Will - inheritance, is this fair?

[clingycassandra]

I will start by saying I firmly believe a will should be what the will maker wants to happen to their estate when they die.
My worry is the arrangements being made by an elderly relative will make waves for the family.
Elderly relative has told me they intend to leave their estate equally to their grandchildren and great grandchildren.
All good so far, except some of the grandchildren have yet to have children. I am worried (knowing the family dynamic) that the childless grandchildren will have issue that their unborn children 'will miss out'.
The elderly relative does not see grandchildren or great grandchildren due to location, they have met GC but not GGC.
Relative has adult children but they are financially secure and are not included in the will.
In my family parents have left their estate to their children and them to theirs, down the generations, so this feels odd to me.
Surely better to leave the estate equally to the children or skip 1 generation and share it between the grandchildren (there will be no more)?
My direct family is not involved so I will not benefit either way but I will have to help deal with the fallout, which I know will happen.

Where there's a will, there's a fallout, sadly.

I think it's fair enough, I don't like the view that children are subsets of their parents, I think it's right that they're treated as independent individuals.

Of course people who aren't born yet won't benefit! That's just one of those things.

My grandmother left a fixed sum to all grandchilden and great grandchildren. I was 37 weeks pregnant with ds when she died.

Luckily it was a small enough amount that we could make it up ourselves - the idea of dd getting money and ds not feels pretty awful to me.

That is probably a point to make - that some of her grandchildren will be “mid kids” at her death and so you could end up with a big divide between siblings.

I’m with the elderly relative on this one. You can’t count children that either aren’t born yet, or not even conceived yet - madness! They’re looking after those that are here and living - makes perfect sense.

This was a thought I had but the sum for each recipient is in excess of £50k, so not an option unfortunately. The GGC will have their share put in trust for them until they are older.

I agree.

If this person wants to leave money specifically for their great grandchildren, that's fine. I don't see a need to factor in completely hypothetical, and as of yet not conceived children.

I would say that the will should be worded as such that it includes all great grandchildren at the time of death, rather than name the specific great grandchildren individually, in case any come along between the will being written, and the person dying.

I wouldn't expect a will to leave something to children who do not exist. Any will I have encountered leaves a specific sum to named people (i.e. grandchildren) but not to possible future grandchildren. That has to be changed at a later date as and when necessary.

It's not up to other people to dictate how a will is written and how an estate is divided.

My granny left money to all her grandkids (I was pregnant when she passed) and she included my baby but any baby’s after that were not included. No one is upset or feels they’ve missed out.

My DC missed out as they weren’t born when GGM died, their cousins all got a sum of money when they turned 18, my DC don’t know they missed out on inheritance, something we’ve never discussed, just one of those things, no ill feeling on our part.

I don't really understand how or why someone could feel they'd missed out on inheritance from somebody they'd never known as they hadn't even existed on the planet at the same time?!

Can't remember the full details, but it was fairly simple for our solicitor to include current nieces and nephews plus potential extra ones when XH and I wrote our wills. At the time, we agreed a fixed sum each for all our nieces, nephews and potential further offspring, with the balance equally divided between our siblings. His family would have got the larger amount, they were the bigger family, he was the bigger earner. Much trickier with my DH now, he refuses to make a will.

I was left money by a grandmother I never met, the equivalent here is that she put an equal amount in a trust for the children of each grandchild when they turned 25. So if one only had one child they got it all when they hit 25, if one had three they got 1/3 you could structure it so that if they have no children by 2040 the grand child gets it.

“I will start by saying I firmly believe a will should be what the will maker wants to happen to their estate when they die.”

Correct so why not just leave it there?

Anyone worrying about their unborn or even not conceived babies missing out is ridiculous

My parents recently updated their wills and took advice on this point. They were told that they could either:
A) leave it in equal shares to all grandchildren born at the date of their death; or
B) put the money into a trust to be shared equally at a specific date in the future (i.e then the oldest grandchild turns 25) - this would give the childless time to have children

They were advised that option B is technically difficult and would require trustees to submit yearly accounts etc.

The reason this was discussed with me in such detail is that I'm the youngest of my siblings, and so am potentially most likely to have children that "miss out"

They felt that option A is easier and I agree!

Anyone who is unhappy that money hasn't been willed to a child that doesn't exist and hasn't been born is bonkers IMO. I find that a very entitled attitude tbh.

I can see that it would feel pretty unfair if an older sibling or to a lesser extent a cousin got 50k and the younger didn't as it's the difference between getting into debt for uni fees or having a deposit waiting for you or not.

There are ways round it from an amount set aside for future GGC the remainder of which could be split at X date to childless GC being given more (and then you're practically at just split between GC) but is up to the relative. Alternatively the GC could all agree to put in a set amount of theirs or a standing order in such a fund, but if you're fallout that is not going to happen.

But for what it's worth my only cousin inherited a million pounds 2-3 decades ago and I got 3k in a post office account (not from the same relative) and survived

My mother's will was written to include any grandchildren that might be born after the will was made. I'm assuming that wouldn't include those born after her death though.

The first sentence of your post is I will start by saying I firmly believe a will should be what the will maker wants to happen to their estate when they die. why are you questioning the will makers decision?

She has every right to leave to who she wants. No one should contest that. They can argue about it but a will is a will. I have never thought about a will that was written by my great grandparents before I was born. I'm sure there were. People leave inheritance to the living. I think she's rather thoughtful enough to leave it to gc & ggc she's never sees!

Of course it’s fair for her to leave money to the grandchildren she had known and loved and not leave anything to any that may or may not exist in the future after her passing.

As someone approaching 70 and revisiting my will, is say it's not fair at all.
At this point only one of my daughters has had grandchildren. The other may or may not. I might or might not live to see them. But if she does have them they'll mean every bit as much to her as my present grandchildren mean to my other DD. And she'll want the best for them just as her sister does for hers. I love my daughters equally and I'd want my money to help their offspring equally, whether I meet all those children or not.

When I update my will in the near future, I'll be taking advice on how to plan for both possibilities.

Because the will maker night not have realised that the wording is important?

I would be very grateful if someone pointed out that the wording of my will could cause family fall outs after my death. That's the very last thing I'd ever want.

As OP will not be benefiting in any way from the will, she's in a perfect position to point this issue out to the will maker.

You can’t imagine tension between an older child who inherited excess of £50k from a great grandparent they never knew because they were 6m old, and a younger sibling who has nothing?

You are doing what you want with your will. That’s totally fair.

Some other woman wants to leave money to the great grandchildren she’s known and loved. That’s also totally fair.

As you said in your opening sentence, it’s her money. She can do what she wants to.

Who on earth leaves money to children who may never exist?

And maybe she is quite happy leaving it to her GC and GGC whom she knows. That’s the deal with wills, you get to say what you want to happen with your estate when you die.

thinking someone might not realise the wording is important is a bit patronising.