AIBU - inheritance sad story

[whattodo1113]

I’m going to break this down as easily as possible.

my grandad who is now 86 had 5 children. (The eldest is my mum)
he split up with my grandma when the children were young.
all the children are now obviously grown up in their 60s.
all of them have wife’s / husbands and their own children. They ALL live good lives and have done well for themselves are by NO means hard up.

my grandad has worked hard all his life and paid his house off etc and was alone for a long long time with not much quality of life. He then met someone and married her and had a daughter later on in life when he was late 50s. This child is grown up now too. He is still with his wife now and has been for 25 years ish. Sorry my numbers aren’t the best and it’s not really relevant.

the whole family welcomed wife and the new child and I must say she’s always been lovely she’s a lovely woman. The daughter they had I loved and still do very much. My grandad has always been a good grandad to us. I have fond memories with him and I love him loads.

so here’s the crunch….
before he met his wife he put his house in the 2 eldest children’s names (my mum included) his train of thought was if anything happened to him or he got ill etc they’d have that house and all those things and he didn’t want it to end up in a charity or whatever I don’t know.

3 years ago as he’s getting very old now he asked them to sign the house back to him as his wife has lived there with him 25 years now and it’s her HOME and their daughter lives there too. She works part time. He’s obviously planning not being here anymore
they have refused him the house and have said when he dies she can stay for 2 years to get on her feet and find somewhere then they will sell it and split the money between the 5 children.

there argument is he left when they were kids and this new child got more of him than they did growing up.
I personally think this is very revengeful of my mum and greedy and not morally right? My grandad is very depressed and cries and I just hate that this is how the end of his life looks. He said his wife has been there the most for him and loved and looked after him and she’s gonna be left in a mess when he goes and she’s doesn’t deserve it. Which I agree.

I’ve told my mum it’s his house. He paid for it. He worked for it. Give it him back. Am I being soft ?? What do you think?? I just personally feel disapointed in them.
may I add nobody visited him often or cared to see him much but they want his house and money?

they’ve all said wife will have his pension that’s enough. Which is about 500 a month I think.

I just can’t stop thinking about him and I’m the only one in the family who has said how he’s being treated is discusting. They think he’s cruel taking the house back but at the end of the day he bought the house and his life situations have changed now and all the kids are so well off with their own businesses etc they don’t NEED it. Xxx

You can’t just decide to sign a house back over - your mother and her sibling legally own it and have for over 25 years

What is the value of the house? And the value of the pension in comparison?

Shes obviously a lot younger than him if he had a child in his late 50s….. she’s benefited from not having to pay rent / mortgage etc and he has benefited ultimately from care fees etc

Did he abandon her? Where does OP say that please?

Yeah. Where does that say he abandoned them and never saw them?

Of course the child who lives with their parents gets more time with them than a child of divorced parents.

There is no suggestion that the GF abandoned anyone.

Oh god what a situation. So many parts to this. Honestly, if it’s the case that he left his first wife and kids with nothing and they struggled then good luck to your mam and other sibling. The house is legally theirs, he’s asking them to give them their house.
If he was always an amazing involved father, then I’d feel differently.

Not an accountant but this sounds like a nightmare. He should have paid CGT when he put in the names of his children (if due) and if they were to give to him now then they will have to pay CGT. So basically the only winners would be HMRC and possibly solicitors! I would leave well alone. He made a decision he regrets haven't we all!

I've come across a similar situation recently (not with a gift of the house, but a man with two families, and the children of the first marriage using the opportunity of their father's impending death to seek recompense for the hurt he inflicted on them when he left 30 years ago).
It's ugly. I don't condone the attitude of the older daughter, but it's a direct result of the parent's selfish actions and a stark reminder of the damage that divorce causes to children. We like to tell ourselves that children are resilient, and that time heals, but the reality is that a divorce can cause lifelong wounds for the children.

Also did the two siblings pay anything when the house was transferred? As most solicitors would have advised a payment rather than an out and out gift of the home he lived it.

Because even more so then your granddad really would be barking up the wrong tree more than he is already.

I totally agree. They have had all this time and did nothing. How lovely for them to be living for free all those years in house they didn’t own. Most people would find it hard to have sympathy for them now panicking over money when they have all those years to plan.

The only thing I will say though is that maybe the children were not young when he left, maybe they were older teens or twenties. He might have left a bad marriage and signed the house over to the eldest two (who were over 21) after a divorce, so that they could look after the younger ones college fees etc or give them a down payment on a house if he died. It also might have been 10 or 15 years between the divorce and meeting his second wife. We can’t really accuse him of abandoning a young family as we don’t know any of that information.

The original families mother might have remarried a very wealthy man. We just don’t know.

All we know is that it’s a mess and it’s better to deal with things than ignore them.

How lovely living rent free in a house he didn’t own? @3luckystars ? Maybe, but don’t make him sound like a freeloader. He paid for it!

Though I agree with an earlier poster who said the only winners are HMRC. You can’t bounce a house back and forward like a tennis ball! What a mess.

Yeah I also paid for a leather jacket about 30 years ago and then I gave it away. I do regret it sometimes but that was my own stupid fault for giving it away and I can’t expect to get it back now just because I want to give it away to someone else.

Won't it be the estate that is liable for the IHT, rather than the two owners of the house?

Government website states:
If you want to continue living in your property after giving it away, you’ll need to:

• pay rent to the new owner at the going rate (for similar local rental properties)
• pay your share of the bills
• live there for at least 7 years

Otherwise it counts as a ‘gift with reservation’ and will be added to the value of your estate when you die. (A gift with reservation is where you give something away but continue to benefit from it.)

Happy to be corrected on this.

When the time comes maybe the daughter can get a mortgage and buy the house from your mum and aunt?

If they're not feeling so greedy maybe they could sell it at a slightly reduced price in a private sale.

I also think he should have been paying market rent

Was his own home so no cgt payable when he transferred it.

Wow, he’s properly fucked this up. What an odd things to do - give your house to only 2 of your 5 children? And to do it by handing over ownership instead of via a Will?! Surely most right thinking people would realise what a crazy risk that is.

I feel for his wife, did she know he’d done this when they met and married?? If I were her I wouldn’t have been moving into that house with him, I’d have bought/retained my own for security.

Just awful all round.

Your grandfather hasn't owned the house for over 25 years, before he even met his second wife. He signed the house over to his two eldest children - they are in effect his landlord and he's a tenant, and yes he should be paying his children rent. A similar situation with my FIL's wife's Dad - he transferred ownership to his house to a niece - the niece and her husband lived in military paid accommodation - the niece asked him to move out because her husband was coming out the military after 30+ years and they wanted to live in the house!! He no longer owned the house, he had no option but to find an alternative place to live in his 80's. Unfortunately, it's not all as straightforward as you think. Morally, yes of course your grandfather's wife should inherit, and your Mum and her sibling should sign the house back over to him. It's not that simple though. Your grandfather made a huge mistake in signing over his property at such an early age, without really either looking into or perhaps understanding the consequences. I rather think your Mum and her sibling need legal advice, because they could end up with huge CGT or/and IHT bills to pay.

I don't think it's fair to blame your mum, if your grandad's wife hasn't looked after herself and their child in terms of future housing, that's her responsibility really. Did your grandad let her think the house was still his?
Is his wife in a position to buy the house off your mum and the other sibling, when he dies, or can your grandad and wife buy it back now?
What's to stop your mum and her sibling selling it from under them right now? They are in a vulnerable position.

Initially I thought you aren’t being unreasonable but there’s much more to this than meets the eye. I don’t think you should be affronted on behalf of your aunt.
Why is the house only in the names of 2 of the 4 oldest children?
Is grandpa not on the deeds at all? You can check this for a few pounds via the land registry.
Who has been paying for upkeep and maintenance of the house?
Were the older ones enough to contribute something financially at the time on the understanding they would inherit?
Looking at it from your mother’s viewpoint how would you feel if a much younger woman moved into your father’s home when he was pushing 60, a home, that he owned outright, and had a child with him, father then disinherited you and that child laid sole claim to the house.

Because the house is in the name of the two oldest children!

Shared between six children, surely, since there is his DD from second marriage, your aunt? But your mum is being unreasonable. She is wanting to turf out her stepmother. Legal advice is needed, rather than hand-wringing, unfortunately.

DD from second marriage is in her 20s.

We need more intel 🧐

DD from second marriage started this thread.

Morally the money should be split between the 6 kids. Why should the youngest and new wife inherit everything?

I would also be very pissed off if I was your mother. I’ve seen similar happen before, man remarries and leaves everything to the youngest child with the current partner. Of course that will cause bitterness towards the older children.

I think so too. You need to get a job and try and buy the house with your mum.