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I think it's fair to split evenly.

However, I hope my parents spend all their money while they are living and enjoy life. My grandparents have lots of money and always joke that they are leaving none behind - enjoying life! I agree with that my mom does as well. I'd rather see my mom have a great retirement then leave us with a bunch of money.

My parents will be splitting everything as evenly as possible. My parents are divorced - my mom is remarried but her husband and her were both wealthy coming into the marriage so they have kept all finances separate. He gets nothing from her estate. My dad has a long term girlfriend (10 years)...he has told me a few times that for now its an even third split (his three daughters) but at some point he may want it split 4 ways to include his girlfriend. I have been very clear with him he better put it in writing otherwise its an even split three ways. No verbal agreements.

DH's parents are different. DH and his SIL swear their mother will leave it all to charity. I dont completely buy it. I think there is a chance she will leave it in trusts for her grandkids but I dont think she'll give it to charity. Who knows...I dont understand why you wouldnt want to give it to your children assuming they are mature enough to do right with it?!

I think splitting evenly is fair. However, in some circumstances, there could be a child that is completely irresponsible or have other issues. I'm in favor of cutting out such child from the will or putting in place a trust that will dictate how that child's inheritance can be spent.

As the child and spouse if the child who would be deemed not needing help I think an even split is most fair. When I am in the parent and have children of different abilities who knows what I would choose. I have talked to my mom about this to make sure I'm compensated for settling her estate since we both know my bro won't be helpful.

Even and equal as possible. My grandparents cut two of their seven children out entirely, based on personal reasons. Whether to include those siblings anyway caused major problems.

I seem to be in the minority but to me it's very situational. If I had a sibling that needed more because he's very irresponsible and diliquent then I would give them less. Otherwise I would just do it evenly.

This thread has gotten me curious. By 50/50 it means that if there's a family heirloom, it's either sold and the money evenly distributed or given to 1 person and its value is deducted from the pot. I've noticed that while the big ticket items are divided evenly, certain people are usually given possessions and it's not deducted from their "share". If that's the case, it's not really 50/50.

This is where being an only child makes life easy. I clearly know where the bulk of the money is going. My dad passed already and I got the whole thing.

For my own kids I plan on splitting it evenly.

I think it's a little odd that parents would definitively know their adult children's financial situations enough to wb able to split it in a way to help out the most needy one. My parents know very little about our finances. They do think we have much less than we do based on how we choose to spend our money, but it's not really any of their business. I honestly don't know which way is "best", I see pros and cons to each. I don't really care though what my parents do. I don't necessarily want it anyways. Happiest day of my life was when I no longer had to depend on them for anything financially. Personally, I'd be inclined to split evenly just so there's no resentment or arguing between the kids over it.

Hmm... I've always heard people say equal is not necessarily fair.

For instance, one sibling wasn't given certain opportunities and could use more money? I would think its "fair" to give them a larger share.

@Beth24: My grandma did that with my mom and my aunt instead of a larger inheritance. One last huge vacation. She's now beyond the point of being able to vacation anywhere. They really treasured those trips.

@Jess1483: I work in finance and we once saw a case where someone died and his trust was to be distributed into equal trust for all grandchildren and great-grandchildren living or in utero! He had 25 and two more on the way, so we had to wait for the births to distribute the trust. It was a nightmare.

Well, my brother and I will not get anything as my parents are indigent - we are supporting them and as they wont downsize their house or possessions, we are looking at dealing with an annoying situation when they pass having to get rid of a ton of stuff and a rickety house.

DH's parents will theoretically split everything evenly but MIL's family members live notoriously long - like almost 100 years old - so FIL has basically worked his tail off his whole life, holding tight control of the family finances expecting MIL to outlive him by 30 years. MIL is not great with money so he feels between her longevity and inability to manage money, there probably won't be much left when she passes. But I appreciate that we won't have to take care of her like we do my parents.

Based on this, DH and I have never expected to receive anything. It sorta sucks because my brother and my BIL are marrying or have married girls who are going to inherit a ton of money so just based on random inheritances, their financial pictures change overnight.

Anyways, because of our parents' respective situations, DH and I had to put ourselves through school, we paid for everything we have ourselves, and now have to support my parents. So our estate planning should we die while we are young is stupid, it's like we literally leave some money to my parents so they don't become homeless and then leave everything evenly in trust for our kids. In reality it is more like making sure we are financially secure first (i.e. Pay off our school loans) then help our kids with their educations, and then do everything we can not to burden our children in our old age. If we find ourselves old and gray and financially secure, we are more likely to help our kids during our lifetime with stuff like weddings or help buying homes and probably set up trust accounts for our grandchildren.

I looked at this more from the standpoint of me and my children. If one child lucked out in life and was doing very well for themselves and the other had a series of difficult obstacles or simply wasn't as lucky I would be tempted to leave more to the second. This may be because I am not nearly as well off as my sister so I can relate to being in the lower position more.

This all reminds me of a cartoon I once saw showing the difference between equity and equality. Just because something is equal doesn't make it equitable!

As far as what my parents do I'm not expecting them to leave me or my sister anything! Id be happy if they spent it enjoying their retirement.

Splitting it evenly is the only way to do it, in my opinion. My dad passed away unexpectedly and had left much more for my youngest sister (his favourite, he never tried to hide that fact). My sister knew it would cause a lot of hard feelings and chose to split everything evenly.

I don't think it's fair to split things any other way.

Splitting the amount evenly makes the most sense to me, in most cases. But I wouldn't hesitate to hold it in trust for a less responsible child, to be sure that it isn't squandered. Or leave that child a house to live in instead of cash.

Both my parents are gone, and we got nothing. My mother died in debt. My father's savings (I bet it wasn't much) and life insurance payout all went to my stepmother. We aren't close, so I'm not really expecting that she will pass any of that to us. I think she'll use it or pass it to her kids. Oh well.

@Raindrop: the sad thing is DH's grandfather tried not to blindside her - he wrote her a heartfelt letter explaining why the situation changed and spoke to her multiple times about it. He was very unexpectedly diagnosed with end stage lung cancer (never a smoker) and had a very short life expectancy upon diagnoses. There were so many factors that led to the change in his division of his estate. And at the end of the day DH's mom still received a sizable inheritance. DH was beyond upset with her for treating his grandfather this way on his deathbed. And he was generous to all the kids during his life.

I kind of think of it like this: if I had two children and one was well fed and taken care of while the other (for whatever reason or circumstances) was struggling, starving and not thriving - wouldn't I put all the resources I had at my disposal to help the one struggling to at least have a comfortable existence. I feel like that is a parent's heart. It's not at the expense of the healthy/strong one - they are still able to thrive and be self sufficient. I think the one that needs help should get help. If I had my choice I would rather be the healthy, self sufficient child that didn't need my parents help rather than the one in a bad situation and needed financial assistance from my parents

Now I think it totally different if an unequal division is clearly out of favoritism and if all the children are in comparable situations.