Inheriting money should never be an expectation.

[NEVERQUIT3331]

It seems like a lot of people expect money to be given to them through inheritance e.g. parents, grandparents...

However, a lot of people who expect is are the same people who would say stuff like "I did not choose to be brought in this world" or "children owe nothing to their parents." If that is the case, then inheritance should also not be an expectation for you as you are a grown adult you should stand on your own two feet.

Also, some people are shameless they would actually tell their parents to leave money from them. That is selfish. If we loved our parents, grandparents, others etc then we would want them to spend their money having their best lives as life is short.

Just to clarify this is in response to those who expect things for free. It does not apply to people whose parents, grandparents CHOOSE to give them money, houses etc...

[SchrodingersImmigrant]

@LadyIsabellaWrotham

I do find the English and US “they can leave the lot to a cat’s home if they want” attitude interesting because you all seem to take it for granted that this is obviously morally and legally correct and anyone who thinks different is outrageously grasping. Globally speaking it’s a very unusual approach.

Yes. The testamentary freedom is somewhat baffling, isn't it. Where I am from, we just die intestate because wills don't have too much point. You can't just leave out a child (only under legally permitted reasons).

[BeingATwatItsABingThing]

There’s a difference between:
Expecting: feel you have a god given right and entitlement to it
Expecting: know that it’s likely

I agree with this.

I know that it’s likely I will inherit when my parents die. I also know it’s likely that DH will inherit when his parents die.

Do I want to inherit that money? No because I’d rather have our parents alive and with us. Would I object to them spending their money whilst they’re alive? No because they’ve all worked incredibly hard to earn that money and deserve to spend it however they like.

[Loopylobes]

My DM wanted to use her half of the house she and DF owned (my sister and I have already inherited his half) to put in with us and buy somewhere together so we could look after her. My sister has made her feel too guilty to do that as she apparently needs all of her inheritance.

I've told my DM that she should spend her money on herself while she's still around to enjoy it but the golden child will have her way and my DM will be a lot lonelier for it. She would prefer it all to go in care home fees than that I should end up with a penny more than her.

[2bazookas]

When old parents of working children require fulltime personal care support, they are very likely to end up in residential care which will drain their finances. So there won't be much left for anyone to inherit.

[SirPhillipsgroupie]

The trouble is that these are very difficult, but important, conversations to have. My husband has a life-limiting illness and we are having to make some very difficult plans and assume I will need to manage a life insurance payout in the next few years to protect my own and the children’s best interests. The conversation with his parents about what will happen to his share of their estate if/when he dies before them would be a very helpful/significant bit of that jigsaw, but they are very much in denial that could happen and much too British and polite to have that conversation.

[user1493413286]

I had an ex boyfriend who used to talk quite regularly about what he’d do with inheritance and how he relied on it to buy a house, considering he was 30 and his mum was mid fifties it seemed pretty distasteful.
My mum and dad worked really hard for their money and unfortunately my dad died before getting to enjoy retirement so I hope my mum enjoys her money rather than keeps it all for us to inherit. She’s been more than generous with money gifts as she wants to see us use the money while she’s still around

[bungaloid]

Luckily I'm fabulously successful, so I don't need death money from my parents.

[celiafforcandle]

The middle way.
Family business was sold 2 generations ago and split between surviving
daughters.
Each one was in business or made a good marriage and enhanced the inheritance. It is not right for that to be frittered away. It should be manged so as to pass on to the upcoming generation.
Neither father nor I regard it as 'our' money to spend as we wish. Father's care requirements were met. Care Home fees, extras such as taxi trips and other outings all paid for, he had a good life.
My Brothers and I are responsible for seeing that we pass more on to our children than we inherited.
One bro will find it harder because he took on a lower paid 'vocation' rather than a simple career. We tell him not to worry, his choice was encouraged at the time. We would not dream of any criticism of him neither will we allow his children to be 'the poor relations'.

[StCharlotte]

@celiafforcandle

The middle way.
Family business was sold 2 generations ago and split between surviving
daughters.
Each one was in business or made a good marriage and enhanced the inheritance. It is not right for that to be frittered away. It should be manged so as to pass on to the upcoming generation.
Neither father nor I regard it as 'our' money to spend as we wish. Father's care requirements were met. Care Home fees, extras such as taxi trips and other outings all paid for, he had a good life.
My Brothers and I are responsible for seeing that we pass more on to our children than we inherited.
One bro will find it harder because he took on a lower paid 'vocation' rather than a simple career. We tell him not to worry, his choice was encouraged at the time. We would not dream of any criticism of him neither will we allow his children to be 'the poor relations'.

It should be manged so as to pass on to the upcoming generation.

Well someone's got to spend it!

[JackieTheFart]

@Cocomarine

There’s a difference between:
Expecting: feel you have a god given right and entitlement to it
Expecting: know that it’s likely

My boyfriend “expects” (second definition) to inherit a quarter share - with siblings - of his mother’s house. His parents are open about their will. He’s already inherited a quarter share of his father’s half of the house (it was split due to potential care home fees).
His mother is in good health but very elderly. Her pension plus savings would easily cover bursting level care home fees to well over 100, given her current age. She has - in her own words - NOTHING to spend it on. Her kids would full support equity release and cruises and a Ferrari for her - she doesn’t want that. So yes, he expects an inheritance.

That’s a really good point.

I expect both my parents to spend every single penny they can enjoying their sundown years. But I also expect that when they die, that the money gained from selling their houses would be split equally between me and my siblings.

[AvocadosBeforeMortgages]

@Soothes

Remarriage is really risky for people relying on inheritance. Even where there's no family drift or large care bill.

Say, Mum dies relatively young. Dad remarries after a suitable interval. Will leaves everythihg to his wife (fairly normal). She outlives her husband by a decade or so, by which time his children are a distant memory to her and "his" money is very much hers. She leaves everything to her children. (Also normal).

It's quite difficult to avoid without disinheriting his wife.

If this was my dilemma, I'd use a Life Interest Trust to avoid the problem arising - effectively giving the new wife a right to stay in the home until death, but after that it passes to the kids from first marriage

www.co-oplegalservices.co.uk/media-centre/articles-apr-jun-2019/whats-a-life-interest-trust-in-a-will/

Possibly split the cash in half at the time of dad's death too, depending on how much would be left for the new wife and if that would be sufficient for her needs.

[peak2021]

I have to admit when I read about people who have died and have made a will leaving their money to charity, or to someone other than family, it brings a smile to my face.

A person may need 24 hour care in the last part of their life which may end up with them having very little to leave in any case.

[cptartapp]

This notion of scrimping and saving to pass money down through the generations is bonkers. I'm all for helping your DC but PIL for example, are very well off, yet live frugally and could have done so much more. Always holidaying in the same place all their lives in the U.K., eating out on the cheap when they have a voucher, not putting the heating on etc etc.Its like they have so little self worth and feel guilty spending and god forbid, enjoying it.
DH (if he inherits) will certainly not be stockpiling it to pass it on and I suspect PIL would be horrified at the thoughts of new cars and foreign holidays. Such a shame to live like that under such illusion.

[Scoobygang7]

I had my mum make a passing joke about the work her and my stepdad are having done on the house is "spending" my inheritance. I slammed down on that, they're spending their money to make themselves happier. It's not my inheritance at all. I've repeatedly said the only selfish thing I want is that there is enough to cover their funerals.
I have no savings hopefully in time that will change but I don't want my mum scrimping and not enjoying her life in the hope I get left money. All I care for is ensuring they have a well lived life, they earnt it they should spend it as they see fit.

[backinthebox]

My father died intestate. His estate was one of considerable complexity, as was his personal life and marital status. I cannot elaborate here without it being outing. If I had just one minute to speak to him again, I would tell him to sign the fucking will he kept going on about. Not because I want my share of his estate, but because the almighty mess he left behind and the way certain unscrupulous people in his life acted when they found he had no will robbed us of the ability to grieve for him the way a family ought to be able to grieve. People are flippant about wills and unless you’ve experienced the disaster zone no will can leave (the mess my dad left has had everyone who hears about it with their jaw on the floor, and it was all so avoidable) you cannot begin to imagine the issues that can arise. My father’s estranged wife will not even allow us to go through our father’s old photos, or have the heirlooms that had been in our family for generations which my dad had always said were to stay in the family. A will, whatever it said, would have provided a degree of closure and left us free to celebrate his life rather than be mired in legal paperwork and what seems like a never-ending battle with circling vultures who don’t even have a claim but are having a go anyway. I feel desperately sad that we cannot even have a conversation about him any more without his lack of will being the main subject of talk.

If there is one thing I have learnt, it is that everyone should have a will. If you have led a ‘fun’ life with lots of complicated corners of it, it’s doubly important, for the sake of everyone you leave behind.

[YouokHun]

@Hophopandaway

I expect not a penny from my parents and would happily have inheritance tax set at 100%. It's amazing how many people want a meritocracy but then are insisting that they should be able to pass down large estates tax free. People should make their own lives what they want through work and not rely on inheritance and unearned wealth.

Lots of people with quite modest estates, through the rise in property prices, have moved into having their estate taxed at 40%, or at least the portion above the threshold. It’s the people with huge amounts of money, with enough money to manoeuvre themselves out of paying any at all that I have more problem with. But people want to give their children what they have managed to save which has been subject to tax already, I can’t see a problem with that and I’m someone with absolutely no inheritance coming my way.

I do think people are very unwise to expect inheritances or rely on them (as others have said). I know people who have made zero pension provision for themselves based on a guaranteed (they think) few hundred thousand pounds only to discover in their 50s that their elderly parents had spent it all on cruises or taken out some horrible loan etc etc or they’ve simply calculated it wrong in their heads and planned their retirements based on an inheritance that was never there and was rashly promised. There are so many variables that can mean that the money disappears; joint tenant owned property that then has to be sold for hugely expensive residential care, personal financial errors, investment disasters, subsequent marriages, pension disasters etc etc.

[Smokeahontas]

I absolutely agree. I have never & will never expect to receive anything from my parents / grandparents. If I do, that’s lovely. You don’t miss what you’ve never had.

Certain others in my extended family are borderline obsessed with it. I find it crass & distasteful.

[YouokHun]

Wise words @backinthebox and a horrible situation for you.

[AuntieMarys]

I'm planning to spend all my pension on me.

[littleredberries]

In some countries it's illegal for a parent to disinherit a child, and I do think there's something in that.
I was abused as a child. I do not want to lay it out on the internet. I have two younger siblings who weren't abused because I got the full brunt of it.
They chose to maintain a relationship with our father because he never did anything to them. I, on the other hand, cut my losses, moved abroad, and cut him out of my life completely. I did this despite him being a wealthy man because no amount of money makes it ok.
My sisters continue to live somewhat lavish lifestyles at his expense, and they are now in their twenties. I've had nothing, and for as long as he's living, I want nothing.

But when he dies? When he's finally gone from this world? Yes, then I would take inheritance, because I was severely wronged. Because I'd like to enjoy life a bit more when I know he's gone. But instead I'm fully expecting to be cut out of the Will.

If I'd been abused in Germany, however, this pitiful human would not be able to cut out the life he made and then so badly hurt from having an inheritance. He would not be able to pretend that he only ever had two daughters, and that the first simply never existed. Which is what he's doing right now according to his online work bio.

I think providing something for your children should be as ingrained in law as is leaving provision for your spouse, so that victims like me don't get punished twice.

[celiafforcandle]

@StCharlotteIt should be manged so as to pass on to the upcoming generation.

Well someone's got to spend it!
True but it won't be us, we are too serious. Must have been Puritans in a previous life (joke).

[gingerandproud4always]

@NothingIcando

Christmas a few years ago my sister and her husband gave my parents wills as a gift. We thought it was a joke present. She was deadly serious. She'd just started having children and I guess was ''thinking of the future''
Still makes my jaw drop😂 My mother's too.

I kind of agree with her. Losing someone who doesn't have a will is bloody awkward.

[ememem84]

@NothingIcando

Christmas a few years ago my sister and her husband gave my parents wills as a gift. We thought it was a joke present. She was deadly serious. She'd just started having children and I guess was ''thinking of the future''
Still makes my jaw drop😂 My mother's too.

Dparents gave dh and I wills (or money towards them) the Christmas after we had Dd and had moved into our forever home. Not as wierd as me giving them wills though....

Dm also knew it was something we’d been thinking about doing just hadn’t gotten around to it yet.

[katmarie]

I expect to inherit nothing from parents, as far as I know they have minimal savings, and rent their home. I'm fine with that, they've given me much much more than money could buy anyway and I'm grateful to them for that. I don't know if they have a will but I suspect dad would just say the little they have goes equally to their children. Mum would say spend it on my grandkids.

I have made a will to leave what I have to my children, and dh's will is a mirror will of mine, as we're fortunate enough to own property. However I hope to raise them to see any inheritance as a bonus, not a given, especially since care home fees are only ever going to go up.

[VictoriaLudorum]

My grandfather used to say to his children that he couldn't leave them x amount per year, but he could educated them so they could earn it themselves. This attitude passed down through the generations.
However, we did benefit quite substantially after the death of our last surviving parent, which was welcome, but not "expected" as a right.
Some years ago, on another forum similar to this, a regular poster was "boasting" about getting a legacy from a relative and what they would do with it - I think it was earmarked for school fees. Imagine the "shock, horror" when it didn't materialise and their plans had to be shelved.
As other posters have mentioned, there is no guarantee these days that assets your parents or grandparents possess will not be eaten up by the costs associated with living to a ripe old age.