Parents being flippant about inheritance - is it a trend?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My parents don’t have a penny to leave me but I’m self-made rich. I’m totally baffled by people who spend it all. How can you really think it’s “yours” when it was a generational gift?h

I hope my kids see it that way when they inherit from me.

They won’t. They will think that you were an atm machine made for their use.

Well I guess that’s why generation skipping trusts exist.

What? No. The point of generation skipping trusts is to benefit the grandchild AND the child while avoiding estate taxes. I’m not even sure this is a thing people still do, whether because of changes to the rules or the availability of dynasty trusts from Wyoming and such that have ridiculously long terms and stuff.

Anyway the point is not really to “skip” your kids, it’s to avoid estate taxes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My parents don’t have a penny to leave me but I’m self-made rich. I’m totally baffled by people who spend it all. How can you really think it’s “yours” when it was a generational gift?h

I hope my kids see it that way when they inherit from me.

They won’t. They will think that you were an atm machine made for their use.

Well I guess that’s why generation skipping trusts exist.

What? No. The point of generation skipping trusts is to benefit the grandchild AND the child while avoiding estate taxes. I’m not even sure this is a thing people still do, whether because of changes to the rules or the availability of dynasty trusts from Wyoming and such that have ridiculously long terms and stuff.

Anyway the point is not really to “skip” your kids, it’s to avoid estate taxes.

Well it’s the point for me.

I’m guessing you’re one of those people who gets mad when grandkids get direct gifts because you think your siblings with more kids are getting what’s yours.

[Anonymous]

I think there need to be some etiquette guidelines for that generation around money. My mom inherited from her parents, aunt and uncle and then dad when he passed. She go0t even more latidah and kept making threats with her money as she assumed this whole over the top way of talking. In retrospect it was comical, but the constant threats about her will were not funny. I helped her as much as I could because I wanted to, but the more la ti dah she got the less I wanted to be around her. I finally shut it down. After enough times of saying she is free to do what she wants with her money, I point blank told her to stop with the threats about her will. I told her I already made it clear she could do as she pleases, but the attempts at manipulation were downright disgusting and I did not want to hear another word about her money. She tried to announce all the people she was giving free handouts to-siblings, cousins and I shut that down too. My dad, grandparents and aunt and uncle are rolling around in their grave. i don't think they worked this hard to turn her into a diva.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I expect to get flamed for this so let me say up front that I 100% understand that people have the right to do what they want with their money and that no one is obligated to leave an inheritance.

Even so, I am a little taken aback at my parents attitude, stated on several occasions, to spend it all and not leave anything behind. They are in a good financial position. That's fine, but the truth is that my parents can afford to think like this is because my paternal grandparents left several hundred thousand dollars to my father. It would have been more if my grandfather had ever been able to bring himself to gift money during his lifetime or set up a pass through trust. Half his estate went to the IRS. My grandfather talked about both of those options extensively with me (b/c I was a practicing lawyer at the time) but could never quite bring himself to do it because, according to my mother, he couldn't get over the thought that the grandkids would do something impulsive like buy a sports car. This was over 20 years ago when the estate tax limit was $1million. I think he couldn't really get over the fact that he had amassed that wealth and thus just pushed off the decision.

Is there something that happens in age that causes you to have weird attitudes about money and inheritance? My mother told some story about her friends who are also quite well off making some jab about their kids frittering away the money so they plan to spend it all. But they raised us, and none of us are profligate spenders or anything.

I don't feel like I'm owed anything and this question really isn't about money, but more about the attitude about it as people age.

Yes when people retire they are scared the money will run out before they die.

[Anonymous]

Living this now - both sides of the family.

My father died a decade ago and my mom very quickly went on a spending spree -re-furnishing their house and doing major needed repairs.

With some of the inheritance from my dad still left over, she made a grand pronouncement that she was paying college tuition for all grandchildren (6) starting with my DC! Amazing! Brava! We accepted and DC graduated, debt-free!

Then, another GC started college and she dialed it back: one semester and books. She eventually reneged on her promise entirely.

Sold her house and pronounced she was now going to spend her largesse on various charities - nothing about her GC. She’s keeping all of her money and we, her family, will have to figure this all out when she dies.

My FIL made us a one time offer: he had $100k that he was putting aside for future nursing home care. Did we need anything before he reinvested? We declined.

TL;dr - stay in your lane and don’t count on a penny from your parents. Pay your own way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s a boomer thing. Many boomers moved from MC to UMC. Their parents lived frugally, saved and left them with an inheritance of several hundred thousand to a few million depending on the land value of the house. This could be the start of generational wealth if they put it into trusts to be invested but instead they treat it like lottery winners.

For whatever reason, boomers are hyper competitive and fearful that someone else will get something that they won’t. They would much rather buy a sports car..even if it isn’t something they really, really want than risk having a grandchild down the line use THEIR money to buy a sports car.

On the nose!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I expect to get flamed for this so let me say up front that I 100% understand that people have the right to do what they want with their money and that no one is obligated to leave an inheritance.

Even so, I am a little taken aback at my parents attitude, stated on several occasions, to spend it all and not leave anything behind. They are in a good financial position. That's fine, but the truth is that my parents can afford to think like this is because my paternal grandparents left several hundred thousand dollars to my father. It would have been more if my grandfather had ever been able to bring himself to gift money during his lifetime or set up a pass through trust. Half his estate went to the IRS. My grandfather talked about both of those options extensively with me (b/c I was a practicing lawyer at the time) but could never quite bring himself to do it because, according to my mother, he couldn't get over the thought that the grandkids would do something impulsive like buy a sports car. This was over 20 years ago when the estate tax limit was $1million. I think he couldn't really get over the fact that he had amassed that wealth and thus just pushed off the decision.

Is there something that happens in age that causes you to have weird attitudes about money and inheritance? My mother told some story about her friends who are also quite well off making some jab about their kids frittering away the money so they plan to spend it all. But they raised us, and none of us are profligate spenders or anything.

I don't feel like I'm owed anything and this question really isn't about money, but more about the attitude about it as people age.

Yes when people retire they are scared the money will run out before they die.

Not all people.

[Anonymous]

I'm with you, OP. My own parents do a variation where they say they wish they could help us (e.g., with college savings) but they can't - then they go buy a sports car, and tell me how much I'll enjoy the car when I inherit it. Their money is theirs to spend, but the way they talk about it is so awkward.

My parents grew up poor and don't have good financial education generally. Like a lot of people in that situation, they cannot fathom the idea of planned giving during their lifetime: they think that leaving an inheritance, preferably of real estate, is the pinnacle of what you could do for your kids.

[Anonymous]

My parents are very generous and they have been very thoughtful about inheritance. They have both set up well funded irrevocable generation skipping trusts whereby my siblings and I will benefit from the trust income but the principal will eventually go to their grandchildren with age and other restrictions. Along with my siblings, my mother is a beneficiary of my fathers trust (and he of hers) so that if their non trust assets run out she will have plenty of money to live on. My siblings and I are all in our mid to late 30’s and doing very well on our own and I think that has led to my parents being very open about their planning which hopefully will be well well off in the future. When my father’s parents died he elected to not receive his inheritance and instead had it go directly to his children. It wasn’t a lot of money but he knew that we would benefit from it far more than he would.

[Anonymous]

Yeah they get grumpy and resentful. It’s weird.

[Anonymous]

That kinda of attitude is usually b/c they feel that you aren't really supportive of them - they may assume you are motivated by money. A lot of older people start to feel like that later in life b/c they are disappointed with their family relationships.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yeah they get grumpy and resentful. It’s weird.

I could understand this, if their parents behaved similarly. But their own parents were very clear they would leave them whatever they could. The disconnect is what I find weird.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We’re in our early 60s and early retired and have a net worth of just over $7 million. We’ve taken very good care of our now adult children - college educations, weddings, down payments all covered, plus literally hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of free and excellent child care (none of our kids have ever had to pay a dime to a nanny, sitter or day care - and that’s enough for them. They’re not chomping at the but waiting for us to croak, and they don’t begrudge us spending however much we want on whatever we want.

If things go well, they should end up with some amount of inheritance, but if they don’t I’m quite sure they’re not gonna trash us on an anonymous website.

Your generation amazes me. It’s never enough. You always want more.

Did you receive a big inheritance from your parents, and are you now proudly telling your kids that you plan to leave them nothing? Because that is OP's situation, not what you have described.

[Anonymous]

I had a friend whose wealthy dad made a big point of spending all his money before he died (or at least trying). He even had a multi-million dollar 70th birthday party where he booked the Rolling Stones and other big acts, and made a joke at the party about how his kids should enjoy the night because it was their inheritance. My friend was comfortable and UMC and of course benefitted from her Dad's wealth in lots of ways in her childhood and teen years. And in the end there was still actually a lot of money, despite his best efforts (at least, it seemed like a lot to me, a normal person). But it's hard to imagine the Greatest Generation throwing themselves a multi-million dollar birthday party instead of using the money to set up trusts to fund their grandkids' education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That kinda of attitude is usually b/c they feel that you aren't really supportive of them - they may assume you are motivated by money. A lot of older people start to feel like that later in life b/c they are disappointed with their family relationships.

I'm a pp at 9:56.
Maybe in some cases, but in my case my mom was literally saying these things when I was about 7 or 8 years old!