My MIL died a couple of weeks ago and my husband is the executor. That’s only relevant because it got me thinking about wills. (Hers is simple and straightforward - no property, just splitting up a bank account.)
It got me to thinking about various movie plots involving wills with conditions, as well as things I assume happen in the real world.
For example, the ever popular spend the night in the haunted house to get your inheritance. Could such a condition be enforced? If so, by whom?
How about “I leave my son all my money provided he doesn’t give any of it to [political party X, or charity Y, or cause Z]” Would someone be designated to monitor how the inheritance is spent? Could that even happen?
Not having any legal education, it seems to me once the estate has been settled, it’s no one’s business what the heirs do with their money. The only control from beyond the grave I can imagine is thru a trust set up, for example, for someone with a known substance abuse problem whereby there is no payout if the heir continues the behavior. Is that possible?
Real life vs. movie plot devices can be confusing.
I went to school with a guy from a good family in town, he turned from being a star athlete to the towns biggist drug addict. He was responsible for killing people in car wrecks he caused, selling large amounts of drugs to support him and his GFs habits and being in and out of jail for numerous charges.
His parents never disowned him and bailed him out of many troubles he could not snitch his way out of. They left him quite a tidy sum when they passed and wrote the will so that he would not receive all of the money unless he was able to stay clean and take numerous random drug test for two years. It was like he signed a contact accepting these conditions. Not sure who made sure he complied with the conditions, must have been a trustee set up by the estate.
Thus was in Ohio, so at least in Ohio this is possible.
Presumably the executor of the will would be ostensibly responsible for assuring that you had satisfied such conditions in order to release the designated assets to you. Would an executor (for large estates likely to be contested this is frequently an attorney but it could be anyone designated by the will or the probate court overseeing adjudication of the estate assigns). Would anyone actually bother to check your claim that you did, in fact, stay in the haunted house? If the conditions are particularly onerous, expose the inheritor to potential harms or legal consequences, or generally against public policy, the probate judge is entirely within their authority to negate such a condition or potentially even nullify the entire will if it is found to indicate that the will is not written in good faith or by someone not in sound mind (although such decisions are rare).
This is essentially correct. Once a will has gone through probate and the assets dispensed, the court has no jurisdiction over how the inheritors use them, and it is generally very difficult to contest once probate is closed, hence why the probate on large, hotly contested estates can go on for years. (The ownership of ongoing revenue-generate assets like companies and partnerships may still be challenged on the basis of prior agreements, et cetera, but not as a part of the probate process once probate is closed.)
Adjudication of irrevocable trusts are in the hands of the trustee who has plenary authority over the management and dispensation of assets held in the trust. Even if the grantor has expressed particular desires or left explicit instructions, the trustee can generally override them as they see fit, and will only bear legal challenge if they are clearly mismanaging or defrauding the estate in trust. Still, a trustee cannot require holders to perform illegal or ethically compromising acts as part of a scheme to satisfy outrageous conditions in a trust agreement or instructions, and the trustee could be held liable for trying to exploit or manipulate inheritors in such ways even if directed to do so by the grantor.
The Westing Game, as great of a novel as it is, would be essentially impossible to execute as a will, especially with a noted jurist as one of the potential inheritors.
This is enforceable because it’s a conditional gift in the will. The legatee is free not to spend the night in the haunted house, but then the condition for the gift isn’t met, and the asset in question goes to the next in line stipulated in the will, or the residual legatee if there are no further provisions.
In principle yes, but most jurisdictions that allow for will trusts also have some variant of the “rule against perpetuities”, according to which such trusts are limited in time (traditionally, some “life in being” at the time of death plus 21 years, though sometimes this old rule is modified by statute to some other period). After the expiry of that period, the property must be vested absolutely (i.e., not subject to a trust) in someone (not necessarily the beneficiary of the trust).
Disclaimer: This varies by jurisdiction, obviously. I’m an English solicitor, and the above applies under English law; I guess most common law jurisdictions will be roughly similar.)
I had an uncle and aunt who didn’t like their two daughters’ husbands. They were talikng about ways to write a will that got inheritance money to the daughters, but such that the husbands could not access or benefit from it. They were considering setting up bank and investment accounts in the daughters names and directing the funds there, or willing it to the grandchildren only. I told them the idea was futile, since any money going to the daughters or their offspring would end up immediately accessible by the spouses.
They are both gone now and I’ve lost all contact with the daughters, so I dont know how it turned out, but ISTM like an asshole move if they worked out something that achieved their goal.
MIL kindly included her late son’s widow in her will, but she worried that the money might go to the children of the widow’s first marriage. Not that she disliked those kids, but she wanted her grandson to get it if something happened to her DIL. I kinda understood, but on the other hand, she’d be dead, so what difference would it make? DIL will get her share later this week, and as far as I’m concerned, it’s hers to use as she wishes.
Not necessarily an asshole move, just proper planning to make sure their intentions are followed. It is after all their money.
My aunt did this. She set up a trust in 3 of the grandchildrens name and stipulated that it can not be touched until the kids are 21, with the exception being for college expenses. The parents can’t touch it or use it as collateral for a loan because the funds are under the management of a trustee.
But note that there is a famous trust law case, Saunders v Vautier, in which it has been held that if all the beneficiaries of the trust agree, and they’re all of full age, then they can “collapse” the trust, i.e. terminate it and demand that the trust assets are disbursed to them free of the restrictions of the trust. This even against the will of the testator. So if this rule applies, theb grandchildren could get hold of the money once they’re all 18, even if the trust purports to bind them untilt he age of 21. Saunders is an English case, so it doesn’t necessarily apply in every jurisdiction. To my knowledge, the states of the US usually do not follow it, whereas a lot of other jurisdictions in the common law family do.
In my will, I have given several named relatives exactly one dollar, if they were to show up /be found at the time of the settling of the estate. This insures that they are ‘in the will’ and therefore can’t contest it on being ‘left out’ of it.
