AIBU to want my estate divided equally between all four children?

[Imdefonotmaddona]

I have 4 children
DD 1 and DD2 are mine and my late husbands.
DS2 - was biologically husbands and not mine but he is with me full time.
DD3 is mine with my current DP so the only one who hasn’t got the same dad.

on the passing off my husband everything came to me. I have always been financially independent and the house was paid for by both of us.
he had some money and a life insurance policy.

I am updating my paperwork and that Includes My will to include DD3.

I was discussing this with my best friend and she mentioned that I should seperate and not give equal amounts because some of what they will inherit would be technically my late husbands so should take than in to account for DD3.

I was thinking that It’s now my assets / money and that I should share it equally amongst the 4 children.

what would you do ?

Totally share it equally.

DD 3 only inherits from your half of your first husbands estate. His half goes only to his three biological children. Its your choice to leave an equal share of your part of the estate to your stepson. Your first husband is quite unlikely to have wanted part of his estate to go to a child he is not related to and who in any case will be inheriting from her own father.

The husband’s estate is being spent bringing up his children. It will be long gone by the time OP dies.

She says the house was already bought and paid for by both of them so quite likely that half would be an asset for his children.

It wouldn't for me because I'd see it as a share from both their parents & mine only from my mum with my share of my Dads still to come.

I’d just start giving now! Even it up in their lifetimes. Are you married or not? I’d maybe leave 10% to 4th and 30% each the three. However is dp leaving any to your 3? This makes a difference in my view. If not, dc 4 will be much richer.

As with all these things, the details matter. If all of your posts had been in your OP my early reply would have been different.

starting from this point I'd say talk to your DP & ask what he intends to do & what he thinks you should do.

looking at it now I'd say an equal 4 way split from you would be fair. As I said earlier, you can always re do your will when they are all adults & you know more (possibly DSS may need greater support towards housing/care? Some inheritance from Grandparents may have already happened etc.)

whatever you do I would leave a message to them all explaining your thinking.

& let's hope your will isn't needed for a very very very long time 💕

It's nobody's business except yours. Do what YOU want to do. For the record, I think it's lovely that you want all four to share the inheritance equally.

Given how you have labelled the children are you overlooking DS1 (maybe didn't live with you, but his younger brother chose to?), who I'm thinking might be biologically related to late dh but getting none of what was inherited by you from his Dad, while dd3 is inheriting despite not being related? (I realise just because you inherited doesn't mean that what you leave will only be from that original source). I'm not saying i agree with your friend, not at all, but just wondering if whoever the first son is should be included? Apologies if ds1 is deceased. Also not had time to read every comment.

Share equally

Would your youngest inherit anything from your partner? If so would it be a decent amount? If so I would reconsider the share as your other 3 will only inherit from you.

My mum passed away recently. Her estate, which isn’t huge. A small house and a small sum of money will be split between her 4 children. The house was paid for by her ex husband who is father of the 3 eldest children. He died many years ago but had already given her the house in the divorce. The 4th child was born after that. Different dad.
My mum has split everything 4 ways. My youngest sibling is already distraught by her death. She would be even more upset and hurt to have been treated differently or given less because her dad was vile and amongst other things didn’t contribute anything financially.

Is the inheritance of the eldest 3 watered down? Yes. Would our dad who paid for the house have been happy about this? No. But the point is she is our sibling and actually the one who was closest by far to our mum so there is no question of whether it was the right thing to do. The money/ house belonged to our mum regardless of where it came from in the first place. So she split it equally between her 4 children. None of us think it should have been done differently although we know it was her choice anyway so our opinions don’t really matter.

I think you should split everything between your 4 children. It’s possible your previous husband wouldn’t have been happy or approved of that but your children are more important than husbands/ partners so I wouldn’t worry about that.

Your late husband left his money to you - it’s now yours to do with as you wish so you choose how you share it . It’s none of your friend's business anyway !

I think that your reasoning is fine to share equally between the 4 children; there are always posts here where people complain that they would feel less loved because they were left a smaller share of the inheritance and it would cause friction between the siblings, therefore what you have suggested is fair.

I would definitely give an equal split. X

These situations with blended families frequently get messy. What was the agreement with your late husband? Who will your DP leave his money to? I think that you and DP either divide everything equally between all four children or DP leaves his money to his only child and you divide your late husband's money by 3 for the 3 oldest and your money (minus your late husband's share) equally across all 4. Whatever happens, you need to make sure all of your children are protected.

Applying this to my step/bio cousins example, the step ones benefited from their deceased father’s estate and are currently set to benefit from my Uncle’s estate as their Mum married him.

They were not formally adopted out from their bio father or his family due to their parents divorce.

so they (in my mind) shouldn’t be treated equally with the bio siblings as the bio siblings (rightly so) didn’t inherit from the half siblings bio father..

that’s how I look at it.

If I looked at it completely like this my DSS would receive a lot less than his 2 sisters.

Equally for sure. Otherwise they will all fall out and split up. And because it’s fair.

but how practical is this? say when husband died he left op 100k. are you saying she should never have touched it even if she needed it to give to his 3 kids? or that it should have been in a different bank, used almost like CM for their 3 kids, and they get a third of what's left?
that money is in her account, mingling with her wages and assets hopefully for the next 40+ years. how do you work out what proportion of that final balance is his kids Vs her kids?

@Imdefonotmaddonawill dss live independently or will you need to provide lifelong care? that's possibly the only variation I would consider.

Some posters are replying as though the money from her DH, including the life policy, should immediately have been ring fenced for the DC's inheritance. Surely the point of life insurance is to make sure your family are provided for after your death. To pay the bills and the food and the school uniforms. To make a difficult time a little easier. The policy will contribute to those expenses as the DH would have done himself if he were here. So by the time the OP's will takes effect it will have gone. And the OP will also have been paying towards those things.

I'm very much team 4 ways equally.

Yes I mean I would hope so but if he can’t he will have support needed. The reason he is in a independent Sen school was he wasn’t quite mainstream but wasn’t Sen enough for the local sen schools. He is a academic Sen school for mild learning difficulties. He really struggled in mainstream primary school.

Haven’t read the full thread but what I did read seems to be trying to overcomplicate things.

your late DH left his estate to you, that now belongs to you, I am pretty sure that you will have & will continue to have used that money to bring up the children after he passed.

You have 4 children & so your estate should be split between the 4 of them equally.

But they are full siblings to your first DH if I read your post correctly and older then the DSS. ?

the funds originated from what you and DH1 built. There’s the line in the sand for me.

IMO They are entitled to their Dad’s portion.

Your portion of what was built goes into your new life with DH2.

Your children with your second DH benefit from what you and DH 2 have grown together and if he outlives you, then he gets a life interest to remain in the property with all of your bio children the eventual beneficiaries.

When/if he takes up with another Lady, then the estate gets valued, he gets his share to move on as you have done and your bio children get your share.

iMO every DC should be entitled to their bio parents estate regardless if it’s ‘equal’ or not to other half siblings because of different parentage.

May be it’s time for a family meeting with the older 2? Ultimately if they are on board with how you see it, then all is fine and well.