Inheritance

[Anotherpotentialinhertiance1]

J is the mum of A,B,C she is 96
C died four years ago, B and A still alive.
J is 96 and has moved in with A and his wife and son who is still a little boy. Band Cs children are all grown adults.
A and his wife have provided many years (15 +) with hands on care, shopping, all appointments, house maintenance, washing, social visits, holidays, life admin as well as A and E visits when needed take unpaid leave to care for her when ill and have cancelled holidays to provide emergency care. Essentially they have enabled J to stay in her own home and have completely placed their lives on hold. They work around J and her needs, provide hands on care, food, appointments and social outings.
B and his family (children and great granchildren) have not visited J for several years and generally just make a quick phone call and send flowers occasionally. There has been no rift just as J has needed more care they have backed away from any involvement.
It was six weeks before they realised that J was no longer living at her home. A and his brother have drifted over the years and don't particularly speak.
J is selling her house, this is going for 200k and she has other savings to about 60k. Her intention is that she will have the cash ready to pay for additional care if she needs it, saving A all the hassle of having to sort out money from her estate after she dies.
J recently requested a solicitor to change her will, she has full capacity. She is changing her will to give A and his wife all of any money that she has left , although A and his wife are providing everything she needs care wise and are not paid to do this so are gaining nothing financially while she is alive.
The most recent will before this was
1/3 of any money left to A
1/3 left to B
1/3 of money left to Cs two adult children.
A is concerned about the potential backlash from the rest of the family on discovery that they now stand to inherit nothing. He is worried more about legal action rather than the moral one because he feels like they have had it easy and not showed J any compassion. If you were the rest of the family how would you react to find that you now stand to inherit nothing?
I'm not standing to inherit anything I'm a friend of J but not as old as her, she looked after my kids when they were younger. I live next door to J and visit her often at As.

They don't seem to make any effort anyway so no real loss there.

It doesn't actually sound as if there is much of a relationship to lose, to be frank.

It’s much less open to challenge if she leaves B something. More than a token but much less than a third. A similar amount divided between C’s adult children. And a letter stating the reasons why (not a nasty letter; just it’s in recognition of all A has done). . Changing her will at her age will likely raise questions about testamentary capacity so she would be best consulting a specialist solicitor rather than a will writing service. More expensive but, again, much less easy to be challenged later. It’s very much best is A does not attend the solicitors appointment at all.

I’m not sure you should be “paid back” for looking after your parents, any money needed should have been paid out as & when needed. Instead there is a “mystery pot” where A is (in thier head) adding together all of the costs with zero transparency.

How does B .. and Cs children know that A is £200k down due to caring, and so feel entitled to all the money ? A should have kept a record of costs, and this should have been shared with the rest of the family.

My mum is in a care home, and as siblings we know who has paid / done what (my sister does a monthly account), so the financial position, and who will get what out of the Estate is transparent

I care for my elderly parents. Dsis does nothing as she lives too far away. I would be horrified if DPs changed their wills to cut my sister out.

I don't expect to get "paid" in an inheritance for the care that I do - I do it because I love my parents and want to look out for them.

If the carers are financially out of pocket as a result of their caring responsibilities, then it would make sense to compensate them for that loss while the DM is still alive, but I wouldn't try to address it through the inheritance.

@JamesPringle and@deeahgwitch
Even despite letting her down so many times?

J's money J's choice.

To minimise fallout later J should ask the solicitor to prepare a side letter explaining why she has left the money to A. At 96 the solicitor will want to be satisfied J has capacity to make the Will anyway.

J could also gift some of the money now while alive to A. The amounts involved will not make any different to PETs/Inheritance tax

No as I wrote just previously I had cross posted with your post stating how they let her down.

I think she should leave a small amount to all the grandchildren too tbh. Honestly, from my experience of wills I'd rather not inherit again. Have caused no end of family rifts for us, people really need to consider the aggro it creates for the family members left behind.

My grandmother did that.

My DF died 20 years before she did leaving my 2 uncles. Uncle P lived abroad, uncle M lived around the corner and spent years being there for her, as did his wife and DC - popped in twice a day, shopped, made meals arranged appointments.

I lived 200 miles away and phoned a couple of times a week and visited regularly for nice times but couldn't do anything day-to-day.

Uncle P visited every year or so.

When she died, everything went to uncle M, and everyone agreed that was as it should be. No arguments.

Is J not claiming carers allowance (it’s not means tested), this could be passed to A now for out of pocket expenses? And a fair split for inheritance which will not cause further issues.

@Shortfatsuit they live less than 10 miles away. A lives about 20 miles away so there's is really no reason other han they can't be bothered however I understand what you mean.

Get a doctors letter to confirm capacity so they cannot argue that point

@EffinMagicFairy I think J sees that A has put in more effort than any carers allowance could ever repay him! I tend to agree, he is a lovely man.

A letter with the will explaining that she is leaving everything to A for his devoted care in her later years. And specifically she has decided not to leave anything to B and C and their descendants. Something like that should make it difficult for anyone to contest the will. I assume the will will cover if he pre-deceases her, passing the inheritance to his wife and children.

I think J should leave a nominal amount to B and the GC, say £50 or £100 each, to show they have been considered. If she doesn't want to leave anything to them then it should be said in the will that they are not being included, otherwise it could be argued J had not remembered to include them.

Although you say she has full capacity, I'd be wary if she is very deaf and almost blind. Again, it could be argued she didn't have full realisation of what she was signing. I think the letter of wishes, to accompany the will, is a good idea so that it explains her rationale.

I personally hate it when families can't be bothered with an elderly loved one, leave all the care to one sibling, then expect a share of the money when they pass.

I guarantee you that the rest of the family will fight or at least complain a lot if they don't get at least what they think is equal share.

A will be completely screwed over if they have a chance.

J is seeing a solicitor and is having an independent undersigned provided by the solicitors. She can still read and understand despite her vision, just needs time to read things.
A support with her ay to day money, he has kept receipts and literally writes every penny she has spent down and what she has spent it on so he can't be accused of anything.

She spends her own money on her needs ? He keeps the receipts for that.

Why is he receiving all the money, if she’s spending her own money now ? It’s needs to be made very clear why the others are being cut out of the inheritance.

@ExtraOnions I don't she could sensibly spend it all. She plans to have some for any nursing care she might need. She is definitely staying with A for life she may need live in help. She sounds some money but can't go on holiday, can't drive etc. So she says that there are only so many pairs of slippers that she can buy!

Might just be your wording, but do the siblings all have the same dad?

There have been a few like this recently, and the problem is they all leave the fallout to the children after the parent has died. There will be bitterness and resentment.

It would be better if J pays A rent and a carers allowance recompense those that were giving her support and care whilst she's alive. Then deal with the residual estate as per the 1/3 per family line. Leaving it all to sort out on J's death doesn't help anyone.

We were in a similar if less extreme situation - in our case J didn't need quite as much support, and B did input but was hampered by distance. C’s children had always lived on the other side of the world so there was little contact, especially after C died.

Our J left her money as per your J’s original will, and that was a bitter pill to swallow. In particular, C’s children - who had had little real contact with J - inherited the same as A who had done the lion’s share of the caring, and far more than A’s child who had a strong close and active relationship with J and received just a token amount. B felt awkward for inheriting as much as A.

And even though there was relatively little to share out, the thought counted - and it hurt A.

At the end of the day, if J’s children have a good relationship then whatever J does will be fine - if B and C still think they should inherit the same as A and are going to kick off if they don’t then there probably isn’t much of a real relationship there in the first place.

But FWIW I think J is doing the right thing, although some tokens amounts would soften the blow.

@Kinshipug yes all same dad. B and C much older than A. J thought she'd started menopause in her mid fortresses was pregnant with A. He was a surprise baby.

@DogInATent she does pay some rent but a hell of a lot less than she would pay for a care home. She has lived with A since December but I think she wants to repay him for nearly 20 years of care for both his dad and herself.
A has missed out on several opportunities as he has provided care. He turned down a job that could have made him considerably wealthier but his dad got cancer. A very significant relationship for him also failed as his partner at the time couldn't cope with the situation so he has done without and sacrificed a lot for his parents. Luckily his wife is equally a lovely as he is.