Should inheritance always be split equally amount children?

[Purpleturtle45]

Should you always split inheritance equally between children or should you adjust it according to their individual circumstances like their income and whether they will get inheritance from their in-laws etc?

YANBU-equally is the only fair way
YANBU-take circumstances into account and adjust accordingly

Thing is - my sil and pil would completely deny that she is the favourite.. doesn't make it less true

Equally, selfish/disinterested siblings would deny they've ever approached the relationship with their parents differently.

No good deed goes unpunished.

I get why not leaving it to your n&n as never met

but why isn’t it shared between both brothers aka nephews on partners side

This is why equal is best!

Yes, an equal approach to parents is best. That way, you won't have to wallow in petulance when your siblings have a better relationship with your parents than you do.

We do have an equal attitude. If they had stayed down the road from us, we would have looked after them, they just chose to emigrate instead!

No. If one of my children needs more then they will get more. That’s how it’s done in my family generally though so I don’t think it will come as a shock.

When my Nan died me and DH got slightly more because we did a lot for her (he did significant work on her home to keep it accessible, I checked on her daily - basically we did what we could do keep her out of a home). Grandad left us all the same money but me and my brother got some of his possessions worth a lot of money because it was a shared interest (we got about 7k worth of model trains between us). When my mum dies I think as it stands my oldest brother and my sister should get a bit more as they are not home owners yet and have much worse paying jobs. I hope that changes, but if it doesn’t I don’t mind them getting a bit more cash. When my dad dies there will probably be nothing left because he’s spending it all while he’s here and my step mum will get the house. When she dies I believe she will split it equally between us because she doesn’t feel comfortable making those kind of choices which I totally get.

I think because it’s always been very out in the open it’s not coming as a shock to anyone. My sister threw a strop over the trains so we said any that we don’t set up and use or donate she can have to sell, and in the end she wasn’t bothered.

Equally, my DB is considerably richer than me, we inherited equally from a relative, not life changing, he gave his share to me. Top bloke.

I agree with you that perhaps bypassing sibling 2 would be beneficial however without saying what my relationship is to the siblings I can definitely say bypassing them and going straight to GC will cause massive family drama.
Unfortunately the children of sibling 2 are unlikely to make much better use of the funds (unlikely but not impossible, they are young so perhaps might make better decisions than their parent) so it is a tricky situation.
On the death of the parent with the funds (probably within the next 10 years or so going off average life span) both siblings will be in their 50's. Sibling 1 hopes to retire into their modest home and perhaps take a few holidays abroad, but funnel most if the money down the generations whilst they are alive.
Sibling 2 will also likely give up work but won't think of investing as much as possible to get some income from the money. It will likely be frittered away before the next generation benefits. I hope that some of the money is at least used to by a home that the children inherit on the death of sibling 2. Otherwise 4 close cousins will end up with 2 quite well off and 2 no better off for having had the money.
It has to be equal though because sibling 2 already feels the parents favour sibling 1....not true but sibling 1 simply makes more effort to communicate with them.
It's a minefield to be honest.

Equally. When my parents passed away, the savings they left (no house owned) went between me and my brothers in equal shares. I'm comfortably off, so gave most of mine to my younger brother to help with his daughters' University costs.

I don’t think individual circumstances should really play much part when it comes to their finances.

if you have one scrounging child who plays the benefit system because they cba to work - why do they deserve the same or more than someone who worked hard and still struggles (or doesn’t struggle)?

inheritance should be split according to who’s been there the most, has valued and respected you the most ect.

Always equally.

You say about in-laws but who knows if they’ll still be married at the time of your death.

Then you get siblings who work hard and therefore earn more and the ones who choose not to work or only work PT and therefore earn less.

Me and my sister had this argument a few years ago regarding a fictional lottery win.
She felt she should get more because she’s married with 3 kids, whilst I was a single parent with 1 DC.
Her argument was that there are 5 of them and so even though they were much higher earners, the lump sum would have to be stretched between 5.
Whilst my argument was that I was a single parent and getting a mortgage etc would not be possible but for her it’s much easier.

Ultimately, it’s always fairer to just spilt it equally.
If I was a much higher earner than my siblings I would then give them some of my share but I’d still want to be treated equally.

I would not give ANY inheritance if my child was lazy and not a contributing member of society, for example. I’d give their share to a charity. If all were already working and productive, regardless of the size of their salary (teaching assistant vs. investment banker), they’d receive equally

Thanks for all the perspectives. Leaving different amounts to different children depending on their circumstances seems strange to me as, unless it's glaringly obvious or discussed in depth, how do you actually know their finances.

My PIL recently died and left us some money, not a huge amount but enough to make a difference. This then lead my Dad onto talking about his will and how he would consider giving us less as we had already inherited, whereas one of my siblings will not inherit from in-laws. I thought it was bonkers as no amounts of money have been discussed. We earn the least out my siblings (although both work very hard) and have the most children, still well within our means though. I just wondered if others thought that was fair.

Obviously it's his money to do as he sees fit but to me if you are going down that road you need to have everyone's actual financial information, which they don't have and nobody would be willing to share.

Rewarding care/attention/support can present its own problems. By the time it is needed, the person making the will may have suffered cognitive decline and not understand or know who is giving that help.

The person giving the help may well not be the direct relative. Could be D/SIL. Could be a nephew/niece. You just dont know who is going to step up to the plate or who is going to hang back.

This is the problem with wills which veer away from the norm, they can end up horribly unfair.

Wills can be rewritten only as long as the person writing the will has the capacity to do so.

I agree, treat the nephews equally.

Someone giving to one sibling and that sibling quivering about splitting with sibling before deciding not to has caused a 15 year rift between two siblings.

What a horrible legacy.

My MIL recently died leaving the biggest share to my DH.
He has 2 siblings. 1 lived 10 mins away from MIL and never visited once in 10 years. No cards, phone calls nothing. Literally nothing.
The other lived about 2 hours away. She would send christnas and birthday cards and that's it. Never even a phone call.
DH visited weekly, called almost daily. Did her shopping, did odd jobs.
Yes he deserves more.

To all the always equal people does this apply if you’ve been estranged for example for 30 years from your DC or your DC is a serial killer?

I don’t think it’s always a good idea for it to be split equally. My friend died 2 years ago leaving 2 adult children, one is a drug addict. She put her inheritance into a trust for her DD which is managed by some other friends, for her DD to request money when it is needed, but my friend was very clear she didn’t want the DD to have access suddenly to thousands of pounds that she’d immediately spend on drugs. I don’t think it was an equal amount either because there have been long periods of time where they were NC

That is an extreme example. In that case absolutely no to everything equal.

I think equality should apply to:-
One child wealthy, one not

One child intelligent one not
One child grandkids, one child not

One child successful one not

I view these as valid reasons not to apply equality:-
Dangerous criminal
Long term estrangement ( there must be a reason)
Drug / substance abuse

YABU

There is no 'should' with inheritance

It's wholly up to the person making the will

Absolutely. You could leave everything to a serial killer if you wished Your right.

That doesn't stop the majority of people not being supportive of that decision. This thread is about the general consensus of what is best.

true

and it’s a shit parent who decides not to treat their children equitably.

The point I am trying to make is that my circumstances are such that had they been taken in to account I would be better off.

I am basically planning to pay myself the same amount as I received UC a month, but my outgoings have increased so I am worse off.

Do you genuinely think that adult children who don't behave equitably deserve to be treated equitably? Surely, by your own logic, it's a shit adult child who decides not to treat their parents equitably to how their siblings treat their parents?