Leaving house to one child and not the other?

Your children won't speak to each other for the rest of their lives

Technically unfair but if my parents decided to leave everything to my sibling and nothing to me, I would be fine with it as my sibling has had a harder life than me and isn't able to afford their own property easily whereas I don't need any help.

I think it’s a horrible thing to do.

After my mum died my dad had changed his will and left everything to my brother. With the house and savings it's a lot of money. It's his money and he can do what he wants with it. Myself and my sisters are ok financially but it does hurt that he thinks so little of us.

In this situation where the parent is so wildly unfair I always hope that the sibling who inherited would do the moral thing and share 50/50. I would without a doubt.

My dad is doing the same. The house if not used for his care will goto my sister as she was primary live in carer for mum for years and is now helping him. I have no problem with this. We are very grateful for what she did for mum and she also lost income as she gave up work when mum declined in Covid as she didn’t want her to go in a home. Stopping work has an impact long into the future and doesn’t just cost her the immediate loss of income.

Otherwise, I think things should be equal and take account gifts help given prior aiming one got a huge house deposit and the other didn’t this should be reflected in the Will.

Balancing things out because one is doing better than the other is not fair as that may be penalising one who worked harder/ sacrificed more etc. If one child has had a very bad hand in life that would be different.

I don’t think this situation sounds fair and is going to cause pain between the siblings.

So mums house is left to my brother's none for me. She had some money that she gave me as my inheritance (a small bit more than my share of house) my brothers have autism and its a way to make sure they have some where to live. Everything else is split equally. I bought a house so I dont really need mums.

Always children should be treated equally in life and death. It shouldn’t be dependent on anything. It is not for a parent to even things up. I would still leave my children the same amount each even if one had stopped talking to me.

My DM, before her death, strongly hinted She would leave more to my sister on the grounds" I worry about her more". This is sister who retired early, declined to rent out a property she could have had a great passive income from, and maintains expensive hobbies. When mum started, I pointed out how incredibly hurtful it was to play favourites in this way and that my sister had already been given massive amounts, whereas I had had nothing.

Then mum got ill, had a difficult last few years of life, and guess where favourite daughter was? Yep, nowhere to be seen. Sitting with mum while she asked why my sister was not there was awful.

DF is so angry he doesn't want to leave anything to DSister. I have advised him just to split things as I don't want the hassle after he's gone. He's helping me more now to balance things up, but in general, I think children should get equal amounts, unless of disabilities and or something like a farm

It doesn’t sound fair on the face of things. Are they both biological children (maybe they’re not and don’t know it)?

Perhaps the person living close by is doing the lions share of care giving/companionship and that's another hreason.

No it is not fair, it’s just bad parenting

Why won’t the child inheriting potential inherit from their partners family too?!

The norm is equal but leaving a child out is more common than you would
think.

Reasons usually estrangement often after divorce so a child takes other parents side/ theft by adult child/ one child massively financially successful and other isn’t.

Not fair. Yes it is the gift of someone, but honestly you must hate both your children to gift significantly to one and not the other - imagine your parting message to one of your children being that you do not love them enough to leave any provision for them after your death, but sibling can take all.

As a side note, the beneficiary could always vary the will post-death to even things out. I could never in good conscience take if my sister had been left out.

I’m sure there are situations where it is Ok but most of the time it isn’t. My mum revealed that she was leaving her house to a sibling and invented a reason why I didn’t deserve it. I was always the least favourite child so it was painful but not surprising. The funny thing is I’m quite comfortable and the sibling isn’t. If she’d just said that the sibling needs it more I’d have accepted it. But it just became another way I felt my mum had emotionally abused me. I am no contact with her now

Oh hang on….do the parents really dislike/distrust the partner and not want half their estate to potentially fall in to their hands should the DC and partner split?
That I could sort of understand.

Then the parent doing this is, frankly, stupid. And unthinkingly cruel.

Just because that child has a partner who MAY inherit, it is no guarantee that they will. The partner's parents may need a great deal of care and there is no inheritance. Or the child and their partner may split. Or the partner could die and the partner's parents decide not to leave it to their deceased child's partner. Or the partner could fall out with their parents and be written out of the will.

If I can think of all these ways to not inherit, why can't they? Stupid. Cruel.

And don't get me started on the wedge it will drive between their two children. Stupid. Cruel.

I disagree that it is always fair to treat children the same.

This scenario happened exactly to someone I know. Her father said that as the daughters had married, then their husbands would be providing for them. The father left the house, business and all the assets to the sons. This caused a massive amount of hurt and a family rift that has not healed.

Oh wait.

This was in 1983 and the person was my grandmother. Her father, who was born in the 1890s and fought in the First World War, constructed his will in this way. A true Victorian gentleman. But it wasn’t acceptable in 1983 and it certainly isn’t acceptable in 2026.

The only situation I have known where this happened there were 3 siblings, sibling one had a fairly normal life, small business owner etc, the second had a very chaotic life, drugs, alcohol, prison etc, parents had paid for rehab a number of times had set them up in their own rented accommodation a number of times, paid off fines and debts etc, the third child was profoundly disabled. In that circumstance child one was left the family home solely, on the basis the third child lived there too and was cared for at home (with paid carers paid for by the estate, there was some kind of trust set up for the third child) they didn't give more money to the more problematic child as they'd had more than their inheritance over the years already and they worried he'd end up dead with a large sum of money. I think that's quite an exceptional circumstance though and it had been agreed with the first child before the wills were written.

I hate wills that pit siblings against each other.

There are some exceptional circumstances where I understand it - i.e. a child that cannot live independently for any reason may need money for ongoing care. Or maybe a child has had a large loan from the parents that the will takes into account, so that overall the money has been split fairly but the will in isolation may look unfair. Or when one child lived with the parent, and financially contributed to the running and upkeep of the house (although this example can also be fraught with opinions).

But otherwise, wills should be an equal split.

Well is the other child being left something else? Of similar value? It doesn’t matter that the other child’s partner may inherit. What if they e split up by then? What if the one inheriting the house gets a partner who is well off?
The only fair way is to split the estate 50/50 and not second guess ifs and maybes as things can change.

I think its an arsehole move but people are entitled to do what they want with their will.

There must be some ill feeling. Maybe your friend just doesn't want to admit to something that would cause their parent to leave them out of the will.