strong moral objection to the way the money was earned, my sibling a supposed ‘socialist’ and ‘Christian’ does not and will benefit. People are so entitled and weird when it comes to money…. Me included. Do what YOU feel is best, no one else’s option should matter.

I agree that it is more of a moral imperative to keep it in the family when it came from family in the first place. For example, I inherited a share of my grandmother’s house. It was a lot of money and when I die, it’s only right that it goes to my nephews, who are her great-grandchildren. If I’d earned the money myself I’d be less bothered where it went.

Live your life spending it! Anything left over to community programmes that supported you in your later years as you are far from alone to have a disinterested family. Make sure you choose to live (rent or buy) somewhere where you have the back up that many get from their families, and clearly indicate your wishes in different scenarios including appointing representatives in case you lack capacity, regularly review this because I know of will holders, power of attorney appointees and executors who have closed their practices before the person needs their services!

I'm childless, My sibling and I Inherited similar amounts to OP from our mother. My DN will get whatever's left over but I don't feel under any pressure to leave them a sizeable inheritance. DN's parents are better off than we are, their house is worth twice as much and they've been saving for them since they were born.they won't need the money. Sibling has told us we are not to worry about leaving DN anything.

If it was hard earned money, then yes, I would appreciate the sentiment.
But the people who left it to the OP might not have particularly liked them, but it was the right thing to do to leave it to her
I’ve also seen what communities charities etc do with donations and honestly be better off wiping your arse with it for all the Good it’ll do in the world.
Usually it ends up lining the pockets indirectly of those in charge.

Why should someone you don't like, don't know, or haven't seen for many years get your money (that you have chosen to leave elsewhere) just because they happen to be related to you and do it by contesting your will? It's just a precaution in case they are grasping and entitled!

well phones go both ways. So unless you’ve also tried to keep in contact and they have then ignored you, you are as much to blame for no communication.

Especially with younger relatives where there is very much the adult / child interaction part even once grown up. The relationship tends to follow the path of from when they where little so if you were not overly involved in them that tends to be the pattern set.

Leave it wherever and to whoever you want however.

I wouldn’t leave it to charity at all if I was leaving anything to any other actual human being though because charities make life hell for those trying to settle and sort the will out. Because they are very set on getting their percentage rightly so but to the extremes that a family member cannot even have a coffee table without an official pricing because that’s a percentage of their entitlement.

Leave the money to the community if that’s what you want. I’m just in the process of getting a will and having a similar dilemma so it’s great to read the ideas.

Usually family does trump everything else, I would leave something to all my nieces and nephews, the relationship they have with you is probably more down to the relationship you have with your siblings than anything they have proactively decided upon.
Have you tried to see them? Organised a family get together ?
But of course your money to leave how you choose, 50% towards community and 50% split between nieces/nephews would be a compromise.
You don't say who your inheritance was from but it could be seen as family money and to pass the advantage you have been given onto the younger generation when the time comes.

I would leave a small nominal amount to each niece and nephew, to be clear you hadn't left them out and maybe peace of mind, it sends a message. You say your siblings are comfortably off so they will inherit from their parents eventually. I certainly wouldn't sit on it, enjoy your remaining years op and use the money to enjoy life and experience new things, I'm sure your darling sibling will be cheering you on.

Rather than this, which might come across as spiteful, you can leave each surviving blood relative the sum of £100, then everything else to where you actually want it to go. This demonstrates that you have properly considered your relatives and made an active choice of what to leave them.

Gosh, what an awful thing to do.

No wonder societies fucked

Id spend happily as much as you wanted , leave a donation to charity or community and leave rest to family

You have no obligation at all to leave money to relatives who don't bother with you. Don't dwell on this too much, live life to the full and don't worry about what will happen after you are gone. I think I would leave a lump sum for the care of my pets (done as a gift of £1000 to X charity on condition that they find a new "forever" home for (named pets) plus an amount of (£1500 per pet per year of expected reasonable remaining life) to be kept in trust to be used for the pet's ongoing care and medical needs. Then any remainder after that left to whichever community organisation is closest to your heart with a request that whatever they use it for should have a memorial plaque with your name and dates on it.

Get this written down, then forget about it and enjoy life. People who dwell on and regularly talk about what will happen to their money after they die tend not to be very healthy in their brain.

I'd definitely buy somewhere, small, manageable, somewhere you could live well into your later years.
Enjoy whats left, and do what a PP mentioned, leave it to a friend who would not expect it rather than family who have an expectation.

Spend it while you can and leave the rest to whoever you want. An aunt of mine died recently and left some to all her nieces and nephews (we are all lovely!) but more to those she saw regularly. Honestly I would not leave to blood relatives you don’t like or see regularly. What about the cats/dogs home. Other local charity? A bequest to a friend or neighbour who agrees to take your pet on.

I would leave it to a friend or work colleague who would not expect it at all but would be a huge fab surprise.

I'd only give money to people when I die, that I'd be happy to give to whilst alive. Sounds like right now you'd choose your community.

Yeah I just don’t think families should look only look after people they like, or only pass on an inheritance to someone who they approve of. Unless there is a clear risk of an inheritance being misused (eg by someone with a gambling addiction), my view is that family assets should be fairly distributed to the next generation.