What would you have done? (Inheritance)

[TheAmusedQuail]

My grandparents had always been quite clear what they wanted done with their estate. Contents of bank accounts shared between their children (2 brothers). Value of their house shared between their grandchildren (4 of us).

Granny died and Grandad remarried (this isn't going where you think). Step-granny had nothing. My dad and my grandfather and my uncle were estranged.

My grandad became frail and my step-granny had always been a bit pathetic. So my uncle convinced my grandad to sell the house and buy a big house together that they all (uncle & aunt, grandad and step granny) would live in.

Grandad died. Step granny's daughter arranged for her to go into a Salvation Army care home (in an attempt to get her hands on grandad's money - she failed).

Uncle and aunt, and by default, my cousins got all of the inheritance. I know this was deliberate, because the one time I saw my aunt with my mum after Grandad's death, my aunt discussed 'Our children's inheritance' (meaning myself and my brother and my cousins). My divorced parents did nothing about it and so my brother and I lost all of our inheritance.

What would you OR your parents have done? Was doing nothing the right thing, because it was too complex to disentangle? Or should they have fought it?

I was a very young adult at the time and it didn't occur to me we should have done anything. Incidentally, my uncle is still alive and has remarried a woman with nothing after my aunt's death. My cousins definitely benefitted (house deposits, cars etc).

Yep - and therefore there's nothing to leave to the OP, in terms of that huge house, which the crafty uncle knew full well.

I didn't throw away the relationships. My uncle did. You're deliberately twisting.

I would be happy, even 20 years later, to reestablish contact. He's rebuffed my families outreach.

It's looking back as an older person at a situation that happened when I was (as I said in my first post) a very young adult.

I'm really not twisting things. You seem to have a very "twisted" view on what has happened, and I'm just trying to explain the actual untwisted position.

How did your Uncle throw away the relationship in your mind?
By caring for your Grandad without any wider family help?
By legally benefiting from Grandad's money as per Grandads wishes?
By not wanting to hang out with wider family members who irrationally resent him and call him greedy?

You've alluded that he threw away the relationship by not giving you something you weren't entitled to? That's illogical. You've frequently called him "greedy". He's not. He sounds like a good man who loved his father and cared for him to the end. A natural consequence to that is that your Grandad chose to quite rightly will/gift his money to him. It's not greedy for him to accept the inheritance willing left to him by his father.

I'm saying the damage to the relationship is likely caused by you thinking you have an entitlement to his money, a viewpoint which you still seem to hold to this day.

I wouldn't choose to hang out with a nephew or niece who had their eyes on my money and felt resentful or thought that I was greedy for legally inheriting from my parent who I lived with and cared for at the end of their lives.

I do think there was an element of coercion. But it's in the past. I do think the lesson I'm taking from it is to make a very clear will myself.

'I'm really not twisting things.' Except this is your Mumsnet modus operandi, which unfortunately invalidates your points.

I'm saying the damage to the relationship is likely caused by you thinking you have an entitlement to his money, a viewpoint which you still seem to hold to this day.

But that's what the grandfather wanted.

True, it was. The ship has long since sailed though. But yes, that point had never occurred to me.

Read back on your posts and the language you have used about people. It's full of anger and resentment whether you recognise it or not. You are not just musing, you've wasted a lot of negative emotional energy and time on this. Whether you change that is up to you. The situation won't change, but you can exercise control over the narrative you tell yourself and move on.

@GutsyShark

'It seems to me grandad has told the grandchildren they would get the house. Which may well have been the plan when it was said but it was a foolish thing to say and this is why. So I’m not sure it’s a sense of entitlement she has as much as that’s what she was told, so the expectation isn’t unreasonable.'

Good point. I must learn from this and NOT do this myself. Need to get my will drafted I think. Thanks for pointing this out.

Yep, my dad (he IS an ars*). And my Step-Granny's DD was grabby and sacrificed her own mum.

Other than that, happy for you to disagree with me.

?

No, I'm not twisting anything.

I'm removing your personal bias, emotions and unsubstantiated beliefs, and taking it down to the facts of the matter. Which is simply that your uncle inherited or was gifted what he was legally and morally entitled to have and was in accordance with your Grandad's wishes at the time of his death. A solicitor would have legally signed off on it that your Grandad both had capacity and was making the decisions of his own free will (so no coercion) regardless of whether it was done via a will or via the house purchase.

Unfortunately the facts don't fit your inner narrative, and hence you keep attacking me for saying them, as it's easier for you to do that than to accept that you've held onto incorrect beliefs over the years. And I understand there's an emotive element to it. You wish your Grandad had priortised you and left money to you - I see that. But he didn't, and that's simply an irrefutable fact. Wishing that he did doesn't mean that Uncle should give you some of his money!

The big issue, as per your own narrative, is that you feel that some of Grandad's money should have come to you and that your Uncle is greedy by not passing some of his money on to you. Neither of those viewpoints are backed up by actual facts or reality, and you holding those viewpoints is going to have destroyed any chance of a relationship between you and your Uncle.

By all means reach out to your Uncle to build bridges. But it won't work unless you are ready to accept that he hasn't done anything wrong.

No he didn't, otherwise he would have made the legal arrangements to ensure that happened (will or gift).

It might have been something that Grandad had said at an earlier point in time, but by the time of death he had decided to leave or gift his money to his son who was living with him, caring for him and close to him at the time of his death.

Yes, that is absolutely the lesson you and everyone reading should take from this. And certainly dont be telling people what they're going to get before it's all written down.

And I'm guilty of this myself! Definitely lesson learned. Thanks Mumsnet!

So realistically what would a frail (possibly vulnerable) and elderly man have done here at the point uncle cooks up his scheme with the joint tenancy and buying a new house? He gets persuaded by his money-grabbing son to buy a big house together so he can get looked after and live out his final years in ease. I think it's likely he assumed his son would give some money to his granddaughter (OP) and her siblings, from the sale of the house.

That's all conjecture.

A solicitor would have been involved in both the house purchase or writing a will and part of the process would be to robustly check that OP's Grandad had full capacity to make the decision and that he was making it of his own free will and no coercion was happening. So we have to take at face value that this was Grandad's true wishes at the time of his death.

It's not unreasonable for him to decide to leave everything to his son in return for his son to provide him with a safe home, companionship and care up until the end of his life, which by all accounts the son did.

Had he wanted his grandchildren to benefit, he needed to make legal provision for that to happen. This would all have been explained to him by the solicitor. He chose not to, so that's clearly not what he wanted.

Hurtful as it is to OP (and I can empathise with that), her Grandad chose to pass everything down to his one son only, so uncle is legally and morally entitled to the money, and OP isn't legally or morally entitled to anything. It's not reasonable for her to resent her Uncle for taking what was legally and morally his and acting in accordance with his own father's wishes. Perhaps she should resent her Grandad, who appears to have historically informally promised her something, and then reneged on that later in his life -however even then, circumstances had changed and it's fair for Grandad to change his mind if he wanted to.

Ignore me. I've RTFT now.

Yep, my dad (he IS an ars). And my Step-Granny's DD was grabby and sacrificed her own mum.*

Who told you this? Your dad? Your uncle?

What is the “sacrifice of her own mum” you think happened?

Here is how it might have played out…

”Mum, now Peter is dead, do you still want to share a house with Bob?”
”Not really, dear, he’s not blood family and I am going to need help with washing myself and things”
”Ok, mum, did Peter leave you any money?”
”Err, he said he’d take care of me”
”Right, let’s get you into a nice care home and then I’ll talk to Bob about the Will”

“Bob, did Peter leave mum any money?”
“No, he didn’t write a will but she does have a life interest in the house, as long as she wants to stay here”
”Oh, she’s not comfortable here without your dad and she would rather be in a home for care and company. Was there any other money?”
“No, sorry, other than the bit in their joint account, which she can access, it all went into the house”

There's no point in earmarking money for yourself from other people's estate.
Firstly, it may get eaten up by care fees.
Secondly, if he wanted to leave you something then he should've put it in his will. Once it passed on to others then it's there's. They've more right to it than you do.
Basically it was never 'your inheritance' to begin with. People need to stop being so entitled.
My own dad left me fuck all and my grandparents were long dead when I was born. Am I hard done by about it? Not at all.

He only had the house to give. But that house was (probably) half the uncle's because of the joint tenancy, so everything goes to the other owner when one owner dies. So no point discussing wills.

Once there was a been marriage any will would have been void even if they had left one. It was up to grandad to provide instructions.

It is not unusual for people to say one thing and then change their mind years later. Your parents could do nothing. Perhaps what happened is exactly as planned?

Yes, clear and legally binding wills are so important, and so many of us realise this too late. It's sad when families fall out over inheritances.
I'm trying hard to keep my will up to date and also to mention the content as little as possible to family members, in order to avoid raising false expectations. I know what I want to happen as things are, but so much can change especially as we get older.

The really sad thing was that despite the confusion at first after my grandfather died, we probably would have just accepted the status quo and continued to be in contact. But Uncle clearly knew he was wrong because his side isolated themselves from us. And my mum had been reasonably close to my aunt in the past too.

That is very sad. Perhaps when the dust has settled in a year or two you'll be able to resume friendly relations with that side of the family.
Its so hard to know exactly what happened. Maybe your uncle did edge your dad into the direction of buying a house with him, but also quite likely that your granddad was keen to have the responsibility of property ownership taken on by someone else as he got older, and to have the prospect of living with younger folk who would take care of him if he wasn't able to manage on his own. That might have seemed far more important than including the grandchildren in his will. Though it would have been nice if he'd thought to leave each of you a small legacy in recognition of what you meant to him.