July 12, 2016
How Estate Planning Minimizes Sibling Rivalry
Make it clear how you want your assets divided to avoid disagreements between your children
After spending your whole life working hard to build wealth, the last thing you would want is for money to somehow cause conflict amongst your children. Yet sadly enough, that’s precisely what’s likely to happen if you don’t make it known ahead of time how you wish to have your estate divided after you’re gone. So take action now. Learn how estate planning can help to minimize sibling rivalry by reading the text below.
Prevent Your Children From Taking Each Other to Court
As an elderly parent, you probably have thought about how your children are going to cope with news of your passing one day. And while thinking about it, you probably hoped that your children would be able to get through the sorrow by being there to comfort each other in the days following your departure. Unfortunately, that’s not likely to happen if there are uncertainties about the distribution of your estate. As sad as it is to think about, the fact remains that adult children will often take each other to court after their parent’s passing in order to fight over money. And even though you won’t be there to witness such a sad occurrence, you still wouldn’t want that to happen amongst your children. Hence, you need to prevent your children from battling over money while you’re still able to do so.
Make it clear how you want your assets divided. Don’t just depend on your children to carry out your wishes. Many parents in the past have made the mistake of thinking that they can just vocalize to their children who is to inherit what without getting anything documented in writing. But the truth is that a vocal agreement isn’t enough to prevent your children from battling it out with each other in court after you’re no longer around to testify. You need to discuss your wishes with an estate lawyer who can actually make sure that your wishes get carried out the way it was planned by you.
Let Your Children Know That You’ve Already Made Plans
Having an estate lawyer isn’t just great for preventing a family feud after you’re gone, it can also help to minimize sibling rivalry while you’re still alive and well. Conflict between siblings often occur when at least one of the siblings think that the other is trying to get closer to the parent in order to get the will written in their favor. This can cause the siblings to see each other as rivals fighting for both love and money.
Many parents hate the thought of having to draw up a will. So they hold off on doing it for as long as possible. However, the longer you delay your estate planning, the longer the time your children will have to think that they can try to influence your decision with the dividing of the estate. Thus, your children will have a longer period of time to see each other more as rivals than as close family members. So unless you want to see your children treating each other like rivals all the time, you need to do something to end the rivalry.
Take some time alone to think about how you would like to divide your assets amongst your children. Then contact us to discuss what you’ve come up with. The estate plan will be drawn up as you wish. And afterwards, you can let your children know that you’ve already made plans for the estate. Knowing that your mind has officially been decided on matters pertaining to the estate, your children can then simply focus on enjoying the time that they still have with you in their lives.