That's what I find putrid in long-term, committed marriages. "Up to spouse" whether they want to share their good fortune with their loving spouse who contribued their own income for decades while raising their family. How is it even a choice? If you love and trust your spouse, it goes into the shared accounts, period. If you don't, you act like a miser. Those who are okay with this were raised the wrong way. And for the record, I come from a wealthy family who is very familiar with all these contrivances. But we were raised to respect, trust, and love one another. |
What are you smoking? late 40s with 2 mill already is great. if you retire at 85, you have close to 20 years spending 100k a year assuming everything is paid off. CLASSIC DCUM idiot. |
Why are you so opposed to paying taxes? In order to avoid paying taxes (on money that's grown BTW), you'd be willing to put it into a 529 and possibly never use it in your lifetime? That's wild to me. The likelihood of a scholarship is super low, also. |
If you give your husband 50% of your inheritance through commingling, and tomorrow he "upgrades" you for a secretary, and your 50% inheritance goes to her ,would you be happy? Anything might happen, particular in LT marriage. Income from trusts can be commingled, so that the whole family could have one lifestyle, but would you re-register your parents' inherited house to your and your spouse names??? Really??? In Ops' situation, she is much lower paid vs her husband, and this financial trust from her parents would ensure she's on equal terms with her spouse. Maybe for someone who inherits hundreds of million it doesn't matter to commingle or not, but if you are making 70K/year and inherit a house worth $2mm, would it be wise to commingle it with a spouse who makes 200K/year? Or make it a rental property under your kids' names, and contribute this extra income into family budget? It's not like that higher paying spouse married you for inheritance! |
They have three kids in "expensive private schools" that they intend to send to college. Their 529s are crazy underfunded, and apparently you don't think they can get scholarships. There's no danger of them not using it in their lifetime. |
+1. And there are other reasons not to comingle beyond a lack of trust. My parents both had inherited wealth, and although they have a 40+ year marriage, they never mixed their trusts or their ownership of their parents' properties. My father lost everything in defaulted loans in 2008, and had to declare Chapter 7, and my mother's assets were completely untouchable. I know another family in which the wife was found to be at fault in a car accident, and the formal separation of assets was the only reason they didn't lose absolutely everything. |
Withhold your good fortune from your spouse of decades and sure, you're inviting them to go do better. I hate my spouse for his refusal to share his good fortune, while every penny of my income is spent on our family expenses. We don't have to worry about college, and I am thankful for that, but outside of that, he lives with the confidence that he can live however he wants with no worries about retirement, while I wonder everyday how I will make ends meet if he decides to up and leave. I hate him for it and am trapped. All he had to do was share his luck to be born to wealthy parents with the woman he chose to marry and have children with, but because of this horrible trend that was devised by wealth managers, here we are. I will leave him anyway, but will sue for all the money I lost while married to him and raising his children. I'll still have to work until I'm 80, but it will be better than growing old with this cheap, selfish, narcisstic jerk. Those of you who put your money ahead of your spouse, trust me, your spouses feel the same. If they don't, they're doormats--just like I have been. |
| To those who say Op has to co-mingle the money for the sake of a good marriage. No. It's not "enjoy your money alone" as some pp said. Instead, it's, "Op, in this case, how it is spent is your decision. Plenty of spouses can choose to invest/spend for the good of the marriage and family. But the decision making power is all Op's. And should be. |
Sorry to hear your husband didn't provide anything for your security. My exH also had a pre-marital property which was his separate property by prenup. But he did use income from that separate trust to purchase joint assets. I worked, and paid towards joint assets which were split very much in my favor in divorce, so I felt it was still fair to me and our son. You chose this to grow old with the man and birth his children without financial security. That was your choice. It doesn't mean that others with family trusts leave their spouses penniless and without joint assets. |
Is your husband contributing as much as you do towards joint budget? Then it should not be your concern that he has a trust which would go to your kids eventually. Or are these HIS kids you were growing from your own income without an adequate equal contribution from him? |
The idea on this board, though, that it's absolutely insane to commingle an inheritance strikes me as misguided. I inherited about 1/3 of what OP is expecting about 10 years ago and didn't think twice about putting it into a joint account with my wife. It's not like I did anything to earn the money. It wasn't even like my parents did anything to earn the money; it came from my grandparents. I saw it as basically a windfall that there was no reason I should consider mine and mine alone. If one day half of it goes off into another family because ours breaks up, the people who actually earned it will never know or care. |
I’d feel the same. Withholding inheritance is crummy and leads to major resentment. |
This. I don’t understand why the inheritance is viewed differently from other assets. If you had a windfall in the stock market, would you also be protecting the shares from your spouse? |
Is he nuts? With inflation where it is? Did you fail to refinance when rates were low or something? If you have any kind of semi favorable interest rate do not do the bank a favor of paying it down early. Sheesh. |
How much are you making? |