If you were left millions in your parent's will, but your brother or sister were left nothing, would you give them some money?
如果父母的遗嘱中给你留下了数百万，而你的兄弟姐妹什么也没留下，你会给他们一些...
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Jeff Edwards, Novelist, researcher, and general trouble maker.
My sister isnot a Quora reader. In the unlikely event that one of you fine people happen toknow her, please keep this information quiet. (Thanks!)
ur mother died a few years ago, leavingher estate to me, my younger brother, and our older sister. While it didn’tamount to millions, between house, savings, retirement accounts, and some undevelopedproperty, there was a fairly hefty sum of money.
As the executor of Mom’s estate, mybrother had direct insight into the financials. When he had a feel for theassets and liabilities, he came up with a plan to deceive our beloved sisterabout the size of our shared inheritance. He approached me with his idea, and Ibecame an instant co-conspirator.
My brother and I both have solid careersand strong retirement plans. While our sister has always worked hard and hasbeen careful with her money, life has thrown her a few curve balls. For reasonscompletely beyond her control, she wasn’t very well set up for retirement. And- given that she’s nearly a decade older than me - we knew she couldn’t keepcharging that hard forever.
Hence my brother’s evil plan…
Instead of splitting the estate intothree equal shares, my brother and I each took a few thousand dollars and gavethe remaining 95% to our sister. We’ve kept up the fiction that the estate wasmuch larger than any of us suspected, and our sister still believes that shereceived an equal one-third share.
It wasn’t a fortune, but it was enoughto make her retirement possible and give her a comfortable cushion againstfuture emergencies. My only regret is that it wasn’t my idea.
Bcause our sister really is beloved.Our father died when we were children, and she pretty much raised the rest ofus. She’s one of the kindest, most supportive human beings you’re ever likelyto meet. She deserves a bit of rest and security after a lifetime of hard work.
Getting back to OP’s question, we didn’tinherit millions and no one was cut out of the estate. But we clearly didn’tfollow our mother’s intentions. I’m okay with that. And if Mom could see usnow, I think she’d be okay with it too.
Edit:
I never really expected this one to blowup like it has. Thanks for all the kind comments! Given the amount of attentionthis answer is attracting, I feel compelled to set the record straight about acouple of things:
#1 My brother and I are not saints.We’re not perfect selfless beings who think only of others. I like to believewe’re basically decent people, but we’re just as capable of pettiness andfoolishness as anyone else. This was simply a case in which we saw anopportunity to do something for someone we both love.
#2 I probably should have given astraight telling of the story, instead of setting it up as a twist. Myapologies for heightening the drama. I’m a writer of adventure fiction and thetemptation to mess with the expectations of my readers got the better of me.
我姐姐不是Quora的读者。万一你们中的一个好人碰巧认识她，请保守这个秘密。(谢谢!)
我们的母亲几年前去世了，把她的财产留给了我、弟弟和姐姐。虽然算不上百万，但在房子、储蓄、退休账户和一些未开发的房地产之间，有相当可观的一笔钱。作为母亲财产的执行人，我弟弟对财务有直接的了解。当他对资产和负债有了感觉后，他想出了一个计划，在我们共同继承的财产的大小上欺骗我们深爱的姐姐。他向我提出了他的想法，我立刻就成了他的同谋。
Gigi J Wolf
Was there a problem between her and your mother? Don’tanswer if that’s intrusive. Just curious. I loved what you guys did, though!
她和你妈妈之间有什么问题吗?如果这冒犯了你，不用回答。
只是好奇。不过我喜欢你们做的事!
Jeff Edwards
Nope. Not at all. Mom just wanted to be fair by dividingthings equally. We were in a place where we could tip the balance toward oursister, so that’s what we did.
不，一点也没有。妈妈只是想公平地把东西平分。我们处在一个可以把天平向妹妹倾斜的位置，所以我们就这么做了。
Habib Fanny
I try. :)
我尽力。
MelanieCelliers, SoftwareDeveloper
Funny you should ask….
I find myself in exactly this position. Well, not exactly. There isconsiderably less money at stake than that, but still similar.
Let me explain…
Dad specified in his will that everything should go to Mom. Hehad a clause to say that if Mom passed away before him, or within a month ofhim, everything should be divided up between all the children. The 7 childrenare my 3 sisters from my dad’s first marriage, my 3 brothers from my mom’sfirst marriage and myself, from their marriage.
The problem is, that Mom died 77 days after he did, and shedidn’t have a will.
So that means that the state decides where the money will go.According to the law, everything goes to Mom and since she died without a will,the state will only give a share to Mom’s biological children. Which completelyexcludes my sisters.
This is completely crazy, and I tried sending a letter to the‘officer of the court’ (I think that’s what he was), to motivate him to insteadshare the investment policies between 7 of us. I tried explaining to him thatDad’s intention was for the money to be shared evenly but he refused.
So now it looks like this is how it’s going to happen regardlessof what my parents intended.
I spoke to my brothers and we have agreed that when the money ispaid into our accounts, we will transfer the amounts to an account that I willcreate. Then from there I will divide it between the 7 of us.
The amount is very unlikely to be very much, but because thesewere my parents wishes, I think that everyone is very likely to do the rightthing.
Perhaps, if my parents had purposely excluded someone, it wouldbe less likely to end the same way but my parents would never havedone that to one of us. Even my one sister, who after a disagreement, didn’tsee my parents for the last 3 years. My parents still loved her and wouldn’thave dreamt of excluding her from the will.
So now, we wait for the state to do what it wants to do and Ihope that it doesn’t end up tearing my family apart.
I have faith in all of them,so I’m probably worried for nothing.
我发现自己正处于这种境地。嗯,不完全是。与此相比，涉及的资金要少得多，但情况仍然类似。
父亲在遗嘱中明确规定一切都应归母亲所有。他有一条规定，如果母亲在他之前去世，或者在他去世后一个月内去世，所有的东西都应该分给所有的孩子。这7个孩子是我父亲第一次婚姻的3个姐妹，我母亲第一次婚姻的3个兄弟，还有我自己。
问题是，他去世77天后，妈妈也去世了，她没有遗嘱。这意味着国家决定资金的去向。根据法律，一切都归母亲所有，因为她没有遗嘱就去世了，国家只会给母亲的亲生孩子一份。这完全排除了我的姐妹。
对我来说，如果真的发生了这样的事，我会和一个兄弟姐妹分享，但另一个几十年前就已经抛弃了这个家庭，用非常恶毒的语言，尤其是对我。这个人从来没有成功过，总是在一些事情不是绝对完美的时候放弃，而我的另一个兄弟姐妹和我从很小的时候就开始拼命工作，从来没有放弃过，无论是好是坏。所以我可能会把微薄的钱寄到那个方向，但我必须咬紧牙关才能做到。
David Gentile
We had a brother like that, always demanding, nevercontributing, basically let our youngest brother die in agony, now stealingeverything he can from our mother now that dad is dead. Disgusting pig. drunk,druggie.
我们有一个这样的哥哥，他总是对我们提出要求，从不做出贡献，基本上就是让我们最小的弟弟痛苦地死去，现在爸爸死了，他从我们的母亲那里偷走了一切。恶心的猪,瘾君子。
Kimberly Ann
Money should always be divided equally between yourchildren. To not do that is to be a horrible parent and to cause even moredivision. If a child is bad it’s on the parent, they raised that child.
钱应该总是平均分配给你的孩子。如果不这样做，就会成为一个糟糕的家长，导致更多的分歧。如果一个孩子是坏的，那是父母的错，是他们养育了这个孩子。
M. A.Steinberger
Feb 8 · 2 upvotes
I must disagree about the “always”. One family I know willleave more to their autistic son than to his siblings. They are all okay withthis, because although he does an impressive job being as independent aspossible, he will need more help as he ages than his siblings. I know this isan unusual situation, but there are cases where one will quitehonestly need more help, through no lack of personal effort.
我完全不同意“总是”这个说法。我认识的一个家庭留给他们患有自闭症的儿子的会比留给他的兄弟姐妹更多。
他们对此都没有意见，因为尽管他在尽可能独立方面做得令人印象深刻，但随着年龄的增长，他将比他的兄弟姐妹们需要更多的帮助。我知道这是一个不寻常的情况，但在有些情况下，一个人确实需要更多的帮助，即便努力过。
Michael Bird, lives in Planet Earth, Milky Way, The Universe. (1973-present)
I know of a situation where one child in a very wealthyfamily was specifically left $1 in their parents’ will because this child hadrepeatedly and maliciously stolen from the parents, emotionally (and a fewtimes physically) abused the parents, frequently lied to the parents aboutthings the other children had done (that they didn’t actually do), andgenerally just making themselves unwanted at any family gatherings. This son’swife, who was just as bad as he was, had also frequently claimed (bragged) thatsince he was the oldest child, he would be inheriting EVERYTHING when theparents died.
The mother, who was more willing to put up with this garbage,passed away first. After she did, the father had the will altered to only givethat son $1, with the added condition that if that son contested their $1inheritance, a sealed envelope would be opened and read to everyone gatheredfor the reading of the will. This sealed envelope contained a detailed accountof everything harmful that the son had done to his parents, to his siblings,how he had cheated on his wife (apparently she didn’t know), and how that timewhen he went to “summer camp” as a teenager, he had actually been in jail forarmed robbery. Nobody but the father knew what was in that sealed envelope. The$1 son decided to contest. Now all of the extended family knows…
So, in a case like that, Iwould not give them any of the inheritance. But fortunately I probably won’thave to because none of my siblings are anywhere near that awful.
我知道一件事，一个生活在富裕家庭里的孩子只从其父母的遗嘱里得到1美元（的遗产），因为这个孩子频繁地恶意地偷父母东西，滥用父母情感，经常对父母撒谎说是其他孩子做的（事实上他们没有做），并且频繁让自己在家庭聚会上不受欢迎。和这个儿子一样坏的他的妻子也经常吹嘘说，因为他是最大的孩子，父母死后他将继承一切。
母亲，这个更愿意忍受这种垃圾的人先去世了。之后，这位父亲修改了遗嘱，只给了儿子1美元，附加条件是，如果儿子对他们1美元的遗产提出异议，就会打开一个密封的信封，给聚集在一起阅读遗嘱的所有人看。
这个密封的信封里详细记载了儿子对父母和兄弟姐妹所做的一切有害的事情。他欺骗了他的妻子(显然她不知道),以及那一次，当他十几岁去“夏令营”的时候，他却因为持械抢劫而被关进了监狱。除了父亲以外，没有人知道那个密封的信封里装的是什么。1美元的儿子决定争辩。现在大家庭的人都知道……
在这种情况下，我不会给他们任何遗产。但幸运的是，我可能不必这么做，因为我的兄弟姐妹们都没有那么糟糕。
