Potential issues with leaving an estate directly to biological grandchildren?

[ChorltonCreamery]

I am driving a neighbour to a solicitor’s appointment next week.

I refused to attend the appointment with her but will sit in the reception while she is in but I have been talking to her about her options though,

She has three children:

One son is divorced and remarried with stepchildren.
One son has a stepchild who has been adopted by him.
One daughter married for nearly three decades.
They all have children.

She wishes to bypass her sons and as a result feels she has to bypass her daughter.

She wants her biological grandchildren to inherit .

She wants to divide assets into thirds so each set of biological grandchildren share a third. So the grandchild who has one sibling would inherit more than the grandchild with two or three siblings.

Are there potential issues with this?

Would the former stepchild who was adopted have any grounds to challenge if the grandchildren are named in the will?

Would her own son be able to challenge on his behalf.

Two of the grandchildren are not yet 18.

She thinks that one son could potentially have more children.

Can anybody think of anything else that needs to be talked about or any potential issues?

It sounds fair and like the grandmother was trying to rectify an imbalance. Step grandchildren are not the same as legally or biological grandchildren though.

@YayRain- the genetic thing can be interesting. I was adopted as a baby - I’m that old lol.

Anyway, my mum’s carers at the end of her life used to say I looked a lot like her - so expressions I know help that impression but one of my granddaughters, never even seen my Mum has a look of her at certain times. Guess I perhaps passed a certain look down.

My birth siblings I got to be in touch with in my 50s - as yes there’s an interest to see your biological background- whilst there’s no overwhelming same look - a child/grandchild has similar type eyes with my birth brother. More interesting is that me and my bro are both outliers in certain values/approaches to the families we grew up in but very similar to each other, we also both have terrible relationship histories and quite a few kids ha - I feel like there’s a connection there that I can’t evidence or explain.

On the other hand we are also not brother and sister like my children from 2 marriages (so different fathers and not as fully genetically tied as I and my birth brother) are because we had separate family lives.

For me family is who you choose to be family and take in to your family and you definitely end up with family bonds beyond the just ‘living together’ - obviously this view is not for everyone and that’s ok - but I find it sad it still persists that adopted kids aren’t a ‘real’ part of the family/ tbh they need to know they are more than the biological ones - you already can feel a bit different.

Step kids are different I think - though every circumstance can differ - and I’ve heard about estates going probably in unintended directions - the other way too when an older guy didn’t have the ability to remain in his late wife’s home for at least a while - these are slight complexities that solicitors can readily resolve - and quite common nowadays.

Not restricted though to blended families- my daughter was worried to find her estate could easily end up with her very estranged Dad (in a terrible, but fortunately, hypothetical situation she was asking about) when she would want it to go down to her nieces and nephews.

This is why everyone should do a will and take legal advice on it imo. Be nice to be kind to kids your kids chose to adopt though too!

I absolutely agree that a child adopted from birth or a very young age should be seen as equally a gc to those who are bio related. The extended family relationships have time to form and the gp has the security of knowing that child will always be there and not taken away if the parents break up. But I can't imagine wanting to cut off my own mum if she didn't see my much older adopted stepchild as the same. Just because I'd made that decision, I can't force others to feel the same way. The emotional bond just isn't there and I don't think it's fair to hold that against someone.

Obviously, when it comes to birthdays and Christmas presents and everyday life, only a complete arse would make a point of treating those kids differently. But inheritance is different imo.

Legally she can do this no problem. She doesn’t necessarily have to name the grandchildren- she can have the will written so as to split each third between biological grandchildren only, which would deal with the issue of more grandchildren being born later. It would need careful drafting.

In practical terms, it’s a shitshow and runs the risk of creating real family division as well as souring her children’s memories of her. I think this the sort of arrangement people often come up with when they haven’t accepted that they’re going to be dead and that they will no longer have control over their assets. So they jump through hoops to try to ensure things are distributed as they would wish without any regard for the wider picture and the fact that the future is unknown. It would be much better for everyone if she accepted that there is some risk of a small part of her assets going to
someone who is not a blood relation and that that’s ok and a price worth paying for a fairer distribution.

It might also be that everyone is overthinking it and assuming it's because she doesn't care about the adopted child, when it might just be that because the adopted child was a step child, they are still close to maternal grandparents and will inherit from them. Or even from paternal GPs - just because bio dad has been taken out of the equation, it doesn't necessarily follow that his parents aren't still present.

This could just be OPs friend twisting herself into knots, to make sure her bio gc aren't getting less than the adopted gc, who has additional family leave them something?

Cutting out the adopted grandchild, who has no other family than their Mum and her son is spiteful. I can understand that she may want to prevent her legacy going to step children (who may have another parent and paternal extended family). I know you asked for advice but let her pay for it.

It's not about if you see them the same. You might not and might not ever feel the same bond. It's about how you treat them. They should be treated as equals and feel equally valued.

Is she going to change her will again if she lives to see her grandchildren reach adulthood and get married to people who already have children?

Trying to control your money from beyond the grave is a mug's game. Families are messy and unpredictable. Her plan still risks her "fortune" whatever it's worth ending up the nose of a feckless grandchild, in the pocket of a divorce settlement or - horror! - funding the dreams of a step great grandchild.

Advise her to split it 3 ways and let the future take care of itself as it will do in any case.

How does it go into Trust though? I.e when my mother dies, we sell her property, assuming it hasn't already been sold for care, the money goes into her current account. What happens to it then? Do I have to see a solicitor to convert that money into a trust and move it somewhere else? Sorry to hijack, just trying to work out how it works in practice. I can't keep the money in my name as id be liable for tax so where do you park it for years until the gc inherit?

It will depend a little bit on the exact wording of the will, which it is absolutely worth paying a solicitor or professional will writer to get right. But the usual thing is the will will direct the executor(s) to sell the house and distribute the proceeds along with any other residual amounts e.g. anything left in savings to the beneficiaries. The money never goes into the legatee (the person that has died)'s bank account. By this time that is usually shut down - the proceeds go first to the solicitor who has dealt with the sale's holding account and from there to the beneficiaries. If any of these are minors and so the money is to be held in a trust or trusts (if there is to be more than one), it goes to the trust bank account. It's for the trustees (who may or may not be the same as the executors) to decide what form of bank account that is, it wouldn't usually be a current account, normally a savings or investment account of some kind - trustees have a responsibility to ensure the money is safe and looked after and it may also be stipulated in the will to earn a return on the capital - so depending on exactly how much money it is you might want to take some professional advice, probably from a financial advisor rather than a solicitor about what to do, if it's a reasonably modest sum and only to be held for a few years e.g. child is 16 and they receive the money at 18 it's fair enough to just stick it all into some kind of bond or savings account but if we're talking hundreds of thousands and for 10 years + it might be worth considering where it will earn better interest.

Why treat the adopted child any different from her biological grandchildren? Very cruel. The adopted child, through no fault of their own has likely suffered trauma and this rejection and othering from their grandmother is diabolical.

Thank you, really helpful.

But @Lolalovesrosesshe might not feel that this is her grandchild. Her son has made a decision (for good reasons, I'm sure) to adopt his stepchild but his choice wasn't her choice and ultimately it's her money. I'm not sure it's fair to condemn a woman as mean or horrible because someone else has created a legal relationship.I don't think that adopting an older stepchild, who still has his bio mum and possibly other bio relatives, is exactly the same as adopting an infant or child who has no one.

Her poor daughter. Imagine being cut out of your mums will because your brother had a step child. This is awful. And she’s doing it to stop her kids arguing?!!? Sounds like a good way to start an argument!

This is terrible too I agree

Yeah, it does sound unfair on the daughter. I do think this will cause havoc in the family and her best option is to leave the money to her kids and let them distribute as they see fit. It would be horrible to die and then have your kids memories of you tainted by decisions made in the will.

Yes. The reasoning is wild.

I've seen the grandchild inheritance in my (extended) family, and it ended up causing a massive rift. When the will was written there were 3 gc getting 1/3 each. Between when the will was written and the passing of the grandparent, gc number 4 arrived. Parents of gc 1&2 were very happy with being allocated 2/3 of the estate for their children, while the parents of 4 were aggrieved and thought that as the intention appeared to be to give it to the gc equally that it should be split in quarters. After a lot of legal fees, I don't think that side of the family talks any more.

I'm not surprised. It's clear what the spirit of the will was, so everyone should have agreed to split it four ways between the grandchildren.

What she’s doing is disgusting. She seems to be going to extreme lengths to avoid any possibility that a non-biological grandchild indirectly receives a single penny.

The only moral option is to leave the money to her own children. It is up to them to decide what they want to do with the money. If they want to give it to their biological children then they can, but if they see the adopted children as their own, then why should it matter?

This is logical reasoning (except the adopted child should be included).

The problem is the grandchildren may not feel it this way, but rather perceive it as being unfair because of not understanding the premise.

She should include the adopted child, and then make sure everyone understands what she is doing while she is alive.

Otherwise, she should give the same to each grandchild, including the adopted one.

For those not understanding why she might give it to grandchildren as opposed to her own children, it can make more sense for inheritance tax. If her children/the parents already have a house, job, savings etc, if they get more money from her, they may then be way over the threshold for inheritance tax when they themselves die.

The grandchildren, on the other hand, could use any money they receive towards university costs or a deposit on a house. The parents do not have to find as much to help them then. The whole family of two generations is helped this way.

If the will had simply said ‘My estate is to be divided among my grandchildren ( or ‘my children’s children biological or adopted’) mightn’t that have worked?

Interested in your comment ‘not entirely in agreement with her position’. This is what most people posting are saying too!

but by leaving it equalling between your children means you are not creating more upset than not leaving it equally.

Probably, I'm not a lawyer and only have the info passed to me through the family grapevine. That part of the family sort of imploded and stopped talking to everyone, and the explanation was that it was all to do with the inheritance.