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.

I think it's entirely fair that the child providing the lion's share of care is left a bigger share, if that's what the parent chooses.

People who say care should be given without expectation are generally the siblings/family who aren't/wouldn't provide any care (thus easy for them to say, when they don't need to appreciate the incredible impact of caring! The knowledge that your sacrifice is 'seen' is the important aspect for a carer's wellbeing).

I personally wouldn't be comfortable with receiving everything though. I think a modestly higher percentage share to the primary carer is the fairest way all round.

She should write a letter to go with the Will to explain, she should also get a letter from her doctor to state she has full capacity.

No one is entitled to an inheritance and what's fair is not necessarily equal.
If B & C's children aren't happy with what's in the will, well it's no skin of A's nose is it because they don't really have a relationship now?
It's easier than you think to go no contact with relatives.

We were cut off from part of our family when my late fil removed one of his kids from his will. They said we made him do it and tried to contest the will. It was not our doing and it made a very difficult situation even worse.

Honestly, in this situation I think A needs to accept that when J dies and things have settled down, he won’t hear from B or C’s children.

A can choose not to ‘deal with the aftermath’. He can choose to accept his sibling and their families will be pissed off and also make a choice not to try to smooth it all over or fix it. Why should he? And why should a very old woman feel obliged to forewarn anyone who has ignored her so much.

It’s ok for J and A to choose to wash their hands of B, C’s children, and all the rest of them.

In this scenario I’d be telling A to accept his mother’s decision and stop worrying about how to manage his crappy family. He doesn’t have to. They wouldn’t do it for him if it was the other way around.

I would suggest that J leaves a letter of wishes explaining her new will and the reasoning behind it.

My dad didn't have a will but when he died it as only me and one brother in contact. My brother did all the hospital/doctor visits/arranged carers/visited multiple times a week as he lived locally and had no children. I lived 3 hrs away and had a primary aged child, so I just couldn't do what he did. I did what I could - came up and did a deep clean for a couple of days etc but my brother did way more. The other two (half) siblings didn't even know his wife had died 6 years previously, and had made no contact for years and years.

Anyway, when it came to splitting the (quite small) estate - I insisted that my brother claimed from the estate all the time he had committed above and beyond the rest of us did (going back 6 years to when he started needing that help). It worked out he got 2/5th and the rest of us got 1/5th. Sounds like A has done a lot more for J than my brother did for my dad.

I would be inclined to put a financial value to all the care etc (and it sounds like it would add up to a lot over a long time if J had had to pay for all of this) that J has received from A and explain that this 'debt' needed to be repaid before the estate could be split equally between A, B and C (issue of) in the letter of wishes. If this calculates out to be the full estate already then that should be explained in the letter of wishes. It may be more palatable that J gives A (e.g.) 70% of her estate for all the help she has received and then the remaining 30% to be split equally between A, B and C issue - so B and C children get a token amount of 10% and A gets 80%.

J is entitled to do what she wants as she is of sound mind. She clearly values the support and care that A has given her to the point where she is comfortable not giving anything to B or C. Presumably she also understands that A doesn’t have a particularly close relationship with B or C so accepts that whilst B and C might be upset with the will, it’s just going to sour a relationship that was pretty distance to begin with.

If I were J, I do feel there is a duty to tell B and C and not put it on A. It sounds like A has already done a lot for J and to leave A to deal with the aftermath and potential backlash from the wider family does seem unfair. I also think B and C will be forced to make peace with the will if it comes
from J.

she does pay some rent but a hell of a lot less than she would pay for a care home.
Then why doesn't she correct that? She can pay them for the board and care now.

Poorly thought out inheritance decisions are a great way of screwing over your kids and ensuring they never speak to each other again after you're dead. See the other recent thread on school fees and inheritance.

If you want to reward someone in the family for supporting you in your declining years, then ffs do it whilst you and they are both still alive. Directly associate the reward with the effort. Don't leave it until everyone's raw, emotional and in a state of grief, and you're no longer around to explain.

Carer's allowance isn't paid out easily; OP or their spouse would have to be working very limited hours to claim this.

J needs to explain to her other children now, if she doesn’t then A will be left with an all the fallout to deal with and that isn’t fair.

I would probably stipulate that A gets the first x amount and then the rest is shared equally between A, B and 50/50 to C’s children. If there’s nothing left beyond x then so be it. I’d also make sure to leave them all something personal.

it must be takes about before hand though. When my grandparents died one of their children get it was unfair and made a huge fuss, got solicitors involved, etc and a significant part of the estate went on legal fees.

the advice i had from a solicitor is to leave the others an amount - say 5k so that they
can't claim that they been outed from the will as such - just that the amounts have changed. perhaps j could also put - i leave b 5k and living children of c a sum of 5k to be split equally. ein recognition of the many hours of care provided by A i leave the remainder of the estate in full to a.

I would think this is more than fair; A and A;s family has taken on a massive burden to care for A's mum and presumably given up a lot to do so as well.

Solicitors can and should help J write a letter to the other siblings and grandchildren explaining the reasoning to be given to them after she passes.

It's also possible that they won't particularly care about the money. I've sort of been on the other side of this- disinherited by a grandparent. They died as they lived, bothered about nothing other than kissing golden aunties arse, at the expense of every other relationship. Perhaps they haven't bothered with her because she didn't bother with them. It is very unusual to not visit your dying father in hospice, suggests perhaps all is not as straightforward OP believes.

They will contest this. The person who stands to inherit must do absolutely everything possible now whilst she's alive to prove that she has the capacity to make this new will. If that is done they have absolutely no grounds to contest the will and any attempt will fail. I'd honestly have a capacity test recorded on her health records with her agreement of course before the new will is drawn up. I'd also make the solicitor aware of the potential problems down the road and have 2 extremely independent witnesses sign the will. Not you btw whilst you legally can do it, I would make it a litteral stranger like other solicitors in the office or legal secretaries. I'd also ask them to speak to her alone to ensure it's what she wants and isn't being coerced so that the solicitor can give evidence at any contestment of the will

I want to make absolutely clear there is an extremely high risk of contestment and a clear case for coercion unless J takes action to prevent this now.

She's only changing her will after moving in with A, B and Cs children could claim that they pressured her into changing the will ie saying you can move in with us if you change your will and we will keep you out of a care home.

I'm not for a second saying this has been done but it is absolutely imperative that she has a capacity test and is spoken to alone by the solicitor so that they can bare witness that these are her true wishes and not pressure from the inheritor.

The solicitor making the will must be informed of potential issues with executing the will when J dies. They will be well used to dealing with these issues and know what to do.

But if the mother died intestate, then C's children would inherit C's share.

I think the mother should leave a token figure to the others and say that A gets the rest because of his/her caring role.

My mum is paying £1000 per week in her care home. £260,000 would last about five years, unless she has a huge pension coming in.

96 or not this is an unfair way to do things. It seems ridiculously harsh to not give anything to the others. This should be explained in her lifetime. I also assume there was a father around so some of this inheritance is from him too. Why not simply provide money for A now and keep the inheritance separate from that.

There is nothing suggesting A did any of this to get repaid.
They did it because they care.

It would be so unfair for them to not receive the money considering that money is essentially THEIR money. Had A not undertaken the care, J's money would have gone to pay for their care. So the money is essentially only there because A paid for everything

Another person who was in A's situation so am biased but -
Agree fully with J's decision, she also should put a very clear letter of wishes in with her will to explain her decision and ward off any challenges from the other children.
Doesn't sound like the relationship between the siblings is positive anyway and these things often break down fully after the death of a parent anyway.

As others have said, another option is for J to distribute money (that she has liquid at the moment) to A, however again the other children could challenge this if they find out afterwards (they could accuse A of financial abuse of J) especially if there's any sniff of cognitive impairment.

I think it's difficult, because you're relying on secondhand information. Your friend will obviously tell you only their side of the story.

As an outsider, even as a close friend, you can't know the full details of their family setup and relationship with each other, including potential backstory. Or the circumstances of the other sibling and the grandchildren. Maybe they're going through or have been through difficulties. Marriage problems, perhaps even abuse (which often isolates someone but will be perceived as 'not bothering to be in contact' by other family members), ill health, mental health struggles, work problems, or something else.

I also feel slight alarm bells about a 96 year old suddenly changing their Will, especially given this.
She is very deaf and nearly blind, very frail and emotionally fragile. She wouldn't cope with the backlash to be honest.
The adult DC providing care has been doing so for a while? But only now, the very elderly (and physically and mentally fragile) parent is changing the Will. I'd be concerned about whether they genuinely have full capacity to make that decision.

From the NHS: Someone can be deemed to lack capacity to make some decisions (for example, to decide on complex financial issues) but still have the capacity to make other decisions (for example, to decide what items to buy at the local shop).

I think OP has said that that is pretty much nonexistent anyway, since the other sibling has just abandoned his mother .

Cutting people out of wills is generally not a good idea even though the burden of care often unfairly falls on one child. The repercussions can last generations. Plus everyone has their own version of events and sees the situation differently.

Agree with you @Againname, family dynamics are very complicated and things are normally not black and white.