My wife and I wrote our first wills today. Well when I say first, it's my second, I did my first one when I was single. But this was our first one as a married couple (it's only taken 10 year of married life to get round to it!). We're about to go away together across the other side of the world for a few days without the children so she was panicking that if something happened then... well we couldn't imagine.
So we sat down and begun the lengthy process of deciding who would be the executors, guardians, trustees and hold 101 other key positions of responsibility. The whole process was pretty morbid (as you can imagine) and technically overly complicated in a legal jargon kind of way.
I just want to leave everything to my wife and kids.
Why can't it be as simple as that?
When my parents were still together they spent a small fortune setting up an elaborate will sown into a maze and hidden in a spiders web somewhere in a Oceans 11 style vault in a hidden place that no-one has been given the location for. Every penny, every asset - literally everything is held in a complex trust that we'd have to go before a panel of dragons to request a loan from the trust. That is if we first were able to somehow track down this hidden location, access the vault, locate the web and navigate the maze to find the will.
I don't understand this approach to inheritance. The best bit about Christmas? It's the giving. It's seeing peoples faces when they receive something of value to them. So why wouldn't you want to do the same thing with inheritance? Inheritance tax is a major issue so why not start giving it away to your beneficiaries whilst you are still alive?
My parents are pretty well off and that's got me thinking about how topsy-turvey life is. There they are with considerable disposable income and reluctant to part with any of it, no matter how many hints I give them!
A while ago I asked my Mum when was the hardest time (financially) in their married life. She replied;
"When we were in our 40's, you were both at private school, we'd got a big and expensive house and our outgoings often exceeded our income. Those were some tough times."
I replied "So at that point, if someone gifted you a chunk of money, or paid a lump of mortgage off or helped in some way wouldn't have that made a huge difference to your life?"
"Oh God yes"
So I went on... "So, just to recap, there you were, like I am now, in your 40's, with 2 children, like I have, going through school, like ours are and a windfall would have made a substantial difference to your life".
"Yes, definitely".
She never got the hint. Of course I was only half joking anyway, our parents have never helped us and I don't think I'd like any kind of back-handed handout. It'd only be accompanied with "yes well he could have never made it without our help." I guess it's one of the things that has made us so fiercely independent but I'm not sure that's such a good thing. We're both good kids, we've never really been any bother to them at all. I mean it's not like we turned out to be drug addicted alcoholic gamblers. I personally think they should be very proud of both of us.
As long as our children turn out respectable, law abiding and good citizens then we'll be handing over our assets early enough to be able to see them being enjoyed. Surely that's what life is all about?
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