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.

Is it from a student finance point of view for university? Or are they just being an entitled 🔔 ?

Spot on @WiddlinDiddlin ! I was about to post to point out that we have no idea what grandfather intended but if he wanted to put more restrictions on what tge money could be used for he would presumably have been offered that option when things were drawn up.

there is a balance between making children your priority and dancing to their tune.

Some discretionary trusts would actually allow a wide range of family members to access funds, regardless of any letter of wishes and the trustees would make final decisions x wives , stepchildren and various family members might access money based on their need.

SS will Inherit the capital on his DF s death and until that time he should not question his DFs spending.

You're spot on about taking nothing for granted.

A friend's (very wealthy) DF had an affair with his secretary, left her mum, married the secretary and had a third child with her. He always promised friend and her brother that they would be well provided for on his death.

He was in the early stages of dementia when he died, and his last will left everything was left to the second wife, bar his telescope, which friend inherited, and an antique orrery which went to her brother. The expensive flat and what was left of the proceeds from the sale of the £2.5m house, plus all his investments (which were considerable) were left to the second wife. The gross value of the entire estate was well in excess of £5m.

Friend and her brother got advice about challenging the will, but were told that the chances of success were less than 50/50 and that the costs would be huge.

She was saving for it, but couldn't reach the amount in time. That's when her husband stepped in.

Most married couples combine their income. OP has not done that. If she was the gold digger that you think she is, surely she'd have pushed to combine finances and spend her DH's money freely?

Nope, I can't see anything in her behaviour that should lead anyone to think that she's taking her DH for a ride. So there's something that's either consciously or subconsciously, making a surprisingly large number of posters take against her.

Maybe it's just that she's a stepmother. Or maybe it's something else.

Knowing their parent’s income for a form and asking to see their parents finances and wanting to be reimbursed for money spent on others following a parent’s death are 2 very different things…

i think the SCs need reminding, gently, that there is no inheritance currently, as DH is still alive.

he should also regularly tell them he plans to donate his fortune to a donkey sanctuary anyway - whatever it takes them to catch on.

or he should scrutinise their purchases, and complain they're spending his grandchildren's inheritances...

Where does it say that the son is missing out on anything because the OP’s child went on a ski trip?!

It’s not about whether the ski trip is easily affordable, or if he’s missing out or not, it’s about his father taking on a parental role for unrelated children.

As I see it your husband can spend his income from the assets on whatever he chooses to, it's the same as any other income he gets. So no, nothing to scrutinise or claim back. His children are only entitled to their share when the assets are sold, at a future date, as an inheritance.

That would be something the DH would need to face in order to make whatever decision he would be most prepared to live with the consequences of.

It may be that hurting his marriage is more acceptable to him than hurting his children, or vice versa. Only he can decide that.

So basically, DSS resents the fact that his father spends money on you and your children. He sees this as you and your children “depleting” his eventual inheritance. Perhaps he is worried that your husbands estate (aside from the provision from his grandfather) will go to you and then ultimately to your children and not to him and his brother. You do hear of many cases like this where children of the first wife “lose out”. Likely nothing anyone can say will change his mind. Possible time and life experience might affect his view but who knows. Ultimately your husband needs to find a way to try to reach him and maybe reassure him about his inheritance (although frankly no one is entitled to anything and your DH can spend his money on whatever and whoever he likes in life and thereafter!) But for the sake of preserving the relationship your DH will likely not want to phrase it like that. But you need to stay right out of the conversation, this is on your DH to resolve.

My comment was in direct response to the PP who said “not wanting DSC getting free skiing trips instead of him”

so essentially the father should only spend his money on things that directly benefit his own children and no one else?

Love and care for others are not a finite resource, and thinking that they are is sad and leads to nothing but sorrow. "Do you love me more than you love(d) her/him?", for instance, indicates to me that someone is probably very unhappy.

A man caring for his wife and his wife's children does not mean he does not love his own children (though he may find them hard work if they demand to oversee his finances). He may perhaps care rather less for his previous wife than he does for his present one; but I'd honestly hope that he would do that and even if he didn't would allow his second wife to think he did, because how horrible to be in a marriage with a man who is hankering after his previous wife! However, if the ex is poisoning his son against him and his new relationship, it's likely he doesn't feel all that fond of her any more and certain that she is interested only in his money at this point. (She can't really care much for her son or have his best interests at heart if she is trying to foul up his relationship with his father; if nothing else, a row between them might mean the son getting a smaller amount of both money and obvious love and care, at the present even if not in future.)

What we know about the eighteen-year-old son is that he openly resented his father spending part of the cost of a school trip on someone other than him (and an eleven-year-old at that) and that his mother so resented it that she rang up to complain that it had happened and the money spent should have been kept to be left to her children when their father dies; but worse, that the son resented the very possibility that his father might have paid for someone of nine to be taken to the theatre for the evening by someone other than his father and not even related to him.

And we know that he has said that he wants any money spent on his father's wife and her children to be "reimbursed" to him out of the wife's estate. WTF? Nobody should be saying that!

That is carrying a chip on his shoulder to ludicrous extremes, and I think he might need professional help to get over the inadequacy which leads him to measure everything in pounds and pence because he has been taught that his father doesn't love him on account of loving other people as well.

It is unfortunate for him that it seems as if the only way he can be happy at this point is if his father never speaks to his current wife or her children again, and that would be a thoroughly unreasonable expectation.

(I wonder whether he feels that if his aunt, his father's frugal sister, or either of his uncles, has no children, he is entitled to be left the lion's share of their incomes and savings. I hope not, but I cannot feel sure at this point. After all, they are benefitting from His Inheritance.)

If I had an opinion as to what he ‘should’ do, it would be entirely irrelevant.

That’s up to him 🤷🏻‍♀️

He is spoiled. The will was constructed so that the parents benefited from the investments and their kids in turn benefited from the sale of the assets. This grabby little scrote wants it both ways. The assets are safe and will be sold when everyone has passed. All this says is ‘hurry up and die’.

And ? His dad is married to OP who has kids - why wouldn’t he take on some parental responsibility ? Dad’s who don’t come in for a kicking on MN. You can’t have it both ways.

Absolutely spot on.

It's all well and good saying that the OP's DH should no longer offer to pay for skiing trips for the step-children, but it sets a very dangerous precedent. The son can then keep making further demands.

The DS will be away at university for the foreseeable and presumably only home in the holidays. If OP's DH fancies an impromptu, casual meal out to a restaurant one night, and pays the bill for the group (which would presumably be for himself, OP, her children and his younger child if in attendance, the DS would be away at uni), would his son feel wounded and betrayed as a result of that? Would he need to see an itemised bill highlighting which drinks and meals were for OP's children and have the sum of that be added to the spreadsheet to be reimbursed in the future?

As I said earlier in the thread, I feel sorry for OP's children. I am not sure how aware they are of their step-brother's attitude towards them but if I were them I would feel quite intimidated during his time at his dad's house. In their situation, knowing that your step-brother thinks that you are a leech fleecing his father, you'd be scared to do or say anything. God forbid you get an Amazon parcel delivered and he sees it, as he'll start interrogating you as to whether his dad paid for it. What if the OP's husband announces he's going to the shop and asks everyone if they want anything? The stepchild would feel terrified to ask for something as small as a bloody tub of Ben and Jerry's out of fear for how their step-brother would interpret it.

Well, its not Ben and Jerry's we are talking about, is it?
Its about subsidizing her and her children's lifestyle which includes (what I assume are) expensive ski trips at the (perceived) expense of his original children.

"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."

He's gone well beyond being grabby about the ski trip. Whenever the OP's children receive something, he demands to know who paid for it. It's vile.

It was never at the expense of his "original" children. It is passive income generated from an asset, and asset which the son and his sibling will receive in the future. The asset is not being depleted.

I'm sure the son would take great pleasure in OP's husband becoming hostile to OP's children, but thankfully, he doesn't seem to want to do that.

The Ben and Jerry's situation is an example of how far this lad could take it if his dad gives into his demands. If people are right that it's not really about the money and is more about this lad feeling hard-done-by, then he could absolutely stoop to being that petty. Isn't one of OP's children only 11? I very much hope they aren't getting picked on by an 18 year old.

Where are the stepkids getting screwed ? They will ultimately inherit when the assets are sold. Where is the respect for what DS’s grandfather wanted, or the fact that how his dad spends his money is naff all to do with him. Can’t believe so many posters excusing shitty behaviour that says ‘hurry up and die, l want my money’ !!

Absolutely this. It’s just grabby. OP and her DH should be making sure their wills are watertight.

Who is asking for it both ways? I’ve never been a proponent of the idea that a stepparent of either sex is responsible, financially or otherwise, for a stepchild.

In that case, OP should be under no obligation to ring-fence a part of her share of the marital assets to her step-kids as a form of "reimbursement" for every penny that her husband has chosen to spend on her kids. Because it's nothing to do with her. This lad should instead demand that his dad takes on a second job to make up for the "shortfall".

Maybe it would create an escalation, or maybe it would ease the tensions in his relationship with his father, and be a step towards repairing what is clearly strained.

Equally, continuing to ‘parent’ OP’s children despite his actual child’s feelings may be something the son gets over in the way that many think he should, or it could cost the DH the relationship.

There isn’t only one potential outcome of a course of action.