If one of your adult kids won the lottery

[Hedgeoffressian]

If you have two grown children. One of them wins a substantial sum on the lottery. Your other child is very poor living from one pay day to the next and has to budget to make sure they can pay for life’s essentials. Would this affect what you leave your children in your will and would you leave the majority of your assets to the child who needs it most? Or would you split it between them evenly?

I personally would leave the majority to the child who has nothing. Would you do the same?

Disclaimer to add this hasn’t affected me in real life. It’s something I have wondered about though.

I would leave them an equal share.
Why should the one who makes shrewd financial decisions be penalised because their sibling hasn't done the same?

Yes I'd leave it to the one that needs it most in that situation.

But I would also be extremely disappointed in the lottery winning child if they didn't share their good fortune with their sibling. I'd expect my kids to set the other one up if they received a lottery win tbh.

Winning the lottery is not a shrewd financial decision.

I think you would have to leave them equal amounts.

Still get the same. Many people, particularly on here, equate love and worth in such terms and if one sibling gets more than another in an inheritance, the general consensus is that the parents loved the child with the bigger slice more

Oh yeah 😂, should read more thoroughly!

I have 2 adult DC and we have discussed mythical lottery wins and already agreed we’d share so it wouldn’t be an issue. Plus I don’t have much to leave in a will! So that wouldn’t really matter.

I'd expect my lottery winning child to give their sibling and me a chunk of the money.

No. Both get equal share

This. You've no really idea how people‘s lives will play out.

I would leave equally unless one needed it because of disability or poor health rather than poor decisions.

A lottery win may well be an exception, since it's just good fortune. Only if the lottery win was more than the estate though and enough to properly set them up so an inheritance wouldn't make a difference. I'd discuss it with the lottery winner so they'd know though, and leave them something sentimental like my jewellery or something.

In general though, best to just go equal.

No they should get an equal share. I would hope that the lottery winner would give a chunk of money to their sibling!

Can't believe the sibling with the lottery win wouldn't help out the struggling sibling. This wouldn't happen in my family. If I won the lottery I would definitely give a substantial sum to my brother (and parents).

I'd be very disappointed if the winner didn't help out their sibling (assuming they hadn't fallen out)

I'd try and help out the struggling sibling while I was still alive and then leave more to them to even things out.

Ok but for arguments sake what if the child without any money is poor through no fault of their own? E.g. if they struggled academically and had a run of bad luck leading them to the situation they now find themselves in?

Interesting to read people’s comments on this.

My children would share, so it wouldn't come up. I help my two youngest out, one a LP and the other has had life opportunities cut down because of Autism/LDs. My eldest is well set up and also helps the LP DD. I used to buy my LP neice a weekly bus pass and bits of shopping, there was no resentment from my children. Money grabbing doesn't exist in every family.

If the lottery winning sibling has t helped their poor sibling I’d be tempted to help the poor one as much as I could, draining assets if necessary, then leave equal shares.

Well I would like to think the winner, would offer some financial security for their sibling,. A lottery win is a gift, if they could not share that with their sibling, I would be most disappointed and that would be reflected in my will as I offered the poorer child financial security.

Well if it were me who won the lottery, I'd sort my brother and his family out. Buy their house for them etc. I'd like to think my dc would do the same for each other too.

I’d leave the majority to the child who has nothing.

If I were the child who’d won the lottery, that’s also what I’d expect my parent to do. In my own family, there’s not much difference in the finances of me and my siblings. But if there was, we’d all want the money to go to the one/s who needed it rather than the one/s who were already extremely wealthy.

I think if I’d raised a child who didn’t share their good fortune with their sibling (assuming there wasn’t a good reason why they didn’t get on) I would be very disappointed with them, but I don’t think I would cause the sibling relationship to have any further damage by favouring one of them in the will.

That is like my family.
2 of us are financially okay, the 3rd isn't. The 3rd isn't stupid, she is financially feckless.
I know my parents have helped her out over the years and I don't resent that but I can believe some people would.
My parents had nothing to leave, so inheritance wasn't an issue.

I'd discuss with the child with the money what they thought

I'd leave it to the one who needs it most but I'd tell the lottery winner of my plans so it wouldn't come as a surprise.