Ultra high net worth and how much to leave to kids

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
But we could more intelligently sell them the strip mall for $3M and carry back a mortgage for the $3M. The IRS puts out minimum interest rates on a monthly basis. During the pandemic this rate was below 1%. Currently it is 3.72% on long term interest rates. In other words we could sell them the property at market value and lend to the them to purchase it at effectively below market value. We’d lock in the purchase price and they’d keep the cash flow. We’d still get the mortgage payments.

This seems kind of convoluted, and a lot for a CPA and lawyer to set up. It's also a reporting burden for your kids. Why not just keep the asset under an LLC or Trust, and never transfer it to them directly so you have no asset transfer? Instead, make them trustees or shareholders so they can benefit from it.

I guess they can get fancy with it and use it as their vacation fund -- have the board meeting in Hawaii and stuff like that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Dh and I are extremely fortunate and currently have a net worth in the upper 30s, all self made, although our parents provided some help for college such that we were able to borrow just the federal student loan max for our state schools. We are in our mid 40s.

We have 3 kids currently in middle school. We do not believe in generational wealth. I’m inclined to provide them whatever they need to finish school (wherever they want to go and for as high a degree as they want, inclusive of room board and incidentals). DH would like to leave them something more but not the majority of our wealth. We have another $12M in life insurance so if we died tomorrow each would inherit roughly $17M.

If we died before they graduate college we would keep everything the same until they graduate and then they would receive their inheritance.

The question is how much to leave them each after education expenses and living costs through college in todays dollars?

Our current thoughts are one or some combination of the below:

1) $1M each
2) a family trust for education so that future generations don’t have to worry about college costs (this would obviously benefit our kids).
3) the max that we can leave not subject to estate taxes without playing gifting of partial interest games. We recognize that this figure can change. We are sorta indifferent if the number stays the same or reverts as current scheduled.

Everything above what we leave them we will donate.

Thoughts?

$1M?! Peanuts!

Bill Gates supposedly is leaving $10M to each of his kids but that's just BS. His daughter already owns an estate in NY and just bought a $40M apartment in NYC and go knows what else. All said and done she'll be worth $1 Bil at least when Bill is dead and gone. If your $1M thinking was inspired by people like Bill's false statements, please change.

I'd structure things as follows:
1. Money enough for any level of any education they want
2. Money for their first home
3. Money for their wedding
4. Some cash
5. A trust that gives them enough money to live a good life but not enough that they don't have to work
6. Money in their kids' 529. You could just invest in their 529s and let it grow so when they have kids, they can move it to their kids' names.
7. About 20% to charity. Try to give when you are still around so you see the benefit.

We are nowhere near as wealthy as you but except for 2 & 5, we will be able to do the other things.

[Anonymous]

Why not teach them about money and values, giving back, importance of education and trust that your children will come through.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Leaving them money to try to control them probably won’t work and neither will not leaving them money to try to control them.

Just do what you want with the money and your kids will turn out how they turn out tbh.

The bigger question you need to deal with is how much if any money you will give them while you’re alive and sitting there with all this money.

That’s so obviously more important than what happens when you die that I think you’re a troll.

Most with that wealth start giving when alive simply to minimize taxes. Might as well start saving in 529 for future grandkids once the kids are married/planning to have grands. Just keep the kid's 529 open and invest yearly even before the grands arrive.

NP - not high net worth but on board with this sentiment. My parents became very well off post-retirement and I'd be happy if they would pass their wealth on to my kids, since I'm old enough to be comfortable and don't really need a windfall now. It's too early for you, OP, but I would say the real goal should be setting your kids up to be debt-free in their 20s and their kids to be well looked after.

DP. The issue we struggle with is if you gives kids too much money when they're young (20s), you can have a failure to launch. I had a friend like that. Trust funder, and every year he came up with some new wacky idea for a business that of course failed because you don't hustle when you don't need to. I just Googled him -- looks like his latest venture is some organic healing patch or some nonsense.

The best we came up with on advice from our financial planner is their college + expenses are fully paid for, then they get lump sums every 5-10 years, but I'm still not happy with that. Will they become lazy if they know the next tranche is 3 years away so why work towards anything in the meantime? Our kids are young enough where I can't really predict personality-wise how it will shake out.

Just don’t tell them in advance they’ll be receiving money and if they know in general how wealthy you are try to minimize how much you actually have. Spread out the payments randomly too, 300k, then 3 years later 80k, 7 years later 800k, keep ‘em guessing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Dh and I are extremely fortunate and currently have a net worth in the upper 30s, all self made, although our parents provided some help for college such that we were able to borrow just the federal student loan max for our state schools. We are in our mid 40s.

We have 3 kids currently in middle school. We do not believe in generational wealth. I’m inclined to provide them whatever they need to finish school (wherever they want to go and for as high a degree as they want, inclusive of room board and incidentals). DH would like to leave them something more but not the majority of our wealth. We have another $12M in life insurance so if we died tomorrow each would inherit roughly $17M.

If we died before they graduate college we would keep everything the same until they graduate and then they would receive their inheritance.

The question is how much to leave them each after education expenses and living costs through college in todays dollars?

Our current thoughts are one or some combination of the below:

1) $1M each
2) a family trust for education so that future generations don’t have to worry about college costs (this would obviously benefit our kids).
3) the max that we can leave not subject to estate taxes without playing gifting of partial interest games. We recognize that this figure can change. We are sorta indifferent if the number stays the same or reverts as current scheduled.

Everything above what we leave them we will donate.

Thoughts?

$1M?! Peanuts!

Bill Gates supposedly is leaving $10M to each of his kids but that's just BS. His daughter already owns an estate in NY and just bought a $40M apartment in NYC and go knows what else. All said and done she'll be worth $1 Bil at least when Bill is dead and gone. If your $1M thinking was inspired by people like Bill's false statements, please change.

I'd structure things as follows:
1. Money enough for any level of any education they want
2. Money for their first home
3. Money for their wedding
4. Some cash
5. A trust that gives them enough money to live a good life but not enough that they don't have to work
6. Money in their kids' 529. You could just invest in their 529s and let it grow so when they have kids, they can move it to their kids' names.
7. About 20% to charity. Try to give when you are still around so you see the benefit.

We are nowhere near as wealthy as you but except for 2 & 5, we will be able to do the other things.

Bill has also paid for his 3 kids’ private k-12, elite private colleges (Stanford & UChicago) and Jennifer’s med school/MPH education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Troll. If you’re really wealthy your family office should be managing this, not strangers on dcum.

Unless she just wants to brag.

Besides we all know she’s leaving everything to the kids.

The jealousy on DCUM is so pathetic and uninformed. They said they are self made rich - family offices are usually from generational wealth and are set up to ensure that generational wealth lasts. Read OP’s post again. Why would she want to pay money for a family office when they have no desire to raise a bunch of Paris Hiltons?

Biglaw partners these days have this kind of money. Ask me how I know. Then ask me who I don’t ask for advice on how to spend it.

Quite the opposite. It used to be a much better gig.

DP here. You are so wrong. Biglaw profits per partner are through the roof for equity partners. I was making just under a million a year as a lower paid equity partner in a DC firm before retiring early close to a decade ago. Profits per equity partner at my old firm are now close to double what they were when I left. They’re raking it in, trust me. Not saying I have any regrets about leaving - I don’t - but equity partners at the major firms are making tons and tons of money.

[Anonymous]

I wouldn’t leave less than 2/3 of my assets to my kids and their families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Dh and I are extremely fortunate and currently have a net worth in the upper 30s, all self made, although our parents provided some help for college such that we were able to borrow just the federal student loan max for our state schools. We are in our mid 40s.

We have 3 kids currently in middle school. We do not believe in generational wealth. I’m inclined to provide them whatever they need to finish school (wherever they want to go and for as high a degree as they want, inclusive of room board and incidentals). DH would like to leave them something more but not the majority of our wealth. We have another $12M in life insurance so if we died tomorrow each would inherit roughly $17M.

If we died before they graduate college we would keep everything the same until they graduate and then they would receive their inheritance.

The question is how much to leave them each after education expenses and living costs through college in todays dollars?

Our current thoughts are one or some combination of the below:

1) $1M each
2) a family trust for education so that future generations don’t have to worry about college costs (this would obviously benefit our kids).
3) the max that we can leave not subject to estate taxes without playing gifting of partial interest games. We recognize that this figure can change. We are sorta indifferent if the number stays the same or reverts as current scheduled.

Everything above what we leave them we will donate.

Thoughts?

$1M?! Peanuts!

Bill Gates supposedly is leaving $10M to each of his kids but that's just BS. His daughter already owns an estate in NY and just bought a $40M apartment in NYC and go knows what else. All said and done she'll be worth $1 Bil at least when Bill is dead and gone. If your $1M thinking was inspired by people like Bill's false statements, please change.

I'd structure things as follows:
1. Money enough for any level of any education they want
2. Money for their first home
3. Money for their wedding
4. Some cash
5. A trust that gives them enough money to live a good life but not enough that they don't have to work
6. Money in their kids' 529. You could just invest in their 529s and let it grow so when they have kids, they can move it to their kids' names.
7. About 20% to charity. Try to give when you are still around so you see the benefit.

We are nowhere near as wealthy as you but except for 2 & 5, we will be able to do the other things.

Bill has also paid for his 3 kids’ private k-12, elite private colleges (Stanford & UChicago) and Jennifer’s med school/MPH education.

Of course! When there was swooning talk in the media about how he was going to leave them 'only' $10m, I thought he was an idiot. Not one after all. That's just for PR. In reality, each kid will end up with at least $1B through various means.

[Anonymous]

You never know what life will bring. I would have a substantial medical account for each child that could be tapped for any medical needs except for strictly cosmetic procedures.

[Anonymous]

Definitely pay for their education. I think what is most important is that they should have to support themselves, with no help, for the first 15 or so years post college. Once they have very established careers, I think helping to buy a house or, later, putting grandkids through college is fine.

[Anonymous]

Just do an education trust so a few generations of grandkids can get college paid off. This way they can start life without debt, but they still need to earn their nut.

[Anonymous]

I wouldn't call 50M an ultra high net worth. Which is what makes me inclined to think this isn't a real poster. Ultra high is multiple hundreds of millions into the billions. People with 50M know this.

Second, very, very, very few genuinely wealthy people genuinely don't believe in generational wealth. They may talk it but in reality they will leave their children very comfortably off. Generational wealth is only a modern buzzword that's no more than a few years old, preying on liberal white guilt in the DEI age.

17M per child (I'm assuming this is post tax) is unquestionably a nice sum of money. But it's not ultra high net worth. It will allow each child to own a nice 2-3M house plus another 2-3M summer house and the rest tied up in investments generating a nice income for what will be generously comfortable, affluent life. But you're not owning private jets or buying a 10M summer house on Nantucket or living in Kalorama.

If you are real, in reality what will happen is you'll help each kid get launched, buy their first house, pay for the grandkids' education, and when the time comes, each kid inherits 10M while the rest is donated. It's not that complicated. See your financial planners.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn't call 50M an ultra high net worth. Which is what makes me inclined to think this isn't a real poster. Ultra high is multiple hundreds of millions into the billions. People with 50M know this.

Second, very, very, very few genuinely wealthy people genuinely don't believe in generational wealth. They may talk it but in reality they will leave their children very comfortably off. Generational wealth is only a modern buzzword that's no more than a few years old, preying on liberal white guilt in the DEI age.

17M per child (I'm assuming this is post tax) is unquestionably a nice sum of money. But it's not ultra high net worth. It will allow each child to own a nice 2-3M house plus another 2-3M summer house and the rest tied up in investments generating a nice income for what will be generously comfortable, affluent life. But you're not owning private jets or buying a 10M summer house on Nantucket or living in Kalorama.

If you are real, in reality what will happen is you'll help each kid get launched, buy their first house, pay for the grandkids' education, and when the time comes, each kid inherits 10M while the rest is donated. It's not that complicated. See your financial planners.

Ultra high net worth is a financial term. It is not subjective and refers to a net worth more than $30M.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Leaving them money to try to control them probably won’t work and neither will not leaving them money to try to control them.

Just do what you want with the money and your kids will turn out how they turn out tbh.

The bigger question you need to deal with is how much if any money you will give them while you’re alive and sitting there with all this money.

That’s so obviously more important than what happens when you die that I think you’re a troll.

Most with that wealth start giving when alive simply to minimize taxes. Might as well start saving in 529 for future grandkids once the kids are married/planning to have grands. Just keep the kid's 529 open and invest yearly even before the grands arrive.

NP - not high net worth but on board with this sentiment. My parents became very well off post-retirement and I'd be happy if they would pass their wealth on to my kids, since I'm old enough to be comfortable and don't really need a windfall now. It's too early for you, OP, but I would say the real goal should be setting your kids up to be debt-free in their 20s and their kids to be well looked after.

DP. The issue we struggle with is if you gives kids too much money when they're young (20s), you can have a failure to launch. I had a friend like that. Trust funder, and every year he came up with some new wacky idea for a business that of course failed because you don't hustle when you don't need to. I just Googled him -- looks like his latest venture is some organic healing patch or some nonsense.

The best we came up with on advice from our financial planner is their college + expenses are fully paid for, then they get lump sums every 5-10 years, but I'm still not happy with that. Will they become lazy if they know the next tranche is 3 years away so why work towards anything in the meantime? Our kids are young enough where I can't really predict personality-wise how it will shake out.

I know lots of people with family money and trust funds and plenty of them launched. Some didn't. About the same averages of the general population.

[Anonymous]

We had no generational wealth. Three kids. One did not launch. It’s not always about the money. Again, you’re not going to die until they are well into adulthood.