Wills

[beachcitygirl]

So, I have 2 kids in their 20s and dp has 3 adult kids. Our wills are mirrored/ everything goes to each other and when surviving partner passed divided equally between our kids.
we are tenants in common in case either of us needs care (on legal advice)
anything else we should be doing ? Or is that sufficient in all your opinion x

This is dangerous.

There is nothing stopping the surviving partner from marrying after the first death, which would void this Will and disinherit all the children. Even if they make a new Will (if they don't, intrstacy woukd give almost everything to their spouse) they might specify that the children don't recieve the inheritance in full until the new (younger) spouse dies, and an inheritance when you are 75 isn't much use.

I would arrange it that each of you leaves your assets inclding your 50% of the shared home to your own children, with a proviso that the surviving partner has 5 years from the date of the first death to make arrangements to either buy out the share now owned by the deceased partner's children, or to sell (whether on the open market or selling to the partner's children) and move elsewhere.

I would do this even if either of you is apparently firmly against the idea of marrying someone else. It is impossible to predict, and anything could happen.

What RareGoals said. I’m not even a step parent and I’m giving directly to my children. Also remember if the surviving partner remarries then previous wills are null and void.

Our wills are mirrored/ everything goes to each other and when surviving partner passed divided equally between our kids.

Nooooo
This is terrible
Are you happy for your children and grandchildren to inherit NOTHING.
Because that is what could and does happen...

I'm married to the father of my children and a significant portion of my estate is being left directly to them he is left enough to house and raise them. This is to protect against remarriage should i die.

Rewrite your will asap
If it will cause a stink dont even discuss it with your husband - just do it.

I'll never understand why people with children marry people with children. Why not just be together without legal entanglement? Such a mess.

Nothing to stop either of you changing your will on first death and removing children that are not biologically theirs. Or of course on remarriage it's game over.

I agree with pp - I would never have a will like this in your circumstances. It's not fair on your children as your partner could easily leave them with nothing.

My friends parents did exactly the same. Her dad died first, leaving everything to her step mum. Her step mum changed the will and left everything to her bio children. My friend fought for several years with her step and half siblings. In the end, they did a deed of variation, and she was given 60k. 60k of over a million estate..in all honestly, she didn't care about the cash. It was the principle.

Don't trust another person to do right by your kids. You do right by them. If you want them to have your half then leave them your half. Let him leave his kids his half. Otherwise, hope that he dies first.

Absolutely horrible plan here. Go back to your solicitor and make sure your kids are provided for!

My Mum and step dad had mirror wills. She died first and he then changed his will to leave more to his children. We never would have dreamed that he would do this.

This is what trusts are for. Same effect - surviving spouse can benefit etc, but what they don’t need is protected for the biological children. See a solicitor.

Leave your 50% to your 2 children, with a lifetime trust (?) on the house, so that your husband can't be made to leave his home if you die, but your 50% will go to your children when he no longer needs it. I think you can add clauses, e.g. if he remarries or downsizes/moves.

I have heard so many stories of children losing out due to step parents changing the will after the death of their spouse.

You should protect your children better than that. I don’t think children should have to wait for the death of a step parent to recieve their inheritance.

Please protect your dc

What a silly comment to make.
Sometimes first marriages don’t work out for whatever reason.
The same risks are there with a spouse remarrying after you pass regardless of if it’s the children’s dad or step dad.
Do people in abusive first time marriages not deserve the chance of happiness again.

As said, neither of you is protecting your children with the current arrangement. DH has two and we have two together. My half goes to mine, his half is split between all 4 of his.

They can be happy without being married and even an abusive parent is likely to leave their assets to their children instead of someone else’s.

The potential for your children to be disinherited has been covered but also be wary of inheritance tax.
My DH and his siblings just paid a lovely big wedge to the treasury because they inherited their dad’s house via his long term partner who died the following year. It was not a particularly large estate all things considered, before someone comes at me about “the rich”. Mortgaged house below national average value and a death in service payment from FILs employer were about all they had. The pensions disappeared as the partner still named FIL as her beneficiary and hadn’t updated in his death.
As far as the taxman knows or cares, if you are not married then you might as well be leaving your house to your next door neighbours cousins hairdresser as your unofficial step children.

I suppose I am an outlier.... I have a will with my DH like OP does. Children are adults on both sides... they can fend for themselves at this point, surely, no? We were more concerned with protecting each other from greedy children & relatives in old age.

Can’t believe what I’ve just read. I’d never do that to my son. What if you die and your kids fall on hard times? They just wait around and struggle waiting for some guy to die?

Madness that you would remarry. If you die first he could easily change his will!

You need to draft the correct protection trust wills to ensure the correct protections are in place and distribution to your beneficiaries.

That could go horribly wrong! We are both on our second marriage, each with kids from our first and none together. We had both been a bit naive first time around and done the mirror wills thing with our first spouses and inherited all marital assets and life insurance. He came to the marriage much more wealthy than I did.

What we’ve done, rightly or wrongly, is taken a snapshot of our assets when we moved in together. We are mortgage free but there is a clear 70/30 split in his favour on the ownership of the house. The wealth he built with his first wife will be inherited by his kids, what I built with my first husband will be inherited by mine. Anything accumulated from the date we set up home together will be divided equally between all the children. Two of mine are adults, they are aware of the details and feel we have been fair. The others will be told when they are older.
Setting it up was actually the most romantic conversation we’ve ever had; respecting each others’ former partners and doing the right thing by each others’ kids developed a lot of trust. What is a bit frightening is that we didn’t have to.

I would never prioritise a new man over my children.

Agree with almost everyone else. My kids get my money when I die, and my 50% of the house with a lifetime interest to my husband (their stepdad). I don’t have a problem with them having to wait until he dies, but then he’s pushing 80 with a life-limiting illness; if we were young(er), we’d set a different length of time, I think.

DH has left some stuff directly to me and some to his children to get straight away. I have a lifetime interest in the house which seems fair to me as I've paid for half of it. Yes this means DSCs have to wait for me to die but frankly I wouldn't have invested all of my money into a house I was would be expected to leave as a probably elderly grieving widow to allow adult children to inherit.

My will is similar but substitute out dscs for neice and nephew.