stepdaughter won't make a will.

bowb

My step daughter will not make a will even though I have tried to convince her how important it is. She is a middle aged woman with 2 grown up children, she owns her own home. She assumes her children will inherit automatically. However she has now remarried .I am not sure now if her husband will inherit or will he and her children share the estate. The children do not live at home. Any advice please.

Kynthia

bowb wrote: »

My step daughter will not make a will even though I have tried to convince her how important it is. She is a middle aged woman with 2 grown up children, she owns her own home. She assumes her children will inherit automatically. However she has now remarried .I am not sure now if her husband will inherit or will he and her children share the estate. The children do not live at home. Any advice please.

Unless her state is very large her chikdren will inherit nothing.

Does she have a private pension or a life insurance that specifically lists the children as beneficiaries? These bypass the estate, intestacy rules and even wills.

Rubik

You are quite right that it's important to make a will especially if there is property or other significant assets involved. However, you can't force someone to make a will if they don't want to. More than half of all adults in the UK (I think it's around 65%) don't have a Will.

If she dies without a will then under the rules of intestacy her spouse would inherit a certain amount (I think it's the first £250k but would need to check) and any surviving children would inherit the remainder of the estate - after all debts have been met from the estate.

SevenOfNine

bowb wrote: »

She is a middle aged woman with 2 grown up children.

You've suggested it, she won't listen. I'm afraid my advice is going to sound rude (sorry), but you should mind your own business now. She's not 12.

I've no doubt we'll all agree she definitely should, if only to protect her own children, downright silly not to but if she won't, she won't. Nagging may just alienate her, no amount of pulling can get some people's heads out of the sand!

Maybe she simply can't confront her own mortality, like thousands of others, unfortunately.

Yorkshireman99

bowb wrote: »

My step daughter will not make a will even though I have tried to convince her how important it is. She is a middle aged woman with 2 grown up children, she owns her own home. She assumes her children will inherit automatically. However she has now remarried .I am not sure now if her husband will inherit or will he and her children share the estate. The children do not live at home. Any advice please.

Perhaps printing off the intestacy rules from the U.K.gov Site might convince that she is wrong

Keep_pedalling

Rubik wrote: »

You are quite right that it's important to make a will especially if there is property or other significant assets involved. However, you can't force someone to make a will if they don't want to. More than half of all adults in the UK (I think it's around 65%) don't have a Will.

If she dies without a will then under the rules of intestacy her spouse would inherit a certain amount (I think it's the first £250k but would need to check) and any surviving children would inherit the remainder of the estate - after all debts have been met from the estate.

No, he would inherit the first £250k and half of everything over that. The rest would be shared between the children.

Give her the facts if she still won’t make one then there is nothing you can do as there is no known cure for stupidity.

Sea_Shell

I'd try once more, with the intestacy rules to hand, and point out in no uncertain terms that her children could end up with nowt!!!! Alternatively, ask her what she would WANT to happen. Maybe her new husband has "promised" he'd "see them right", but we all know about so called promises on this forum!!!

Does the husband have a will....otherwise I can see her estate ending up with his own children (if any), an aging parent or a sibling of his. (depending on the order of such things).

These are hard conversations to have, as no-one really likes to confront death head-on.

Good Luck

Margot123

Try a bit of 'reverse psychology' rather than trying to nag her into making a will.

You could apologise for being pushy and then have a laugh and a joke about it, saying something along the lines of 'wills are only for old people who want the greedy ones to have a shock when they're gone'.

Worth a go, but don't labour the point and risk losing the relationship.

Rubik

Keep_pedalling wrote: »

No, he would inherit the first £250k and half of everything over that. The rest would be shared between the children.

Give her the facts if she still won’t make one then there is nothing you can do as there is no known cure for stupidity.

Thank you for the clarification

bowb

Thankyou guys for all your advice. It is as I expected. So I will show her the evidence and advice her for the last time

Silvertabby

Sea_Shell wrote: »

I'd try once more, with the intestacy rules to hand, and point out in no uncertain terms that her children could end up with nowt!!!! Alternatively, ask her what she would WANT to happen. Maybe her new husband has "promised" he'd "see them right", but we all know about so called promises on this forum!!!

Does the husband have a will....otherwise I can see her estate ending up with his own children (if any), an aging parent or a sibling of his. (depending on the order of such things).

These are hard conversations to have, as no-one really likes to confront death head-on.

Good Luck

That's what happened to Mr S and his siblings.

Father died without making a will, everything - the house, the pension lump sum, the insurance policies, went to their step-mum.

Step-mum later remarried and her new husband moved into what had been Mr S's family home. Step-step-father had also been widowed, and he gave his house to his children.

Step-mum assured Mr S and siblings that if she went first step-step-father would stay in the house until he died then the property would go to them.

You can see what's coming next - step-mum died without making a will. Step-step-father DID make a will - leaving Mr S's family home to his own children.