Stepchild wants to see finances and money spent on his stepsiblings.

[Greenhairedmonstor]

My late FiL who I never met, left school at 15, fell into the right crowd while he was doing a labouring job and ended up with a little empire.

There is something in place that is not quite a trust. It allows SiL to choose to live frugally without working, and has enabled my husband and his brothers an income which supplements their incomes.

Their children will benefit after their parents’ deaths when whatever is in place will be dissolved.

My husband has his own business as well.

My stepchild is 18 and will go to university next month. I also have another stepchild who is 13.

The eldest has asked that now that they are an adult that they want to look at my husband’s finances. Essentially they want an account of any money that is spent on my children and they wanted my husband’s estate to be reimbursed from my share of the house when he dies.

Now Mumsnet always asks, no I was not the other woman, my ex meets more than his share of his financial responsibilities and I also work and rent out a house that I own in my home country that I will eventually return to. Husband’s ex is comfortable and I don’t believe this has come from her.

Inevitably my husband subsidises our life.

This has been a bitter blow to my husband and he doesn’t see how his relationship with his child(ren) will recover.

You need to get very clear on ownership. I don't think you are right now because you're using words like deplete, subsidise, use as he sees fit.

From what you've written it sounds like:

There is a mechanism (why is it not a Trust?) whereby funds that generate an income ARE NOT OWNED by your husband and his siblings but the income from those assets is divided and then YOUR HUSBAND'S SHARE OF THE INCOME IS OWNED BY HIM.

Your husband's other income is also OWNED BY HIM.

On the death of your husband and (all his?) siblings (ie when the last of them dies?) then the assets in the Trust-like mechanism get divided between your father in law's grandchildren, at which point it will be OWNED BY THE GRANDCHILDREN.

At that point your by then late husband's assets will also be inherited (OWNED) by whoever he leaves them to in his will, likely a combination of you and his children.

Whilst someone OWNS money, they can spend it, keep it, burn it, give it away. They have zero obligation to account for it to anyone else.

Once someone else owns money, the same applies to them.

Sounds like someone is stirring the pot and you (or your DH) needs to get to the root of who and why.

we had an unexpected family meeting a couple of years back where my cousin advised our uncle his other uncle had showed him a property and said our mutual great grandparents had sold it and everyone but his parents had been given funds. It was simply not true and I managed to work back addresses etc to prove they never lived there.

we have no idea but geese it cause a lot of grief for the lie to exist for years.

Amen!

The DSS who is being fully supported through all education and RG uni?

he will have had his skiing trips paid for, plus, plus, plus

no, he just wants ALL money spent on him and has been wound up by the mother. Who I dare say gets/got a healthy maintenance agreement too.

Your husband will need to have a difficult conversation with his son. Difficult because it seems that your stepson does not understand how the world works. He has no business or entitlement to know about your husband's finances. Your husband needs to actually go nuclear with this and instruct a solicitor to lay out the rights responsibilities clearly in a legal letter to ensure comprehension.

Unfortunately some of the current upcoming generation are very grabby and entitled. He is already making plans for the money he has not yet inherited!

I don't see any way for this to end happily unfortunately - perhaps he will come to his senses when he is older...

Actually there was more detail provided.

this kid has been fully supported through education and RG uni. the mother has been meddling and the child is being manipulated and wound up.

similar situation with my H and his DC. They’re all fully funded through private schools and RG unis, paid for by an inherited income. We had one demand for a post graduate course, with a fairly heavy foot stamp of “the trust can pay”

DC was told that the divorce agreement was that all school and education be funded until completion of uni, including the maintenance for the dc, and that the mother had more than enough to take her turn in putting her hands in her pockets to help her child with post graduate education.

This kid will have had a fair chunk of change spent on him already but that’s not enough he wants ALL money, he thinks all his fathers income should be spent on him.

he has no right to demand to see any financial information at all. Its not his money.

Yes, that was me who said it is seldom about just money and I completely agree.

I feel sorry for the son and actually think he is showing some spirit to be challenging the situation he finds himself in. I see it to some degree as loyalty to his grandfather.

I find that in blended situations, dc are labelled difficult if they don't just fall into line and accept whatever. It is more often than not a situation resulting in a difficult balance of conflicting interests and loyalties and the dc are expected to provide the wriggle room for resolution of that.

Is it a case that he wants all his father’s money spent on him or he just has an issue with his father paying for stuff like ski trips for OP’s kids?
Op’s kids have two parents why can’t they pay for their kids trips? I doubt DH has endless funds.

No, I don’t think an 18 year old has a right to see his father’s finances. But I think it’s a lot emotionally for teenagers to see daddy playing happy families with someone else’s children.

I also think Op is very clearly putting her own kids first as nearly all women do, but men don’t seem to.

The reality is that RG uni or not life is very hard for young people today and I would hope that DH has ringfenced his assets to pass to his children. Your children should always be your number one priority IMO.

You'd think less of your own child rather than wonder what had happened to create such a situation? You'd imagine this all happened in a vacuum and take everything completely at face value? The whole situation can be summed up as easily as "it's my 18 year old's fault, they're just a bad person and love money"?

I suppose when parents with second families see things like this with the depth and introspection of a puddle, it at least explains why the kids haven't learned to navigate the situation much better, but the parents don't have the excuse of youth and, almost certainly, complicated feelings about how they moved on.

I don't think I've seen venom like this on here outside of threads about OW.

Well put - and exactly what I was thinking about all these "I'd sock it to my kid" posts.

It has nothing to do with second family dynamics. Some on MN and in the wider world believe that their parent's assets already belong to them, and their parents are merely keeping the funds warm until the day they are inherited.

This delusion is driven by envy, entitlement, ingratitude and utter disregard for the rights and well being of their parents.

Any functioning adult with a shred of self respect will hope their parents enjoy all their wealth in their lifetime, hopefully a long lifetime. This child has every opportunity to build his own income and wealth, he would do well to focus on that.

You are supposed to support your children to the best of your capacity; it's a parental duty. We don't usually start keeping ledgers and claiming that it somehow obligates our children in the future... unless, of course, we gain a second family and now, suddenly, the first child should be grateful and permanently perfectly compliant in a way the second family isn't obliged to be.

This thread definitely shows the spite and anger towards first families, specifically children of those families. Seems unlikely to me that this kid never saw any of that. And if money is how a parent claims a right to gratitude and permanent perfect compliance with no human failing, I'm not too surprised that a child might also see it as the language of what they might feel they've lost.

You can't use it as a different type of currency and then be surprised or outraged that others do too.

This scenario isn’t about the wider world. It’s specifically about a second family.

And yes some people feel entitled to their parents money in general, but there is a difference between that and watching your dad pay for trips for another child. That’s often not just about the money, it’s about watching your dad put his efforts into another child. Another child who has his own dad.

I think the “trust”, which I take to be rental generating property, is a red herring. The capital is protected, they will receive what their grandfather intended. End of story.

What’s at the bottom of this is the DH’s children’s attitude to the OP.

Brutally, I think they suspect the OP’s motives, which may be down to how she and her DH met and the fact that she says she intends returning to her home country eventually.

As far as the DC are concerned, they see what they consider to be their inheritance being spent on the OP and her family, who they don’t have a close relationship with and who will ultimately disappear from their lives.

I think their attitude needs some adjusting, but their father also needs to reassure them of their place in his family.

It seems the Op and her former partner were not as well off as DH. She is happy for her children to benefit from that - “Inevitability my DH subsidies our life”.

But you can’t expect DH’s DC not to be aware of it. And as a teenager I wouldnt have been happy with my dad subsidising the lives of two other kids. He was my dad.

I think 18 year old are still children - they lack any life experience and most still feel very dependent on their parents - they also lack the people skills, emotional maturity and understanding of themselves to navigate these kinds of conversations - generally I'd say they have a lot to learn and it's still your dh's job to teach him.
And he should be teaching his son the correct way to ask about things that concern him like sensitive money issues - it's a good life lesson, because asking the wrong way can backfire spectacularly and we don't want that for our kids. As parents we don't always expect them to get it right especially at 18 years old - we can teach them and model how we deal with sensitive topic though - your dh needs to step up and parent, his job's not done.

There is a lot of crazy over reaction on the thread, both from all the posters suggesting SS is a "grabby little prick" etc etc, that he be told to "fuck off" (is that how all of your speak to your kids if they do something that annoys you? Seriously?)

And OP's husband who thinks his relationship with his son is now unsalvageable. You what, now?

SS has over-stepoed, yes. Because he is 18 and 18 year olds don't have a.full and complete understanding of relationships, finances and the world.

That's why they rely on trusted older role models, like parents, to explain things to them.

Could OP's husband not sit down with his son, explain to him calmly why his request is inappropriate, and try to fathom where it has come from and if it is, perhaps, driven by a need for some kind of emotional reasrruance that he CAN provide?

Or do you all honestly think it's better that he just swear at his son abusively, and/or never speak to him again?.

Unfathomable.

This a thousand times. Actually sit down and reassure his sons that they are his number 1 priority, and then behave as if they are.

Where do you get fully supported through uni? OP says he will be supported through uni. We supported DS at uni but he still had the loans we just topped up his income.

And SS may wonder whether his dad will do the same for OP’s DC (especially if the amount of loans they can get could be impacted by his dad’s income)

OP and his dad have been married 3 years and he is seeing his dad pay for ski trips etc for OP’s DC.

The money side of things may be partially being fuelled by the boy’s mum but there could also be insecurity or the feeling of being ousted by the new blended family.

My FIL has been married a number of times since divorcing MIL. There is no substantial inheritance in our scenario but with every marriage DH and his siblings get pushed further down the line for the amount of time and interest FIL shows in them compared to the time and interest he shows in his ‘new’ family. And as fully fledged adults this hurts. So I can imagine 17/18yo will find it hurts seeing their dad play happy families with a new family

Why does he need to "go nuclear"? Why not speak calmly and respectfully to his son? Model good behaviour?

The child framed it as spending "his" inheritance. It is not his. Nor is it his business to critique how his father chooses to support his children, no matter how the family is constituted. At 18 he is not owed anything and whining about inheritance is grossly offensive.

Some years ago my mum asked me to a meeting with her bank manager to discuss investments. After the usual chat I said she really should plan to spend it all on cruises or whatever made her happy. The bank manager agreed.

Mum died earlier this year, her final years in a care home that consumed her funds, but she left property that I don't want or need. I wish she'd spent it on cruises.

But what if he were watching his dad spend on a hobby? Would anyone say that isn't his father's right?

Clearly there needs to be a conversation with this young man. Whether reassurance of how important he is to his father will be enough depends on his motivation. I hope it's misunderstanding. But it's possible it's entitlement.

As for people decrying blended families, one of my friends just found their second spouse wrote the sc into their will and was very touched. Second families can be very difficult but it's not impossible to make it work.

You don't have to explain anything to this grabby little scrote!

I doubt the OP wants her DH's sons to be his number one priority, she's certainly fine with hundreds of strangers calling them scrotes, shits and fuckers.

I’d be more than happy for my mother to blow all her money on herself so 100% fully with you there. But that is very different to this scenario. That is our mothers spending their money on themselves.

OP’s children are not DH’s children. They have their own dad. And it is not unreasonable for his actual children to have a view on him spending big money on his SC.