Work Life Assurance, Leave to my husband or son?

[Doingmybesteveryday]

I know this is morbid and I hope it never comes to this, but here goes.

My work provide life assurance at x3 my salary if I were to die whilst working there.

I am married and we have an 11 month old son. We are both early 30s. We have a Life Insurance and critical illness policy which would pay off the mortgage completely if either of us were to die or become ill, etc.

The work one would be a separate thing. I remember putting my husband down as 100% beneficiary if the worst happens, but I’m beginning to wonder if I should have left the whole thing to my son. My theory would be, the mortgage would be paid off and his work would absolutely give him a huge amount of paid time off. My son would then go onto inherit from my parents as I am an only child, and he would find himself quite well off. However, the likely hood is my husband would more than likely meet someone else and could potentially have more children with them? The house could then potentially be left to “new wife” would could then potentially cut him out especially if they have more children. Money does horrible things to people, especially when it comes to other people’s children. I know I sound like a nutcase and my mind is running wild, but I feel as if I change the form to him, I’m guaranteeing him something which no one can take away or move the goal posts on. Other part of me thinks, should I leave it to my husband who at that point could do with that large slice of cash to help through a tough time and make memories with our son. How would I feel if he did the same to me? And, would I tell him? I just don’t know. Help.

aibu-

yabu- leave to husband
yanbu- leave to son

I’d leave it to my husband and trust him to do right for my child.

Id leave it to your child definitely

Hm. I kind of agree.

It's not about trust really, life can be long and if you were to die young it wouldn't be out of the norm for your husband to remarry and have more children.

If it were me, I'd see if I could leave 50/50 to my husband and son whilst he is young. That way your husband would have money to help him raise your child.

Then, as your child gets to older teen years/adulthood I'd update it so he would inherit 100%. His dad wouldn't require help from your income at that point to raise him.

I think you are being quite canny. Plenty of people re-marry and years down the line everybody has forgotten your share and strangers get a chunk of your money via blended families.

I think that we read too often on this site about people whose fathers have remarried and everything has gone to the new wife cutting out the child.

I appreciate that reading it maybe once or twice a month in here means it's probably still quite rare, but honestly it's not worth the risk!

While your child is young I would leave to your husband because the extra costs of him raising a child on his own - full time nursery etc - would be high and even with the mortgage paid off he'd be living on only one salary. However I agree with the PP that once child is older you could change it.

Everything is being left to my children. I've seen first hand far too many doting husbands keep money from their children after their partner passed. You never think people will be dickheads until they're dickheads.

I would leave to my husband and trust him to ensure the money went to our child if he went on to have more children when older. I feel confident my DH would do this although if I didn’t, I would leave to my child.

Just talk to yur DH about your feelings.

If I died and my DH went on to marry again with further children I'd be happy for them to benefit from what would now be my DH's money to do as he wishes.

@Doingmybesteveryday You could sort the house situ in your will so that your DC will inherit your share, and if your DH remarries, he could never leave your portion to a new wife or family. I believe your solicitor would need to get you both registered as tenants in common rather than joint tenants.

I’ve split mine in % shares.
DH gets enough to pay off mortgage and have 100k buffer to pay for Nannies, therapy, etc. the rest goes to kids….

I think when your son is so young, leave to your husband. We're of the view that insurance policies, death in service, widows pensions etc are too support the one left behind in raising our DC to adulthood.

When they're grown, we'll likely amend things in our DC's favour, but for now I wouldn't want to restrict DH's finances in any way if he was widowed with two young DC. I'd be happy for him to spend every penny for the benefit of him and the DC.

Yes me too. As I said I'd feel differently if my DC were grown.

If son is under 18, would it not have to be administered by a trust anyway? A child cannot invest or spend on their own nursery fees. I would talk to my husband about it.

£100k won’t last long for nannies and therapies. You might want to rethink the split and also take into account inflation.

I’m all for safeguarding assets to provide for your kids, but in this instance, unless you seriously don’t trust your husband to look after your child if you die, then nominate your DH as the beneficiary.
That money is for your DH to bring up your DC in the lifestyle that your wage would allow had you lived. It is no use your child inheriting £100k in a trust fund at 18 if his childhood has been lived in penury.
You can rethink the nomination when your child grows up.

We've set up a trust will so that in the event one of us dies dd's proportion of any money is protected even if there is remarriage etc.

I’ve left to children

you cannot guarantee your husband would do the right thing and ensure it went to your child - and I don’t mean he’s sneaky or untrustworthy- but life moves on. He could meet someone else, remarry, have more children etc etc and that money becomes part of another family and split or simply left to wife etc

seen it happen so many times that I wrote my will in such a way to prevent this and nominated my children as benefactors to this

Oh and my dh would have been fine as mortgage paid off, had his own pension, etc already taken care of . My half if house ringfenced yo children along with my work life assurance

this absolutely happened to my own mum / and all her own mothers assets went to her dad/ who remarried v quickly then died with no will in place so all assets went to new wife and her family and my mother never saw a penny…. New wife of not long gained hundreds of thousands

I've left mine to DH. The mortgage would be paid off. I'm the biggest earner, I'd want him to have a comfortable life if I was gone. He's a bit old for remarrying someone young enough to want kids, and I don't think his moral compass would let him cut DC off. And DC are very well provided for anyway.

We have life insurance which pays mortgage off. I’ve split my work one 3 ways between husband and children. He has done the same with his.

It’s discretionary anyway, your company can give it to whoever they think best whatever you write down. You will only fill out an expression of wishes form, this means that it will sit outside of inheritance tax. I’d just leave it to your husband, I’m sure he’ll do the best by his son.

It's so difficult. Our home and 2 btl would become my DH's and he'd also get half my private pension and annuity for life. He will shortly start drawing a good pension of his own. I've also left 1 btl house to each of my DC, one almost paid off mortgage house between 2 DGC and a further 4 btl houses in a ltd company with shares split equally between my DH and 3 DC. I'm also setting up a trust so 2 houses can be managed with my Foster Son and any future DGC as beneficiaries. FS has quite severe learning disabilities and most likely won't be able to work or live alone and because of this I can't risk his level of state support by leaving him a house as then he wouldn't get benefits or help so I'm going down the route of a trust for him to benefit. He couldn't manage his own finances.

DP left 90% to our daughter. I said to him no point her having this money if she can't access until 18 so need to check the rules etc. he's now changed it to 50:50.

Mines 90% to her. Just to be safe.