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.

“When your brother was 3, his great gran died and left him some money. It was before you were born.”

Nothing more to be said. And no need to discuss with the children until they’re of an age to access the money anyway.

My children know they are not inheriting from their grandparents but their cousins are. It’s a life-altering amount for young people, probably £100k.

That’s just how it goes. It doesn’t stop them loving their grandparents and getting on well with their cousins.

How would you manage things in a straightforward and reasonable manner if one or two of your children each had over £50k each and the other one or two had nothing?

The money left by a great grandparent that that none of the children had ever met?

Yes, you could put energy into persuading the ones with nothing that it’s just bad luck, don’t worry, find ways to deal with jealousy, envy or resentment, or just wish that your grandparent had distributed the money to their grandchildren who could in turn share it amongst the great grandchildren once they turned 18. For example. No resentment, jealousy or envy to deal with.

No sadness watching one kid struggle while another sits nicely on a nest egg for a deposit .

OP, another potential issue with leaving named sums to named or specified individuals is that if the money runs out (care fees etc, investments crash) is that once the named sums are distributed the people that were originally intended as the majority beneficiaries as receiving the ‘residual estate’ might not get a bean.

Another possible pitfall of not using a proper solicitor.

Sounds like a nightmare which you're going to have to deal with.

Maybe best to advise your brother in law to change his will and completely disregard all great grand children and everything is to pass to the grand children only. Then its upto the grand children to pass it down to their own children ( if they have any). I think this is the fairest way.

If he doesnt change his will then I can't see what arguments the childless grandchildren can have. It's just unfortunate they didn't have children early. It is what it is. Hopefully the children who are financially independent and not inheriting from your brother in law will be able to provide an inheritance for their grand children and give more to the ones who missed out. Hope it all works out for you in the end.

Could the relative be encouraged to set up a trust fund that pays out once the youngest GGC turns 18 or 25? That way, realistically they all will have been born and will all be of a (hopefully) responsible age.

Can I ask if your nieces or nephew are inheriting from a grandparent that is a grandparent of your own children?
How would you/they feel if a joint grandparent left money to the cousins but not your children?
Do you think that at the age they were old enough to inherit they would be happier than knowing from day 1 (or age appropriate)? Would their age alter what their reaction would be?

When great grandad died he left 3/12 of his estate to my two named children. I was pregnant at the time so we split it in three and gave them all the same. It was a clever and lovely way of making sure my unborn child also benefitted.

Yes, I think this is very significant. How are the parents supposed to handle that? They might well not have the means to provide the same amount for the one who was not included.

A solicitor should do that.

I am leaving everything to my children except for a bequest to my oldest friend. My solicitor said if I wanted to leave my friend 10k but my estate was 11k, my friend would get her ten but my kids would only get a third each of the remaining £1000. It is better to leave percentages so that is what I did.

Then it would be time to introduce that very important concept: life ain’t fair.

Although not directly involved myself, I have come across the situation you mention in (B).

It was really complicated (although I believe that the law has changed since then) and involved "lives in being plus 21 years" and leaving gifts to the grandchildren.

Yes, it’s shared grandparents. They’ve known since they were about 15. They are ok about it - they understand the reasons behind it. I’m fine with it as well.

You have come on here and asked a question when you're already totally fixed in your opinion. There was no point in asking. You are answering to justify the viewpoint you held in the first place and are going to stick with that viewpoint regardless what any poster answers. Waste of your time and everyone else's.

bit harsh.

That’s a very big form of unfairness though!

One DC getting more birthday presents from school mates is one thing. £50K that one sibling gets and one doesn’t is on another level and not how I want to bring up my family. If I was facing this situation as a parent, I’d be working out how to provide the £50K to the younger one. And cursing the relative.

I can't change a thing. I asked for opinions and hoped that people on this post would give me examples of situations they have been involved with and give me an idea as to how their situations paned out.
I have nothing to gain but a family that will be shelled shocked and I will have to deal with it as I am very close to the GC and GGC.
The lack of legal professional involvement worries me.

I still don’t understand WHY you have to get so involved OP 🤷‍♀️
As a pp said - “When your brother was 3, his great gran died and left him some money. It was before you were born.” - this is spot on. I genuinely think you’re creating drama in your head. 🤷‍♀️

I’ve very glad my DF didn’t create this drama. It would have resulted in DC1 with an inheritance worth the best part of half a million quid and DC2 with nothing. I’m sure the lesson that DC2 would learn about avarice would really compensate and help to rebalance their relationship.

@clingycassandra id explain it’s just life and it’s very lucky/unusual for great grandkids to get anything at all. They weren’t even born/thought of when the great grandparent was alive. Life’s not fair unfortunately and where does it end if you make exceptions for everything… what if one of the great grandchildren has kids and then their kids die they get something? It has to end somewhere.

I would be wary of the fallout in your shoes too @clingycassandra! It does seem much more straightforward for inheritance to go to GCs only, if that's a fixed variable (i.e. there won't be any more born), but I can understand the will writer wanting to include their GGC.

Hypothetically, I know if my DC was due to inherit £50k+ from their GGM/F who died when they were 9 months old, that I would have an incredibly difficult time explaining to my DC who is only 10 months younger than their sibling, that they had no such monies to inherit - it really does seem to be lining up some pretty fierce sibling rivalry for the future!

It's very hard when it's a considerable sum. The only thing to do really, if the relative is discussing the content of their will, is for a/some/all GC to chat with them about whether leaving it shared between the GC only (presuming there's a 'set' number of them now) and allow them to share the money down to their children as they would like. Maybe leaving a smaller token amount to current GGC which is easier to explain/add to.

My daughter was the only GC and she inherited £10k. There are now three other GC who got nothing. It's a big amount but not as unattainable as £50k, so we've been able to save so our son will have something similar to his sister. Not identical as her's is earning a chunk in interest, but he won't have nothing.

However, my brother and I are executors for our parents will and we're going to even it up amongst the other 3 GC (my son and my brother's children) from our own share of their estate if possible. I think that's probably the only thing to do in this situation, is for the GC to use their own share to even it up amongst any future children they have.

Edited for typos