If you are a second wife, do you expect to inherit everything from your husband?

[rickyrickygrimes]

… or do you expect him to leave something to his children from a previous marriage?

This subject comes up often on here: man is widowed, inherits everything from his wife, remarries, then dies - leaving everything to his second wife and his children inherit nothing.

this happened quite recently to a friend of mine, which not only did not inherit but also lost his livelihood as he was employed in his fathers business, which his second wife chose to sell as she wasn’t interested in running it.

I’m in France where (as I understand it) children cannot be completely disinherited from a will i.e. part of the estate is always reserved for children and the spouse does not inherit everything. This leads to some very complicated situations but does mean that all children will inherit something from their parents, no matter what the relationship between the parents / children is like.

we often hear from the children on here but not often the pov of the second wife. So I’m interested to know what you think? Do you expect to inherit everything from your husband (which is pretty standard between married couples in the UK)? Or would you expect his children from previous relationships to be included / recognised in his will - especially if he has previously inherited from their mother?

Well that’s a lot clearer then – you said in your earlier post that you both had contributed together to assets / savings since

”everything we have, we have collected together”

so wasn’t clear that he has contributed nothing whatsoever

👍

Why should that affect the children of the marriage?

Why should that affect the children of the marriage?

Because in the case of divorce there has already been a division of assets and the mother is (like the father) free to divide her half as she likes. If the mother died (like my granny) and then the father remarries, all the late mother’s assets are now assets of the new marriage meaning it becomes possible to completely disinherit the children of the first marriage.

Why is it only second wives?

it’s also perfectly possible for mums to disinherit by leaving everything to their second husbands.

it’s one of dh’s concerns, as he had to walk away with almost nothing. I think he got 10k as his “share” of a 400k house, as court deemed that was all she could afford to remortgage for. He paid the mortgage for 18 years, put up the deposit etc.

so from his point of view all his assets up to age 40 that he would leave his children are in that house. Since he left he has not accumulated anything, between rent and bills, plus CMS and child related expenses he had no spare cash.

he has no idea what she has done with her will and it upsets him to think that everything he worked for for half his life could go to the man she had an affair with rather than his children. If he then doesn’t do a will, or chooses, it could all go to the OM’s children.

She just tries to change the conversation or says oh we don't need one. In her eyes it would be admitting that she is getting older (she avoids any talk of age) which is ridicules. DH & I made wills when we were in out 30's

This👏

Interestingly I'm chasing an inheritance from my father who remarried after my mum died, he died and left everything to his wife but the house is still half in my mums name and as he is in another country which has forced heirship we are entitled to some of her share (his English will over rides the forced heirship on his share i believe) he completely dropped his kids as soon as he remarried and he wasn't a nice person but I'm so annoyed that he benefitted hugely when my mum died (paid off the mortgage) and she would be gutted to know we won't get anything/much. Which is just a lesson to write a will really

Why is it only second wives?

Because step mums are evil and don't deserve to benefit from the lives they built with their husbands in their old age I expect.

What a nasty thing to say.

Listen love, step mums are wonderful people, taking on someone else's children.

Lol. I'm a step mum myself. I was being sarcastic. As a regular on the step mum board we get regular influxes of non step mums coming in to tell us just that.

This is what's usually known as sarcasm.

This happened to an acquaintance recently. But without a will.

She insisted everything was split between her and the DC equally.

The same here; it does seem the most just way.
Also to consider, if someone remarries, the second wife often has caring responsibilities, leaving adult free from such things.....why then should she be expected to leave her home on his death?

@Teenagehorrorbag

Because my stake in the house is 5/6 and my savings/inheritance is 7x that of DH.

That is a fairly attractive package.

I would like to think that if he takes up with a new partner that they are interested in HIM and what HE has to offer and not MY money and what is rightfully due to my children.

The whole point is to deter people with the wrong motives and to provide protection.

When my mother died I very quickly had to adapt to a swarm of women around my father and it was horrific - one started to dictate when I would be able to visit my family home, and when I would be able to speak to my father. It was utterly traumatising. (Thankfully she has since been dumped).

I never want my children to ever go through pain like that. My DH is a big boy; he will have a life insurance payout and has his own money - he won’t be living in a small flat. And his partner won’t be living like a leech off me and treating my kids like crap.

My friend has two children with her ex-husband. He had two from a previous marriage. He now has a step-child from his current wife's first marriage.

He has told all of his natural children, his current wife will inherit his house (bought before his current marriage but after his divorces) the contents and half of any other monies. On her death that will pass to her daughter. The other half of any monies will be divided between his 4 children from his first 2 marriages. The house is currently worth approx £500,000 and he has £22,000 in savings.

My friend is really angry but as the 4 'children' are all adults (25-36 yrs)and unsupported by him financially now, has been told he can do that if he wishes.

There are lots of 'what if x happens' during the rest of his life, of course, but it seems unfair. The step-child is also an adult, but younger than the other 4. He has only been married for 4 years to her mother. Currently, SC stands to inherit over £500,000 and the other 4 , £11,000 between them.

Do the 4 children stand to inherit a house from their mums though? Especially if he paid for the house during that marriage- it sounds like he earns well if he can afford a 500k house after 2 divorces.

if his stepchild has a dad with no assets he may feel it fair that they inherit what will be the estate from that marriage.

My ex told me when he married that he hsd taken out a life term insurance policy with our DS as beneficiary so if he died before DS was 21, DS would get money from the insurance policy. Everything he owned would be going to new wife and any kids they had together - they've had two.

He told me like he was father of the year, but i think it's is going to be very hurtful for our DS when he discovers his Dad left him nothing in his will.

But he’s not leaving him ‘nothing’. He’s taken out an insurance policy (and paid for it) so that your DS will be properly provided for without having to sell the family home to do so.

Maybe encouraging him to see this negatively is not helpful to anyone. It’s not somehow excluding him. It’s actually diverting a regular sum of money that could otherwise have gone into your ex’s household to paying for an insurance policy to ensure that, first and foremost, your DS gets a large sum of money if his father dies.

I’d assume his half siblings are not getting the same. Their mother will get all the marital assets in his will (with the expectation that she is continuing to provide for them) and their half brother gets an individual lump sum. But no one is wailing about how unfair this is for them (because it’s not).

There is definitely ‘second family’ maths going on here. Children of the first marriage; inheritance covered by mother. Children of the second marriage, inherit from mother and father.

Pointing out the maths gets you called grabby, entitled etc etc but that is just ‘second family’ morality where what’s good enough for the first family children isn’t good enough for the second. I generalise - I know there are exceptions including one poster on here but I haven’t encountered these families in my real life. Drivers of all this are second wife often being younger, arrangements put in place to protect a child from the second marriage that remain way after that child is an adult, confusion of maintenance with inheritance, resentment at having had to contribute to the ex wife’s house and/or pay maintenance, the break down of relationships with family one often due to age, the relationship with the ex… add in fear of making wills and ignorance of the fact that none of this need make the second wife homeless, and it’s a mess.

… I should add that I say ‘wife’ as that is what I have known. Yes, there will be exceptions however, the examples I know are age gap relationships where the woman is younger and still able to have a child.

I was a second wife
Now a widow
Two stepchildren
Two from our marriage
Everything left to me
I will leave 40% to step children
60% to our children

The reason for the sc having slightly less, they will inherit from their mother

This assuming neither she but he have to pay for care.

As a second wife I object to being called grabby.

Typo should read

Neither she nor me

The DS only benefits up to age 21: presumably the step siblings will stay in the will and potentially inherit long beyond this age. That’s going to hurt.

Tbh I think if dh and I ever divorce the first thing I’d do is take out a life insurance policy to pay out to the kids should something happening.

in fact I don’t know why it isn’t advised or even included in financial settlements if the kids are under 18. I have one for both of us at the minute, costs £300/year and pays out £200k if one of us dies.

something should be in place in lieu of CMS/inheritance IMO