Strange Inheritance Situation - Need Perspective

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, what does your husband think about the situation?

What does the husband have to do with this?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think you should talk to a lawyer. It's perfectly legal to disinherit your adult children, but that doesn't mean it won't be contested. I would not respond to them.

I agree with this. Don't do anything without consulting a trusts and estates lawyer, who can advise on the implications of any action.

I would have to. The money is in trust and my kids would not come into it until their 21st birthdays. They are in their mid-teens now.

[Anonymous]

I know from my family that children of the first marriage feel hurt if all the money goes to the second wife (and her family). It's a kind of a jerk thing to do. In this case, if he was estranged from his kids it's a little more understandable, but ultimately he played a role in that relationship and could have been the bigger person and tried to maintain more contact.

OP, I don't think there's anything for you to do in this situation, but I agree with some others that your mother could leave them at least a little money, since it sounds like she won't use up the money he left her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, what does your husband think about the situation?

What does the husband have to do with this?

Maybe he can mansplain what to do?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m curious did his kids come to his funeral?

This is OP. No. One sent flowers.

[Anonymous]

So he was "in" their lives as long as he was in the lives of your kids.

Of course you don't need to feel guilty or engage with these people but that is like the ultimate dick move he pulled. The money would have gone to your mom regardless, the fact that he purposely put money aside for your kids was just mean.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, what does your husband think about the situation?

He is as surprised as I am.

[Anonymous]

I was estranged from my dad when he died, and I never thought of trying to get "my share" of his estate. I cut him out of my life when he was alive, and I didn't want his money after he died, either.

His adult children need to get over it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I hope you can see your way to being a charitable and humane person. The rightful path is clear here, and only you can facilitate it.

It’s not OP’s money to be generous with. If I were OP I would 100% tell them to get lost.

I would not want to be a weapon in a dead man’s continuing war on his kids.

Then that’s the burden OP’s children will have to grapple with. It’s not OP’s money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'd love to hear the legal grounds pps think this will can be contested?
Note, legal grounds does not include the hurt feelings of adult children:

The will failed to comply with the statutory requirements for it to be valid, often an issue where wills are handwritten (in whole or in part), unsigned, not witnessed or not notarized
Breach of fiduciary duty, for example where a power of attorney does something in their self-interest instead of in the interest of the person they are supposed to be serving
Duress (threat of violence, abuse, or other unethical, coercive action)
Fraud that affected the details of the will
Forgery
Misrepresentation
Someone used undue influence to ensure that the terms of the will benefited them
The person who made the will can be proven to have been mentally ill, incapacitated, or otherwise lacked the capacity to make a will

You forgot about assumptions. There is an assumption that you would provide for your surviving spouse and children. If you want to disinherit them, you have to provide for that in the will. If you don’t, it is grounds for a contest.

OP, I’d ignore them. And only if you get served with a lawsuit or if you are really worried about it would I even bother to call a lawyer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I hope you can see your way to being a charitable and humane person. The rightful path is clear here, and only you can facilitate it.

It’s not OP’s money to be generous with. If I were OP I would 100% tell them to get lost.

I would not want to be a weapon in a dead man’s continuing war on his kids.

Then that’s the burden OP’s children will have to grapple with. It’s not OP’s money.

Then that was an awful thing for him to do to OP’s children. They have to fight people they don’t know, who never did anything to them. What a gross man!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m curious did his kids come to his funeral?

This is OP. No. One sent flowers.

NP. That's cold. Hard to muster any sympathy for them being disinherited.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would ignore their calls/emails. If they indicate they are pursuing legal action probably worth it to contact a lawyer of your own and find out what this process usually look like, but I wouldn't assume they will go down that road (it seems to me that it is likely to be expensive and ineffective for them.) I"m sorry, it sounds like a messy situation that really has nothing to do with you. I disagree with the the "come to an equitable agreement on your own" advice and pay them off. These were HIS wishes with HIS money. If his first family was horrible to him and he didn't want to leave them anything that is entirely his right and it would seem disrespectful, after death, to use his money for something he clearly decided not to do.

+1

[Anonymous]

To the people who are saying that the adult kids deserve nothing for mistreating their dad, or for checking out of their dad's life, I'd like to urge you to consider that you only have one side of this.

I am sure my dad's wife's kids will be saying similar things when my dad dies and leaves everything to them/his new wife. I also know he has told people that the kids from his first marriage are "spiteful" and are willingly not a part of his life. But the truth is that he abandoned us for his new wife and her kids. We were teens when he married her, and he had no interest in us from that point on: he didn't come to birthdays, graduations, or anything else. When we needed something, we had to plead, and we usually didn't get it. My youngest brother never got braces because dad wouldn't pay, even though older siblings got them and he paid for his new wife's kids' college. We, his first family, took out student loans. We were never invited to his home with her. Oh, and our mom was dead, so that lent an extra note of bitterness to the situation.

I am sure we will get nothing. We don't expect it. But I wish people would be a little less quick to assume that everything our dad said is true. Does it REALLY make sense that ALL of his kids willingly checked out of his life?

This happens a lot when men remarry.

I have reservations about OP's step-dad's story. I think OP should at least talk to the kids and be willing to share.

I know my dad's new wife and her family won't do the same for us.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m curious did his kids come to his funeral?

This is OP. No. One sent flowers.

NP. That's cold. Hard to muster any sympathy for them being disinherited.

Yet you don't know what their side of this story is. What if he abandoned them? Would you really expect him to tell his new wife and her family that he had chosen to focus just on his new family and cut ties with the old one? Of course not. Man remarries, first family becomes a burden he'd like to forget. Tale as old as time.

There's probably nothing OP can do to make things right, though.