Non Contentious Request to change SIPP beneficiaries

Spendless

I would say let your wife and sis-IL look at this from a different angle. The grandchildren have been left money to enable the 'stepping stones' into adult life that often land at the bank of Mum and Dad. They will have enough money at both 18 (the pension) and 25 to pay for things like driving lessons, first car, supporting themselves through Uni if their loan isn't enough to live on etc  . Their Mums benefit from not feeling they need to contribute to any of these items as their children have enough money to pay for these costs themselves   and can sort out their own pensions and savings for their old age from their own household income. 

BooJewels

That sounds like a brilliant way to look at it @Spendless - the parents will ultimately gain for not having to fund those expensive items that crop up at around the time the monies will appear.

Capricorn282

All good points. 

The only issue with suggesting to my wife that her mum's legacy will massively reduce the future burden upon the Bank of Mum and Dad is my wife's presumption that this burden would otherwise have been borne exclusively by the Bank of Dad .......

Thank you all for your opinions and advice. I'm starting to think a lot more charitably about my late MIL than I did before she became my late MIL 

BooJewels

I know exactly what you mean @Capricorn282 - my late M-I-L was, frankly, a thorn in my side for over 40 years - I was never quite good enough for her son, even though I proved myself many times over and I was perhaps the only person in the world she could truly trust and actually rely on (along with my husband of course). 

My husband pre-deceased her which didn't make it any easier - her suffering was way worse than mine, as she gave birth to him and I could never understand that.  Whilst she re-wrote her will with slightly indecent haste after he died, she did actually do right by me in the end and I've actually found myself missing her rather more than I would have guessed.

Capricorn282

Thanks @BooJewels.

The dynamics in my wife's family have always been complicated - and made more so by my In Laws divorce and their respective new partners. 

MIL's new partner was never a popular figure in the family for presumably obvious reasons, but he was very financially savvy and her will was clearly influenced by him - in my opinion wisely - but trying to help my wife understand the difference between influence and undue influence is proving "challenging".

Savvy_Sue

Capricorn282 said:

All good points. 

The only issue with suggesting to my wife that her mum's legacy will massively reduce the future burden upon the Bank of Mum and Dad is my wife's presumption that this burden would otherwise have been borne exclusively by the Bank of Dad .......

Ah, so NOW your approach is that since Bank of Dad won't need to fund these expenses, you will be able to more easily keep her in the manner to which she'd like to become accustomed. 

Either that, or you could always indulge in fast cars, wine, whiskey and wild, wild women once the offspring are all set ...

(Our approach has always been that there are no separate banks: historically he earned it and I spent it, then we swapped that to me earning more of it and still spending it.)