Re-writing a will to the benefit of all our children

Savvy_Sue

Also consider provision for the situation where any of your children pre-decrease you, with or without having children of their own.

And while it might be hard to imagine that the disabled child might have children, I'd include that possibility in your plans.

Marcon

eddyinfreehold said:

I am still interested in canvassing other peoples opinion as to whether we are asking too much of the State and should be paying all we can ourselves? It strikes me that having sacrificed an awful lot of our life at our cost already, the State owes something back to our beneficiary. Thoughts?

The costs associated with having a disabled child are huge - and not just financial, as you clearly know from experience. You will have saved the State a fortune by keeping your daughter at home and providing for her yourselves. Speaking as a taxpayer, I think it's entirely reasonable to try and ensure that her inheritance is handled in a way which does not impact on the any State benefits to which she would be entitled. After all, your motivation is to give her the best possible life both now and after you are gone, not to make some sort of shady profit.

Get some specialist legal advice with the clearest of consciences. 

eddyinfreehold

Thank you everybody for your comments so far. I have always found the Forum a potboiler of excellent opinion and experience. Something in every contribution is of value. Much appreciated. We will not do anything precipitate but probably will refer to Scope for expertise in good time. They offer a will assistance service and although not requiring a will gift for their service, would appreciate one. If initial communications are good, I do not think we would find it difficult to leave a small legacy to Scope. They have been very good to us in the past.

  One thing I have learned however is to leave a fixed sum legacy rather than a fraction or percentage of the Estate. We have had friends who have dealt with the estates of their parents who had left a fraction or percentage to a charity. The charity administrators are often forensic with the valuation of property, chattels etc. and can with legal fees make things very difficult both in time and cost,  negating the point of the legacy in the first place.

Regardless, thank you very much everyone. Any further contributions or experiences much appreciated.

Keep_pedalling

eddyinfreehold said:

Thank you everybody for your comments so far. I have always found the Forum a potboiler of excellent opinion and experience. Something in every contribution is of value. Much appreciated. We will not do anything precipitate but probably will refer to Scope for expertise in good time. They offer a will assistance service and although not requiring a will gift for their service, would appreciate one. If initial communications are good, I do not think we would find it difficult to leave a small legacy to Scope. They have been very good to us in the past.

  One thing I have learned however is to leave a fixed sum legacy rather than a fraction or percentage of the Estate. We have had friends who have dealt with the estates of their parents who had left a fraction or percentage to a charity. The charity administrators are often forensic with the valuation of property, chattels etc. and can with legal fees make things very difficult both in time and cost,  negating the point of the legacy in the first place.

Regardless, thank you very much everyone. Any further contributions or experiences much appreciated.

Why put this on the back burner? No one knows what tomorrow will bring, accident or illness happen to all ages and you really should not put off making wills suitable for your particular circumstances.

Gold_Shogun

Keep_pedalling said:

Gold_Shogun said:

@ eddyinfreehold

Hi,
<<SNIP>>

I offer the following tips and thoughts which you may hopefully find useful in your considerations.

***  TWO Executors ONLY is not generally a good choice as it allows for the distinct possibility of a future 50/50 loggerhead-disagreement as to "a proposed action" .... It is much better for the long term to EITHER have (a) a Third "Tie Breaker Executor" that ONLY comes into play as the Deciding-Vote IF the Two Primary Executors cannot amicably agree (prevents Court-Fights), OR (b) always have an ODD number of Executors with a "Simple Majority" needed for anything but small Decisions. .......... I suspect (a) may be more suitable for your wishes.

Cheers
Bob

You raise some good points but I don’t think having an odd number of executors is necessary to avoid a conflict. However many you have, they have to work together and majority rule does not really help when one executor decides to put a spanner in the works. You could even say you have a 50% increase of it happening by going from 2 to 3. 

Chose your executors well, but if you have 2 children who you suspect or know won’t work well together, think about appoint one as main and the other as backup.

*********************
Bob replies :-
Having prepared & setup a fair few similar such Wills & Trusts for various family & friends (and also having managed some of them as a Trustee) over several decades, whilst I might tend to agree with your post in a theoretical IDEAL world, I would respectfully disagree with your post where the REAL world of family interactions is concerned ..... For examples :-

Para 1 == Having either an odd number of Executors OR an odd-number "Tie Breaker" deciding-voter actually makes it harder for any one of the Executors to unilaterally "put a spanner in the works", especially if either of my suggested "Dispute/Conflict Resolutions" are documented in the base Will and/or any Trust Deed ... I have seen (and forums like this are often littered with) examples of where one-half of an "originally amicable / reasonable" (at the OUTSET) executor(s) in a Fixed-Even-Number  situation later in the life of the Trust becomes unreasonably stroppy/spannerish/greedy/etc, often due to future changes in their life, or being egged-on by vulturish partners, or family fallings-out, or similar. ..... Resolving any often diametrically-opposed head-to-head disputes by a Majority makes it much easier for that majority to resist the machinations of a "Spanner".

Para 2 == I agree it is imperative to choose your Executors wisely and as best you can, but Eddy (the OP) made it clear that (at the moment) he & his partner have full personal faith & trust that their 2x other children (a) work/get-on well together, and (b) are equally trustworthy and likely to act solely in the best interests of the disabled lass, in which case it is human nature that if ONE of them is given priority over the other, the excluded/backup child is likely to feel snubbed and to develop (even perhaps sub-conciously) a growing resentment.
..... Furthermore, from experience, I would always strongly advise against appointing a Single Executor/Trustee for managing ANY Life-Trust as that would make things MUCH LESS safe for the Beneficiary in the event of possible future mismanagement or Fraud by a Single-Executor and/or Trustee ... For similar reasons & personal observations & experience, I would only consider allowing a commercial Lawyer/Bank/Charity/etc being an Executor or Trustee as an absolute LAST resort because (despite often spurious claims to the contrary) they are often primarily motivated by profit considerations rather than the SOLE interests & well-being of the Beneficiary, (and Eddy touched on this sort of Estate-Commercialisation a couple of posts ago) although they can often be useful in a "Tie-Breaker Vote" situation.

..... Eddy (the OP) & his partner are very fortunate to have family members and/or kids they strongly feel they can trust, BUT even so, a wise person or couple should still try to build in as many safeguards as possible for the protection of their disabled lass, as nobody can know what the future holds OR how those family members might change over the course of the long term Life-Trust.
... You only have to browse through the MANY "Family & Commercial Vulture" Will/Trust/Inheritance threads on MSE and other forums to know what a Truism my comments are, but at the end of the day, only Eddy & his family can decide what suits them best.

Cheers
Bob

eddyinfreehold

Thanks everyone for your further contributions. We will be in touch with Scope later this week. in addition and depending on their advice our children have some very sensble cousins of the same age, all of whom could act as an arbitrating Executor in the event of a dispute. We feel that one from either side of the family would be sensible.

Marcon....

  "You will have saved the State a fortune by keeping your daughter at home and providing for her yourselves. Speaking as a taxpayer, I think it's entirely reasonable to try and ensure that her inheritance is handled......"

Thanks for this. Many years ago when I took said child to the GP with a recurring problem and apologised for being back so soon, he cut me off with words almost identical to yours above.