To ask for your opinions on “blended” family wills proposal?

[Catatatan]

DH has 1 child from previous marriage, and together we have two young kiddos.
Previously rented but have just bought own house as joint tenants, mortgaged. Both have life insurance policies to cover the mortgage and a bit more.
Making wills and I want to avoid issues such as stepson being left out should DH die first, and want to ensure my children benefit from me but don’t want stepson to inherit from “my” half (because he has a mother he will inherit from iyswim).
So my proposal is that the everything is passed from either spouse to the other spouse, and then on their death, the estate is split 50/50 - first half split in equal shares between the children DH and I share and then the second half is split in equal shares between the children DH has in total (so our two plus his firstborn).

E.g. dh goes first and then I pass away. Estate is £300,000 after all deductions (hypothetical!)
£150k of estate (my half) is split in equal shares to my two children (that I had with DH) So £75k each.
150k (his half) is split in equal shares to DH children (£50k each)
Which means stepson has £50k but his two half siblings have £125,000 each... which might seem unfair but stepson will also inherit from his mother who has a house of higher value and no other children. I don’t see why stepson should benefit from three adults but our kids only benefit from two.

This seems the fairest way to me - would like to know if others in similar scenarios have done things differently!

No expertise on this at all. In our own dealings we’ve decided spouse should only have a life interest in share intended for the deceased’s spouse’s child.

In our family we had children disinherited by their father’s new wife. She didn’t have kids but kept 100% of the money and never left any to them.

You need proper advice from your solicitor - they will be able to suggest a range of approaches

I know you trust your ph now, but what if he’s 80, confused (but still legally of sound mind) and the cleaner persuades him to get married? Very similar to what happened in our family

The step child isn't her child though. I doubt the child is at the fathers more than a couple of times a week and that the OP doesn't parent them or is overly involved in their lives (because that's also a big no no on mumsnet to be stepping on another mums territory) - also lots of step parents admit to not "loving" their step child and that's fine and I doubt many step children will also say they love their step mothers like their own mothers - so why should the child be entitled to anything the OP has worked for all her life. At the end of the day the child will inherit from its own mother

We will do something similar, as my two step children will obviously inherit from their mothers side too. Also anything I inherit from my family will go to my son, not my stepchildren.

To me this seems a little bit petty

It seems a bit like your DC will benefit a lot more from their dad than his other child.
What if your DH contributes more throughout the marriage for example? What if you die a long time before your DH?
Yes when you are married you share money, but in my eyes what that means is all the money is yours and all is DHs not 50/50 and it seems a bit petty to say upon death 50% of this is mine so you cant have any of it step son. What if you two die young and your DSSs mum doesnt, he will benefit much less etc.

If you just split it 3 ways all dc will still be provided for. Step son may inherit from his mum but equally may not. One of your DCs might marry someone incredibly wealthy, there are always going to be external factors which mean your DC will end up in different financial positions I think all you can do is make sure that you uave provided for them equally

Circumstances might change, and wills can be changed witj time. But if you both died right now would you really be comfortable with your DSs inheriting so much more than their sibling?

Squirrel I know one man, so so so in love with his wife, no doubt about it! They were a beautiful couple and devoted to their 2 sons... Older late teens.

They went to every match, show whatever to support them, everything was revolved around those boys. In public the parents always hand in hand or arms around each other etc.

Anyway, she died utterly tragically and out of the blue. It was a huge shock.
9 months later. Yes! 9 months later dad met a new lady, also a widower. He wasn't behind those boys as much.
Few years after that he sold the family home to buy a new home with her, he hasn't even thought about the boys and wills or anything. He's totally in love with his new lady and the boys live alone, they don't see him as much because they don't feel comfortable at all with the '' new ') house which, let's face it, isn't their home. The new ladies dc are there all the time!

Already, that chain and link is broken and yes with utterly frightening speed.

Another couple I know, the dad is v wealthy and he protected the dc inheritance however... He has banned his own 2 ds from his new home with his new wife! They argue and clash with step mum... But her dc from 1st marriage all live there or have rooms there.

It seems a bit like your DC will benefit a lot more from their dad than his other child.

They will all be inheriting exactly the same from their dad. The other money OPs DC will be inheriting will he from her.

@VeniceQueen2004 I care that my impact is positive on my SCs life. But my impact is emotional, not financial. He knows I'm not his mum so frankly no I'm not going to consider his feelings about not getting my money when I die. Assuming he's an adult at that point, he shouldn't expect to.

Inheritance is inherently unfair, so I think taking into account what one person might inherit from someone else is pointless and will make them feel less a part of your family. Split it equally between all your and your husband's children.

I completely agree with this. Whatever promises you and your DH make to each other, and if the survivor faithfully carries out your joint plans to the letter, consider the following possibility:

Your DSS's mum has since married again, to a man with children of his own. She dies the day after the second of you two goes and the very next day, her husband is off to the solicitor to make sure that all of what is now his money (including all of what originally belonged to your DSS's mum - his ex-wife, even if she'd been earning £1m a year and he'd been on £15K) goes to his children and not a penny to his own step-son. What if he says "I married her, not her son - he isn't my responsibility, so he isn't getting a penny of my money"? Morally reprehensible but perfectly legally valid. He could even go one step further and say "Well, he had his own dad and inherited from him".

Yes, an inheritance is pragmatically financial, but that's by-the-by because the entire reason for leaving it to somebody is that you love them. You left it to your kids, because you love them; you didn't leave it to your milkman, because you have a friendly arrangement but you don't love him (unless your milkman is also your husband, son or grandson, I suppose!).

It's the splitting of your OWN worldly goods and assets that matters and not what financial position your heirs independently end up in. They could be millionaires or low-earners, marry millionaires or low-earners, win the lottery, lose their house when it burns down and they were too poor to afford home insurance, lose the use of their limbs in a car accident and have to give up their £200K job etc. etc. You can't legislate outside of your own circumstances.

Personally, I think the only justifiable reason for varying this principle is if one of your children is very disabled and will need expensive care, not be able to work to buy their own home etc. whilst your other children are fit and healthy; but even then, one of your healthy children could have a life-changing accident the day after they inherit whilst your disabled child could win £100m on the Euromillions.

No-one should expect anything from someone else's death. But by giving to your children and not to him you are making it very clear he is less than to you. Which may be true but still may be hurtful depending on how much you are a parent figure to him .

But by giving to your children and not to him you are making it very clear he is less than to you. Which may be true but still may be hurtful depending on how much you are a parent figure to him.

I agree. It strikes me a little like when a couple have children together and maybe one of them has a child from a previous marriage/relationship - and that child is told how lucky they are to have TWO bedrooms and TWO homes when their half-siblings only have one. Apart from the little fact that they get to live with both of their parents all of the time, that is.

Put the property in a trust

@Onceuponatimethen

No expertise on this at all. In our own dealings we’ve decided spouse should only have a life interest in share intended for the deceased’s spouse’s child.

In our family we had children disinherited by their father’s new wife. She didn’t have kids but kept 100% of the money and never left any to them.

You need proper advice from your solicitor - they will be able to suggest a range of approaches

Yep I think that's what's going to happen to my kids.

It's only hurtful if the stepchild considered the step mum as equal to his own mother and loved them exactly the same.......which I highly doubt is the case!

You want your children to inherit equally. Therefore dh should allow his children to inherit equally, it just so happens that one of those children isn’t yours.

You’re perfectly within your rights to leave less to your stepson because you “don’t want him to inherit from you” but be aware of the message that sends to him. Whether he will or won’t inherit from his mother is irrelevant, I never understand that argument, either he’s a part of your family or he isn’t.

But you are unreasonable to expect your dh to give less to one of his three children just because you didn’t want that.

When you die the whole house becomes the property of the surviving partner. Your asset ends there.

You could draw up your will in such a way that your children inherit on your death but then if I were your DH I would write my will in such a way that your children would inherit less and DSS would inherit more to make it equal.

You are unreasonable to expect your DH not to treat all of his children equally.

There have been many threads on MN where someone has been left without an inheritance because after the first person dies, the second person has no obligation at all to adhere to their agreement with the first person.

Fundamentally, if you are holding your property as joint tenants, when the first person dies the second person inherits the whole property, regardless of wills. That's the point at which they can (and often do) decide to renege on the deal.

You need to have Tenants in Common ownership. Then the two shares of the house can be willed separately. You can each leave a "life interest" in the house to the other person, so that they can go on living there, but when they die the value of your share of the house goes exactly as directed in your will and that cannot be changed (easily).

You need a lawyer for this.

@aSofaNearYou

For the sake of unity I'd probably split equally three ways - £100k each

But that is splitting the whole amount equally and completely defeats the object of OP leaving her inheritance to her own children, and her husband to his.

Well I’m saying I wouldn’t want to do that - for the sake of not a lot of money (relatively speaking) I’d leave them the same amount.

There would be three bereaved siblings - a hard enough time without further disharmony.

It's only hurtful if the stepchild considered the step mum as equal to his own mother and loved them exactly the same.......which I highly doubt is the case!
This in absolute bucketloads!
I didn’t take on DSD as my child. I took on DH as a man who already had a child. There’s a massive difference.
DSD is most certainly part of my family, she just not my child.
What’s mine is already halved with DH because I married him (I brought all the assets) and my half is for my DS alone. DSD will eventually get her half of DHs half (which all originated from me anyway).
She’s not less than DS in any way. She will be treated the same as him by their shared father.

What other people may of may not leave is neither certain or anyone elses business. This is about the stepparent saying "they are my family, you are not."

But what if the OP has siblings who outlive her? Nieces and nephews? Are all these people ‘not family’ because they’re not getting anything in the will?

When you die the whole house becomes the property of the surviving partner. Your asset ends there.

That's about the size of it. You can only will your money and possessions once - after that, it's as though they were never yours - so you have to make sure that you trust the person/people you choose to act wisely and fairly with it. Like it or not, just as you can't dictate whether they will invest it wisely or gamble the lot away, you don't have any say in whom they give it to or pass it on to after their own death.

You could be in an apparently simple 'traditional' situation where you're both married once, two kids between you and no other relationships or kids outside of that, your kids grow up and each have two kids with one spouse in the same 'traditional' way. Even if you both plan that, when the second of you dies, everything goes 50/50 to your joint kids, you have no say whatsoever in whether they subsequently leave any/all of it to your grandchildren and equally or not, as you would hope and expect. It's no different really. If you don't trust your new spouse to do what you would want to be done with what was originally your money, your only option is not to marry them in the first place or otherwise leave the lot directly to your kids when you die and potentially kick your spouse out of their home.

I disagree. If the marriage came about when all the children were young then personally I think the only fair way is to split it equally between all the children. IMO the fact that SS will inherit from his own mother is irrelevant, she’s not part of your family set up. This is the arrangement my father and step mother have and quite frankly it’s the only fair one as we were all young children when they got marries

I would seriously discuss with a lawyer as there will be ways to do this that can ensure all children are receiving their parents share properly regardless of who died first or if one does remarry. You’d also need to look at how much money was brought into the marriage, you’re splitting it equally between you two but not between the kids so you should make sure that’s fair to start with. My father hasn’t left my half brother anything but as he grew up with us the rest of us find that really horrible and mean so have agreed to split equally between us regardless of blood.

but I would never cut my stepson out of my will. My own DM was deliberately left out of her mothers will and it was awful. I couldn’t do that to stepson even if we fell out, DH is still his dad and he shouldn’t lose out just because his parents are separated

All very noble and easy to say in your current circumstances. However, there is so much that can happen in very short periods of time (let alone long ones) that I really don’t think leaving it all to your spouse to do the right thing is enough. You may experience a period of poverty, end up with a partner who refuses to acknowledge your past, illness, disability etc could all impact on your thinking at some point in the future. None of us know what our future’s hold. The only safe way of securing your dss’s inheritance is to go down the ‘life interest’ route, I think.

A child youve partly raised in your house with their half sibling is not the same as a sibling or a nice/nephew. This is so spurious.

You want your children to inherit equally. Therefore dh should allow his children to inherit equally, it just so happens that one of those children isn’t yours.

You want your children to inherit equally. Therefore dh should allow his children to inherit equally, it just so happens that one of those children isn’t yours.

You’re perfectly within your rights to leave less to your stepson because you “don’t want him to inherit from you” but be aware of the message that sends to him. Whether he will or won’t inherit from his mother is irrelevant, I never understand that argument, either he’s a part of your family or he isn’t.

But you are unreasonable to expect your dh to give less to one of his three children just because you didn’t want that.*

I disagree. I want my daughter to inherit all of my money, and both of his children to inherit equally from him.

Not because I want my daughter to inherit more, but because I want her to inherit what is mine. I'm not trying to swindle any of my partner's money away from DSS.

Whilst technically when you die it goes to your spouse and ceases to be yours, I would want my partner to respect my wishes of where I wanted my money to go. He could choose not to, but I don't think it is unreasonable to expect him to at all. He should be motivated by all his children inheriting equally FROM HIM, but also by his late wife's wishes being respected when it comes to the money that was hers.

My grandad died quite recently and there was a brief period before he died when his mental state was deteriorating and his partner (who he was with for a few years before he died) tried to get him to write his family out of the will. Long story, but by a long way the part of it that felt most upsetting was the fact that that was not the agreement he had with my grandmother, who had died ten years earlier, and much of that money was obviously hers. She would have been devastated to know he planned on changing it afterwards.

Yes, it is very easy to change your will after your spouse dies to suit yourself. But you SHOULD respect their wishes.