Inheritance with grandchildren and step grandchildren

DM showed a great presence of mind; I think she’s had the measure of the sister. Greedy, demanding and rude.

Dsis is well out of order. Absolutely no excuse trying to recruit other family members into this.

Sorry, forgot to add, if the ungrateful bastards are already kicking up fuss (through your sister) along the lines of 'not enough' - then she should change her will and leave those step-grandchildren fuck-all. What is the point of leaving them even £2.50, if they are going to be 'not enough' ungrateful anyway?

P.S. There is not even such a thing as a 'step-grandchild'. It does not exist.

Your mother is right both because it is her fucking money and she should do whatever she wants with it, and also because she owes nothing to randos. Apologies, if the biological families of those step-children are going to leave a lot of money, and have made it clear, and have made provisions for that, to those grandchildren who are biologically related to your grandmother - in that case, equal amounts for everyone would be fair.

I was just thinking that this would be the best thing. They now get nothing because of their SMs ridiculously childish behaviour.

Nothing is stopping your sister making up any shortfall out of her own pocket

I think you sound very measured.

I wonder if DSis husband's parents have said they will be splitting their inheritance to steps and bio evenly? And that might be the pressure?

OP you asked whether you are being unreasonable and whether your mum is being unreasonable. You don't really think either of you are being unreasonable and won't hear otherwise. You hide a bit behind the 'I don't want to get involved', 'it's not up to me', 'my brother says', 'my brother feels'. Maybe you should try being honest with your sister about how you actually feel. It's not just that you don't want to get involved. You actually don't think your mother is being unreasonable. You don't think of her stepchildren as her children, you don't think your mother is unfair and that is why you are not prepared to say you do.

It's a shame your sister didn't send a message to her niece with regard to A levels if this is something she would have done under normal cirumstances. I don't see why your sister should have got in touch with you and your bother over you sending a gift to her 18 yo child though.

Ideally your mum should’ve split her estate equally between her 3 children. This way your sister could split her share of her inheritance between her bio and step children (but now I’m thinking her husband is stirring the pot and being grabby)
I’m not sure I agree with skipping a generation and passing things on straight to grandchildren, esp if one sibling has more children than the others.

OP - you mentioned that your sisters step children only spent one weekend a month and holidays with them - this doesn’t strike me as a close blended family. So why is your sister pushing for these children who they only saw approx 12 weekends a year to be treated the same as her own children? Also will her own children inherit from her husbands side of the family? (From what I’ve understood your sisters husband is stepfather to her kids)

The sister brought the complication on herself by getting into a blended family situation. This is the crux of the issue on all these threads; one person does something and just expects (demands in many cases) the rest of the family treat them the same. No conversation is ever had with wider family upfront to see how they feel.

This is a mad, obscure comment. I have no clue what OP should do or have done differently. Even if she thinks carefully and calmly, about your 3 points.

I think you’ve made a massive mistake telling the children they are due to inherit. They sound like they are just coming into young adulthood and I don’t think need to be thinking there is a sum coming that will bail them out (different of course if it was imminent).

I think this highlights the challenges of skipping a generation. Family dynamics are much more likely to be a bit more complicated, uneven numbers of kids mean you either give more to some families or some kids get more (I think you can argue both cuts are fair but inevitably someone loses out). In your sister’s case she obviously sees her step kids as being equal to her other two kids. That can be a massive blow if the family don’t see it the same. She also then has to deal with them having differential lump sums coming their way and deciding whether to try and persuade her biological kids to equalise or not. Either way your mum has given your sister a complication to deal with.

The difference between an equal split of 9 and something of 7 plus a token will likely be significant but I’m not sure it’s worth the consequence of a family feud. say the estate is £700k - a split between 9 would be £77.7k each versus say £20k for each step child plus equal split of the remainder (roughly £94k for the biological kids). It obviously depends on the estate and the planned legacy for the step kids but they could all be getting a sizeable chunk regardless of how it is split.

I haven’t RTFT but have read all of @DogsInThePaddlingPool posts and some responses.

I think I’m in the minority here as I think what the Grandmaother has done is perfectly fine - maybe because it’s her money to do with as she chooses.
What is wrong with leaving your estate to your blood relatives??
@DogsInThePaddlingPool your sister chooses to accept her step children as her own -that’s her choice. Your mum -who hasn’t got a blood connection and has seen them maybe a couple of hours a month - does not have to accept them as her own grandchildren. And let’s face it - They aren’t!!
Your sister is a fool. Imagine falling out with her own family over this. I suspect her husband maybe dripping poison in her ear. I hope his parents leave your sisters kids equally in their will -or will they too favour their biological grandchildren?

My stepfathers mum didn’t leave me a penny - I had no expectations either that she should until I read this thread. It has never occurred to me! Why would I? She wasn’t my granny!
Your sister is greedy. She chose to marry a man with children - her choice.
What your mum does with her money is her choice and I really really hope she does not get bullied into changing her will.
I Love the ‘Noted’. She sounds great.

My friend is the step child in a situation identical to this. She has money likely coming from her other set of grandparents so it wasn't so much the financial side, and she could see the logic, but it did sting.
I think she tried to think of it as a purely financial decision considering her "extra" set of grandparents, but I think she always wondered if her situation had really been taken into account or was she really just getting less because she was viewed as less deserving being a non-blood relative.

This makes the most sense. Having been in a blended family and absolutely hated it, trying to make everything equal becomes a constant. My ex-partners son is her mothers only child, she will inherit all of her estate, 1/3 of her grandparents estate, more possibly from her Dad's side. The idea she then needed a cut in mine or my parents money caused so many rows.

Don't be ridiculous, double holidays in no way make up for having divorced parents and split homes. Lots of stepchildren aren't even taken on all the family holidays. It's shit being a stepchild, still doesn't mean you're entitled to inherit from anyone.

I can’t see that your Mum has done much wrong here… If hypothetically your sister had 20 step kids such that the amount going to your mum’s biological grandkids had dwindled to nearly 0, I could well see that there would be resentment from the biological grandkids.

Equally if step kids were already millionaires from their side of the family, would DSis feel they should share with her biological kids? I bet the step kids wouldn’t!

My Grandmother is deliberately only giving to her own children, not her grandchildren, as one of her own kids had many more children than the other. I can totally see the fairness in this, as otherwise the child with only 1 child would inherit far less in their branch of the family tree. If your mum doesn’t trust what would happen to it if she did that though, which it sounds like she doesn’t, I think her way is pretty fair really.

If you make any or all of your children executors of your will, instead of using solicitors, you save massive solicitors fees and lengthy waits for probate etc to be granted. However, if you do this it will be easier for everyone if each executor is given a copy of the will alongside lodging the original with the solicitors. My mum did this for me and my siblings, one was my step brother. We were all joint executors but as we lived in different parts of the country we agreed that one sibling with the best financial knowledge and experience and who was willing, could sort the will with our written permission. We all received photo copies of documents and all received our inheritance which included a house sale within 4 months. But we all knew the contents of the will beforehand and all totally agreed that it was entirely my mother's decision how she had chosen to distribute her money and property.

It’s her money to control. The trouble has been caused by the sister, who thinks she’s the one entitled to control it.

It isn’t malicious to want your own family to be the ones benefiting from your wealth. As it is, the mother didn’t change her will to exclude the stepchildren, she changed it because her children are already comfortable and she wants the younger generation to benefit. Why would it even have occurred to her to treat her stepchildren as her grandchildren when they’re not?

That’s very true, but if someone can’t treat the children of your family equally you are also at liberty to cut contact like OPs sister. I wouldn’t want my DSD around people who would “other” her for not sharing my DNA and neither would her Dad. Luckily we don’t have this on either side as both my family and her stepdads family aren’t like this!

Out of interest how old is your Mum? Is this inheritance likely to be any time soon?

Not in an inheritance conversation they don’t? How exactly was I suppose to inherit from my paternal grandparents who died 13 and 5 years before I was conceived? I had two biological grandparents at the time of my birth.

They each have two they’re responsible for.

Such things as financial disparity between children is extremely common in blended families, and is indeed the breaks.

If OP’s sister chooses to pour her resources into her husband’s children over her own then she would fully deserve her children having little or nothing to do with her.

It's not entitled for someone to want their family to treat their children equally though is it? If your sister treats them all equally, then the rest of you should too, it really is that simple. It's not up to anyone else in the family to determine their 'worth'.

Your mum disagrees, so has written her will specifically to block her from being able to treat her children as equals.