To think this inheritance split is not fair?

[Big8]

Ok, firstly I know I should be grateful to be getting anything from my grandparents. And I am. But I'm just wondering what the general consensus is on this...

Grandparents have 2 offspring.

Have set aside £x for grandchildren.

There are five grandchildren.

My father has 4. His sister has 1.

Now rather than the £x being split into 5 equal portions for us all

Half of £x goes to Aunts child.
Half goes to my dad's children to be divided between 4.

So say it's £1000

Cousin gets £500.

We get £125 each.

What do you think of that?

The vast majority of us won't have a penny for our grandkids to argue over. It'll all be swallowed up by care homes when we're very elderly.

I agree with Bobbity. I assume each child will receive equal shares. The allocated amount for GC should (IMO) have been divided out equally. It should make no difference how many siblings there. Each GC should receive the same amount. However, as the OP suggests, not everyone thinks this is the right way. Which is unfair but I guess the GP had their own reasoning.

But bibbity - that could still potentially be unfair. Depending on how you do it, your children could get less.

So if you have £10,000 to leave as a fixed amount to GC - to be split equally then that's fair.

But if you want to leave £1,000 to each grandchild but child A has 5 children and child B has 1 child or none, your taking from B to balance A having more children.

And what about the granchildren not born ?

All of which turn into issues if the amounts are large.

Just to say, the OP's grandparents' way of doing it is how my granny did hers. So my two cousins got more than me and my two brothers. It didn't occur to me to be especially bothered TBH.

Seems fair to me if it is what grandparents want.

My aunt is like this.

I am one of 3 kids. Both my brother and sister have a significant other and I do not. When it comes to christmas she divides money by 'family' so me and my DS get more expensive presents than my siblings and their families as there's more of them to split the same money between.

I find it weird and looks like playing favourites. But in her head its logical and makes it so that no one side of the family does better.

So really no one is being unreasonable here, you just have different views on it

I would think that if it is the whole of the estate, and is being done to bypass tax issues by missing out a generation in the inheritance wotsit, then I can see it is probably sensible.

If it is a small sum that is a last gift from Granny, then it is a bit shit to differentiate between grandchildren in that way. Same as giving the only grandchild a more expensive birthday present than the others. In fact, the youngest should probably get a greater share of the pot, as they will have received fewer birthday presents.

Yes Margaret Cavendish I mean exactly that. There are many instances, including amongst our relatives , where someone has died, the widow has inherited the assets, then has remarried and these assets have all gone to her children from a previos relationship.
I don't want that happening.
When we are dead our sons can do what they like with the money, and it is up to them to make provision for their children, but any DILs will have no automatic claim in it.

It seems fair to me

In my family, one sibling has 3 children one has one and the other none. So it should be split 4 ways ignoring the third sibling? No, it should be split 3 ways then split from there. Parents leave to their children and so on.

This is how it should be imo. Split equally between their 2 kids. Why should the other side of the family lose out because your dad had four kids?!

Some people like money to go down family lines rather than to individuals. I've had a lot of experience in this area, and will often see childless children take a slightly larger share than their siblings if gifts are also made to grandchildren. I don't think it's all that odd and definitely not unfair

I was about to post that it seems to depend whether you think of your estate as an inheritance or as a gift. If it's a gift it would seem strange (to me) to favour one GC over another, but then giantpurplepeopleeater came and rained on my theory but if you think of it as each branch of the family inheriting the same then it makes sense and is fair.

As others have said, in a generations time we won't even need to have this conversation as inheritances will be a thing of the past as we pay for our care homes!

Sadly the only money you have any control of is your own. There could well be a back story behind this that you're not aware of; or your grandparents see this as fair. Nothing you can do about either. We've just done our wills and have left the entire estate to our 3 DDs in equal shares and they are all executors so there is no unfairness.

I'm sure it's to ensure to keeping the strict 50/50 split between their children.

So rather than Roger getting 100k and Rose getting 100k, grandparents might decide to give Roger 90k and his only child 10k. And then Rose 90k and her three children 3.33k each. Then each branch of the family tree has got en equal share.

It makes sense to me, and doesn't seem inherently unfair. Just one way of doing it.

And likewise if they also had child-free Ronald, he would get the full 100k.

My grandparents were in their 90s when they died. Grandmother was last to go in 2015. They had two children (my dad and uncle).
There was a will (leaving something to grandchildren), but of course it could not be found.
So it was a straight split of £400,000. Half each to the sons.
My uncle is rich anyway, so gave his sons X 2 a wopping £50,000 each!

My dad pocketed the whole amount.
Upset me and my brother, but although our grandparents talked about leaving something for us, there was no proof. As no will was found.
But it's not worth being bitter.

But if you want to leave £1,000 to each grandchild but child A has 5 children and child B has 1 child or none, your taking from B to balance A having more children.
If you were giving the money to Child A and Child B, I would agree with you. But when you're giving money directly to the adult grandchildren - which I assumed is what happened here - then, in my opinion, Child A and Child B don't come into it, because they won't be receiving the money at all.

Hello there bibittybob

You'd think straightforward fairness would be the easiest and simplest, no?

Strange times

When we are dead our sons can do what they like with the money, and it is up to them to make provision for their children, but any DILs will have no automatic claim in it.

How will you achieve that? You can leave it in trust to grandchildren instead; but if a married person inherits money in the UK it is generally legally viewed as part of their joint pot of matrimonial assets and would therefore automatically be inherited by the surviving spouse.

I know several women at a WAY group I attend whose children have got assets in trusts but who themselves are on the breadline because partners (they weren't married) left assets to their children rather than them. Since being widowed with dependant children has a massive effect on ones earning potential (lone parenting bereaved children is not for the faint hearted) they are both struggling massively.

I really don't understand why people are fixating on the equal split between the two children.

The GPs in this case want to leave or gift something to their grandchildren and they have set aside a sum of money for this. It goes directly to the gc, bypassing the parents entirely. So why isn't it being split equally?

I think bibs, it all comes down to Pythagoras.

He didn't get where he is today by being sensible and straightforward and nor will these demn posters.

Whatever the testator does is by definition right.

But the method chosen here, known to saddo lawyers as per stirpes, is very common.

See dfil gave each grandchild an equal share but Sil kicked off because she has an only child and we have five so she perceived that she was hard done by because dh received more than half because of the extra children. I think with inheritances it's very difficult to keep everybody happy tbh.

Why does the child of one of the GPs children get more wedge than the others? Just flipping why?

I have a totally nuts and unfair will thing going on in my family for the past five years atm and I just want to bang a lot of heads together.

It's getting more common for Grandparent to think well it's not DD2's fault that she only had 2 children, verses DD1's 4. So split the money half per child & then again per grandchild.

It may not seem fair, but she was probably thinking 50/50 for each child, then split again for each of their DC.

It's rubbish in theory, but fair in another.

I would be grateful to have anything, a lot of parents who once thought inheritance was a big thing, are now spending the money on enjoying themselves.