Inheritance Planning for Blended Families

Inheritance planning is not a particularly thrilling activity for any one person to undertake. For one, it necessarily requires an acknowledgement of your own mortality, which not many of us wish to bring upon ourselves on any given day. For another, it involves a dry process of reckoning with – and apportioning – your assets on a granular level.

This is not a task for the faint of heart, and especially not so when familial difficulties begin to present. As such, inheritance planning can be doubly troubling for blended families. But what is a blended family, and how might one approach the sticky issue of inheritance?

What is a Blended Family?

For those unfamiliar with the term, ‘blended family’ simply refers to any family that represents an amalgamation of prior existing family units. Where two people with children from prior relationships get together and have a child of their own together (biologically or otherwise), they might eventually form a ‘new’ family unit that brings those children under the same roof, into the same family.

Blended families are, then, families. Indeed, this is how a vast majority of blended families would consider themselves. However, there are different frictions (at least, on a legal basis) with blended families than with organically conventional family units – particularly when it comes to the act of inheritance planning.

Familial Difficulties

For a great majority of blended families, the direct issue of dividing an estate is as uncomplicated as more conventional family units. However, difficulties can present where ex-partners and half-siblings of a blended family’s children enter the equation.

The children of a blended family often still have parents outside of the central unit, distant or estranged as some may be; these figures may have expectations about your inheritance and its treatment of your children or even yourself. The writing of your will should anticipate craven efforts from ex-family members with ulterior motives, if only to protect the sanctity of what you leave to your children.

Communication and Collaboration

Whatever steps you do take in the writing of your will and the dispensation of your assets, it can be a wise decision to involve your family early on in the process. This is especially the case where your children are already adults, and can be made privy to unique difficulties between other family members.

Transparent discussion may be necessary where equity release has been used at some point in your financial history; an equity release calculator can show them how it works, and what to expect in relation to property sales in the future. Keeping the division of your estate transparent can also dramatically reduce familial tension, and ensure all are able to voice their own opinions and concerns.

Seeking Guidance

Finally, and perhaps most importantly of all, it is important to involve expert voices in the writing of your will and discussion with your family. A legally-educated mediating voice can be extremely useful to ensuring an equitable and airtight agreement for all.