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?

@brumbles I used the term ‘grabby’ but not in relation to either you or second wives? I said that first family children questioning inheritance get called grabby?

You are the antithesis of grabby as your ratios based on entire estate favour your step children over your shared children. I guess your shared children may object to that, but you know your family history and dynamics.

My parents are both remarried. No idea on Mum/Step-Dads will. My Dad and Step-Mum have mirror wills. I have no idea what is in it and that's ok. They built their wealth together and have been together for 35 plus years so it will be up to the surviving spouse how they spend it.

What would you say is a fairer % ?

Always open to suggestions and change.

The usual accepted split in these situations is dad leaves his share equally between all his children, mum does the same.

so if you consider all your assets shared, the parental split is 50:50.

if dad has 4 kids, 2 of which are joint, his 50% gets split equally between the 4. Mum only has the joint kids, so her share is 50:50.

this means out of the total estate, joint children get 3/8 each, step children get 1/8. So 25% to step kids, 75% to joint children. The stepchildren will presumably then inherit at least 50% of their mums estate which will equalise.

dh will do this, all his assets will split between his 4 kids. Mine will split between my 2. However as the house and my savings are pre-marriage, my kids will get that, dh’s will get a share of anything he has accumulated.

Each ex-wife was left quite badly off and each owns a house worth £150,000 and about £220,000, both still paying mortgages (as is he, but his house has increased more in value than theirs). The first ex-wife has another child (19/20yrs) who has some special needs (ASD) and will always find life difficult so I don't know if she might leave him more but her house is worth £150,000. My friend, the 2nd ex-wife, has a house worth about £220,000 with a lifetime mortgage for 1/3rd of that so that will always have to be paid off.
The SC from the third wife is an only child and will inherit from her own father too- who is quite wealthy I understand and has no other children and she is close to him.

It's definitely a very unequal situation but it's his money. He has said he is not prepared to put any limitations on what his current wife chooses to do with the inheritance and she has decided it is for her DD.

He has always paid the set maintenance for the older 4.

It’s really complicated isn’t it? My parents divorced 30 years ago.

My mother has been with her partner for 27 years. They have one child together, my 2nd sister. My mother had two children, me & my first sister, with her first & only husband. My Mum told me that she & her partner have made wills. If they both pass before they need care, half the house will go to my 2nd sister, the other half will go to myself & my 1st sister, so 25% each. I think that’s fair, & at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter what I think as it’s not my money! I would rather my Mum spend the money herself as she has had a tough life & very little in financial terms other than her home.

I am not counting on any inheritance as nobody in my family thus far has ever inherited anything, as they didn’t own their homes. Additionally, it’s highly likely that my Mum or her partner may need care in the future, as both have had health problems, so I am certainly not banking on inheriting anything.

As far as my Father is concerned, my 1st sister & I are his only children. However, I don’t expect to inherit anything from him. His partner has never wanted anything to do with my 1st sister & I, & my father has gone along with this. Also, his partner has lent him significant sums of money over the years so I imagine she will be left his half of their home. My Fathers partner has no contact with her own children having abandoned them very early on in their lives. His partner has also inherited from her own parents, as an only child. I have no idea where that money will go but I am certain she will sooner leave it to a charity or stranger than allow my first sister & I to have anything. If, by some strange twist of fate, we were left anything, I would give some of the money to my 2nd sister, as she has no family on her Father’s side.

Where step-families are concerned it’s really complicated. As I said above, inheritance hasn’t really applied in my family up until now so it’s not something I’ve given much thought to. I think it very much depends on the partners of your parents, their attitude towards towards their step children, & your parents attitude towards their own children.

I see so many threads about inheritance & how so many people perceive it as a ‘given’ & are then very disappointed when something goes wrong. From what I’ve read, it seems the biological children are often the ones that lose out the most when new partners/husbands/wives are thrown into the mix. I think inheritance is a source of so much upset, it needs to be very carefully thought out & ideally discussed before death, where possible of course, to prevent any surprises.

As second wife I expect to keep family home (bought after the divorce)
and
In terms of the rest of funds left over it all depends on the will .

( Stepkids are not always grateful for what they get. )

I was at a family dinner where my sister in law’s father was introducing his fiancé to my sister in law.The fiancé was a twice widowed woman, who, having inherited from both husbands was now very wealthy with a sumptuous house. My sister in law and her father are also well off, but not flashily so.
This was the first meeting of the fiancé and her soon to be step-daughter. The fiancé chose this occasion to lecture her soon to be step-daughter on how she shouldn’t expect any inheritance from her father. She said that expecting an inheritance from a parent is grabby and entitled. All this said whilst the father smiled approvingly. I was astounded by the hypocrisy of a woman who has twice benefited from inheriting to lecture someone about the morality of expecting an inheritance. Especially that this conversation should happen at their first meeting, and that it happened in front of me, since I’m distantly family to my sister in law’s father.
My sister in law stayed polite, so I kept my mouth shut too.

Anybody would think she diligently made a profession of it!

Facking hell. Sounds like SIL’s father should be watching his back.

This actually sounds incredibly unpleasant and hurtful. What a torrid woman.

I think I would have agreed everything and then sat down with a solicitor and my future spouse to ensure that everything reflected our jointly agreed intentions. No agreement = no marriage. Every couple must do what is right for them, so there are no hard and fast rules.

I'm not in this situation, but I don't understand why adult children should expect to inherit anything, regardless of the number of spouses. They are adults and therefore no longer their parents' responsibility (barring learning difficulties, special needs etc). If a parent wants to leave every single penny to a cat charity, then it's absolutely their right and privilege to do so - and I say that as someone who hates cats! We should all be (and are) free to bequeath our money wherever and to whoever we like.

DF remarried after DM died (sibling and I inherited nothing on DMs death). He remarried and moved to France. New wife has no family apart from her cousin’s child. DF died and his wife has got EVERYTHING. She SAYS that she has written a will leaving her estate half to her cousin’s child, and a quarter each to me and sibling. Of course as she is not blood related to us we will have to pay huge French inheritance tax IF she actually leaves us anything. (We have no proof of this and no legal rights when she does die). She has benefitted financially from the death of my mother who inherited well from her own parents. It seems pretty easy to get around the French law of not disinheriting children when they are not French citizens and the property and money is in joint names.
I have no respect for anyone who decides not to leave even part of their estate to their children or grandchildren.

I'm dying and I hope my DH will marry again as he is still young. However, I would be absolutely gutted if he remarried and disinherited our children in favour of his second wife. Surely you must understand that?

I’m really sorry you’re in this situation, but in the average flow of things, you would have inherited pretty much everything on his death, and you would then have left everything to the kids on your death.

I don’t see why a second wife would be different?

My dad remarried and left a third to his wife, a third to my brother and a third to me. He hadn’t been married long and she had her own house in her own name so it wasn’t like we took her home.

it seemed a fair way of doing things.

My FIL got remarried at 70, about 8 years after DH’s Mum died. Before he got remarried he sold his house and split the proceeds between DH & his brother. (he was moving to another country and o it wanted to rent there).

FIL encouraged his wife to do the same for her children. This way the children have already received their inheritance and no-one is expecting anything when one of them dies. This seems fair.

Before this thread I had never even considered the thought of my surviving parent marrying someone much younger and all assets/ family sentimental items going to them.
Sometimes I think I'm a grown up who has never quite entered the grown up world.
Maybe it's better this way.

A second wife is different as, without a will or morals, the husbands money never goes to his biological children. So, new wife comes along ( or reverse genders still the same). In the scenario of no kids from that relationship, if wife inherits the whole estate of their husband, his children get nothing as generally the money then passes to HER family who have no biological link or family link to the father. In the scenario of children from the second marriage, the children of the first marriage are cut in favour of their half sibling.

Of course all of this needs to be sorted in strong wills that protect children of first marriages. A relative of mine seldom saw his father as a child as they were building a business. His father then divorced (1980s so not a ‘generous’ settlement) his mother, remarried and had another child when the relative was a late teen. Second wife very emphatic about adults taking care of themselves. Time ticked on until her own child was an adult and suddenly the rules changed and that child was bought a house outright, then the father died leaving everything to his second wife. Second wife then declared this was fair as relative had already inherited from his own mother. Of course, her rule of one inheritance being enough will be forgotten in her own will when all she has inherited will go to her own child.

its death by a thousand cuts. It’s hurtful that the relatives father did not think enough of the children of his first marriage to write a will that includes them. It’s hurtful that they got to see the shiny second marriage child enjoy a higher standard of living, courtesy of their fathers cash, growing up, it’s hurtful to see this continue after their fathers death and not be receive so much as a momento, including items from a grandparent that have little to no meaning to second wife or child of that relationship as they never knew that grandparent. What this now means is that there is no relationship between the siblings and half siblings. In cases where the second marriage has been short, it’s even more morally dubious.

People often sleepwalk into this. Either they don’t want to think about wills or they get fixed at a particular life stage and never adjusted. So, in my relatives case, they were categorised by their father as an independent adult from being a teen. Half sibling was considered a child in need of protection in perpetuity. People often assume or hope that second wife will do the right thing and include first family in their own will. Unlikely.

I need to start thinking about this.
FIL left everything to his 2nd wife and her children apart from a token gesture to DH (and nothing to DH’s sibling). He was quite wealthy and his wife died a few weeks after he did so his stepchildren got everything.
Then again MIL inherited from her third husband who left half to her and half to his DC. She then died so DH inherited a substantial amount from a man he has had little to do with.
DH and I are separated and have 3 DC. We haven’t got divorced even though it’s been a few years. If we’re still married I believe there will be less IHT. We both have assets well over the threshold. We have both said we want our DC to inherit everything even if we meet someone new. He has met someone now so we probably need to look at divorcing and doing wills. I genuinely don’t know if I should divorce him though. Am pretty sure he’d never bother with the hassle of it all.

This has happened to me. I'm the child from the first marriage and the second wife inherited everything. Both my parents died young and I'm left with very little except a bereft feeling. It's not what my DF wanted but he didn't put the paperwork in place to leave me the things he said he would.
Heartbreaking really and anyone who calls me grabby hasn't got a clue how awful this situation feels. It cuts to the core and now I am alone at an age where most people still have both their parents.
I have written a will to ensure this can't happen to my own DC.

What an unpleasant attitude, especially if either of you have children.

I worry about this with my brother. I spoke with our mum about it the other day and told her that I would mention wills to my brother the next time I see him. All mum kept saying was, I don’t think she would do that. My view was that it wasn’t a matter of doing anything, if wife 2 inherited everything due to the lack of a will she would just see it as hers and I couldn’t see her selling the house to give something to his children when she has three of her own.

This happened to me, my mum died, dad remarried very quickly and soon cut ties with his 3 children (I was only a teenager) 20 years later he died and left everything to his new wife but he lived overseas where they have forced heirship and half the house is still in my mum's name luckily! Why should a random woman get something my mother worked and paid for? (I know my mum should have written a will but she died suddenly in her 40's)

Yes I understand the law, thanks.

What I mean is that spouses usually leave their money to each other, so it seems odd to expect someone not to, just because it’s a second marriage.

For sure you can put mechanisms in place so whatever isn’t spent gets shared fairly by the next generation, but I’d still expect a spouse to get in the benefit for their lifetime.