So said Betty when she came to see me about making a will. She then told me that she would like to leave Edith £10,000. The will would therefore say “£10,000 to Edith and the rest of my estate to be shared equally between my two daughters”
But there is a problem with this. The £10,000 is a specific legacy and so Edith would receive her share of Betty’s estate before Betty’s daughters received theirs. If Betty has an estate worth £150,000 at the time that she makes her will then the gift to Edith may seem perfectly reasonable.
However, what if Betty had been on a series of world cruises and had gone wild at the local casino before she died? Her estate may then be worth only £15,000. Edith would receive her £10,000 and Betty’s daughters only £2,500 each.
Betty was shocked when I pointed this out to her, most notably because she suffers from seasickness and has never gambled in her life! I therefore suggested that she should leave a percentage of her estate to Edith eg. 2% or 5%. That way she would be saying thank you for all of the kindness shown to her by Edith whilst at the same time benefiting her daughters in the way that she intended.
The other item that people often wish to leave by way of inheritance is their home. But which home? When you make your will you may live in a large home which is worth a lot of money. By the time you die you may have downsized your home and put most of your money into other assets. Or you may have moved into much bigger and more expensive premises. Would you still want the same person to benefit from what is now a greater part of your estate?
As life changes it is important to revisit your will from time to time. Predicting your future is like looking into a crystal ball. It is better to consider a will as a temporary measure until the next major change in your life.
After all you never know how much money you will spend when you decide to trip The Light Fandango!
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