Considering leaving our money only to grandchildren

[parsagadae]

Hello,

Just wanted some quick advice from people on here. My husband and I have been retired for some time. We are fortunate to have lived financially secure lives due to buying at the right time, inheritances, etc. My husband headed up his 3rd generation family business, which he sold on for a pension pot (it was no longer really profitable by the end)

We have two children, both put through private schools, university etc. DD1 lives abroad and is a house wife due to ill health/ husband's (very lucrative) demanding job.
DD2 lives nearby and opted for the simple life.. modest house, old cars, nothing flashy etc but lots of time for her allotment! She's going to retire early.

We have four grandchildren, two from each daughter (they are approaching 50 so no more coming!)

We are considering leaving all our money to our grandkids. If we did this, it wouldn't be gazillions but probably about £300k each. They have it so much harder than we did (no really!). House prices anywhere decent are ludicrous, and they will be leaving university with huge student loans.

Has anyone else's family had this set up?

*years off

When DF told me that he was splitting everything equally between me and my DDs, I was gutted. I would get 1/3 and they would get 2/3. I was his only child and he told me I was no more important - in fact less so - than his DGC. I told him in that case, he could give all his bloody money to the kids and he could also expect them to put up with the abuse that I had been doing for the past several months while he was at death's door. He had been absolutely vile to me, yet still expected that I would visit him twice per day, do his laundry, keep an eye on his house, keep his car running etc.

He decided to change his will so that I got a bigger share, but I never quite felt the same way about him, as he had shown me how little he regarded me. I later discovered that he had changed his will on a regular basis, so that every time I hit the age milestone he had set in the will, he changed it so I had to be another 10 years old to inherit. Finally, his lawyer pointed out that it was ridiculous, as I was married, ran my own home, had two children and he still thought I was not 'sensible' enough to inherit.

Your will says a lot about how you feel about your own children and while I appreciate you wanting to help your DGC, do not cut your children out. And you do know they could challenge the will, don't you?

I think this is a bad idea.
You say you have benefited from inheritance, amongst other things, which has given you financial security and I think you should give your daughters the same benefit.
I'm not sure you are morally entitled to potentially change your grandchildren's lives in the way that £300k at a young age would do. To write your will like this without discussing it with your daughters would be totally unacceptable in my view.

I feel sad for the children when parents do this. It implies that they are not worth considering. It's feels a shame that it cannot go down through the generations but it's your money and your choice - speak to your children though and see if they are upset by it .......

My father gave some money to all his grandchildren he didn't have much to give and it really upset my brother that he just didn't consider him at all. He had actually been struggling financially due to no fault of his own and it would have been very helpful. His children however received the money and each bought a car and a very expensive holiday.... my brother was gutted and not just because of the money but because he felt it meant he wasn't important enough to consider.

It seems to be a thing - there will be quite a few young people with quite large amounts of money coming their way.

I tend to agree with those who say this isn't a good idea, for all the reasons outlined. Circumstances do change and it would be sad if either of your children needed money for some reason and it had all been left to the grandchildren. I also agree that it will be your daughters who will be left to do any caring for you if required, as well as dealing with the paperwork, funerals etc on your deaths. You have benefited from inheritances, why should your children not? Maybe leave some to the grandchildren, but I would advise against all. Despite what you think, that is a rather large sum of money and could well end up being frittered away.

I'm in my 40's and I can't understand why anyone would do it differently with effectively adult grandchildren. It sounds like your children have already made their way in life. Your grandchildren will have a much better life by receiving their inheritance earlier. I'm by no means rich but have suggested to my father that he does exactly this.

My in laws will currently leaves money split between dh and sil. We have two children she has non.

They wont have as much to leave as op, at most will be £200,000 to share. Recently mil keeps talking about changing their will to include dc. I haven't broached with her how much of our share she intends to give to our currently young children.

Like others have said, money given when children are young very often gets squandered. My in laws are probably unlikely to live until our children are much past young adulthood (of course they might and I hope they do). Even though we try to teach our children the value of money we can't force them to spend the money on what we think best for them (I say this as someone who got £3000 while at uni and it was all gone by the end as well as significant debt).

My in laws have been able to help us and my sil out (modestly ie £5,000 towards deposit, leant us money for home repairs etc) and have been able to do so partly due to inheritance and financial help they received. I do kind of feel by, by passing us even with a small amount that they are taking away our ability to help our children out. Unlike my in laws who paid off their mortgage in their 40's we currently wont pay ours off till we are in our early 60's. So we wont have the same disposable income to help our dc anyway.

Op talk to your dd's before doing anything. Don't leave them with lasting hurt for no reason.

You don't know how your GC will turn out? As others have said they could end up wasting this money.

I would put some aside now for GC in premium bonds & then split what is left 6 ways. Maybe £200k per child then the rest split equally between GC?

You should trust your own daughters to support their own children. I think unless there's a history of drugs or gambling you have no reason to think they would waste the inheritance.

If you end up needing care later in life then there might not be so much money. Maybe divide some now while you can.

My gran divided everything equally between children and grandchildren, mostly to piss off my aunt. I suspect it worked, but it was excellent for us because the six GC ranged from 18-30, meaning we all had a house deposit for in our 20s. None of us blew it on holidays and booze. Surely most modern 20 year olds have so much student debt and have paid so much money in rent they have more financial sense than that now!

My parents will be leaving 50% to grandchildren and 25% each to my brother and I. My brother and I have our own homes, good jobs and whilst £500k + would be lovely. It would benefit our children

Op this isn't the first time I've came across these sort of threads on MN and there is a general feeling of hurt and upset in the generation missed out.

It makes me wonder why people do it. Are they seeing the GC as purely them ie young single individuals and trying to avoid the SILs and DILs getting their hands on their cash?

Yeah my mom is doing this cutting me out of her will leaving it to my sister and my daughter maybe something to my sons I dont own my own home or anything so it's a nasty blow just shows that she really does favour my sister and my daughter she cant see it though I keep my distance personally because shit like this hurts

It's your money but I'd be gutted if my parents/ILs did this.

How well set up are your children? Do they have £300K to call their own - for most that is a life changing amount of money. When they are old, how will they cope with care home/care fees? - will they end up relying on their richer children to bail them out?

DH has recently come into an inheritence from his DF. There was talk of skipping the generation there. But in reality DH and his sibs have ending up spending it all on their needs - DH has spent it on sightsaving surgery he wasn't getting from the NHS, his brother has spent his on school fees for his children and so on.

The adults are all old enough to spend it wisely - and actually needed the money now. The grandchildren, not so much.

Nice idea, but don't make your own children feel like rejects.

I don't like this idea.

How about splitting it equally among your children and grandchildren?

My dh dad did this and we both think it's a brilliant idea.

Both my dh and his db are settled and happy financial wise, I don't mean loaded but both of them have a house (mortgaged) and jobs etc, both in their mid to late 50s.

There are 6 grandchildren between them both, all grandchildren are in their early 20s to early 30s and starting on the property ladder, some married, some have kids themselves. The estate was worth about 300k so split 6 ways meant that each gc received 50k each. My dh son was able to use this as a deposit on a house and to buy something bigger than him and his wife were looking at, they were going to do shared equity so it's been a huge help to him.

Don't get me wrong, 150k would have been awesome for us, enabled us to pay off our mortgage and put a bit behind us, but I think it benefits the gc much more. It's so much harder for gc to get on the property ladder these days.

I've asked my parents to do this. I don't want to go into why but I think it makes the most sense financially for us. I think people should consider it but I can see if it comes from the parents rather than the child it could be hurtful.

What about leaving the house in trust for the grandchildren then it's protected from being sold for care fees then leaving the cash for your daughters?

My stepsister has been left her grandmother's house this way. It was put in her name when she was born 20 years ago as her mother was an only child (and has since passed due to alcoholism). The grandma hasn't yet died but has gone in a home and the house is being sold and money going to her granddaughter. It's worth about 200k. The cash in the bank will go on care home fees (about 100k) as well as the pensions and bonds depending how long she lives.

As my stepsister is 20 it has come at a great time for her to inherit the money. She's planning on buying a house outright and as she's not the most career minded of people but has a job she enjoys, she can still have a good life without earning loads as she need never have a mortgage.

If the money had gone to her mother she would have spent it on alcohol no doubt so its doing good now for the difficult start she had in life.

This happens in my husband's side of the family so he has already benefited from his Grandparents.
My children are biologically not his, but he's raised them as his, refer to him as Dad and his parents insisted on being Grandma and Grandpa when we got married. However, my children are not being included so everything goes to his brothers children.
This I struggle with.
If anyone does do this and has a blended family please consider all grandchildren. Right now I hope it all goes on care home fees so there isn't a divide later in life. My kids will be heartbroken if they find out they aren't considered family.

My parents have done this and it hurts, they have split it 50:50 between DB but then left to put DC so his get more wash than mine despite him having been supported by my parents through his professional training, living at home and having Dc later so is much wealthier than me.

They have no idea about my financial circumstances!

Yep it's their money and there may be non left after care home fees etc but it still hurts that I'm not deemed "worthy" of inheriting when they both inherited from their parents!

You have a huge amount of money but are choosing to leave your children nothing and your grandchildren a life changing (possibly life ruining if it rolls in at the wrong time) amount? With all suitable disclaimers about grabbiness and not being “entitled” to somebody else’s money etc., I would be really hurt by that and (possibly unreasonably idk) pissed off. Your dds don’t sound like they are in a brilliant position financially (Ill and financially dependent on her dh and old cars and allotment) and to be passed over so the next generation can have new cars and acres is hurtful, no matter how you dress it up.
You are estimating 1.2M. You could leave the life changing £200k to all 6, or £300k each to your dds and £150k each to the dgc. It’s your money but if you do you MUST tell your dds so they don’t spend the rest of their lives thinking you didn’t give a shit about them.

My issue would be that the GC aren’t in settled relationships and my lose half of it to divorce later on. Large amounts of money are also demotivating to many

In principle the idea is lovely and would help a young person massively.

However, I think you really should discuss this idea first with your daughters. It's dangerous to assume both are financially stable tbh.

The dd who has health issues is vulnerable in that she is reliant on her husband. You probably have no idea how happy or unhappy she is in that marriage and may be assuming she will inherit, allowing her to escape or build a life of her own.

Personally I feel inheritance should be passed down each generation, not by skipping generations. I feel it's the parents place to pass money to children as they see fit.

I wouldn't want my child to know they will inherit such a huge amount of money as I'd worry they wouldn't try as hard at school and lose focus on learning to be independent and hardworking etc.

AmIaweed
IME it is not uncommon for only blood relatives to benefit
Not saying its right but very common

My grandad left his two children and 4 grandchildren an even amount each.I think this is the fairest way.

I think it's a terrible idea. But up to you.