Clients sometimes ask me whether they should tell their children about their estate plan. My answer depends upon the family circumstances.
If relations are warm and cordial between the parents and all of the children, then disclosure of the parents' estate plan may be fine. If relations between family members are not warm and cordial, telling the children about the estate plan may just throw fuel on the fire.
There are four things you should remember. First, you are under no legal duty to leave your children anything. If you wish to disinherit a child, simply make it clear in your will that you have not forgotten them.
I had a client whose daughter, Barbara, made poor choices of husbands. Her mother paid large sums (amounting to Barbara's share of her estate) to bail her out of bad marriages. Barbara always told her mother that she wanted to be mentioned in your will so Article Seven in the mother's will I drafted said, "To my daughter, Barbara, who always wanted to be mentioned in my will, 'Hello, Barbara!'"
Second, you are under no duty to treat your children equally. During your lifetime you would deal with your children in accordance with their individual needs and resources, and there is no need to change that treatment in your estate plan.
Third, your assets are your assets. They are not your children's assets.
You have created them. You can do with them as you please.
Fourth, how you are going to leave your assets is your business. You have no duty to tell anybody what your plans are.
I see newspaper articles in which the author suggests that parents should tell their children what they plan to do with their estates. This assumes that everyone in the family relates comfortably with everyone else.
This assumption is not realistic. There are families in which relations between siblings are poor, and if one sibling finds out that another is favored with more of an expectancy than another, there is going to be a war brewing in the family even before the will is probated. If your children do not get on well with each other, stirring the coals does not add anything.
