You're a billionaire. What does your will look like?

In My Humble Opinion
1

So you’re a billionaire by whatever means suits you.

Your assets are cash, stocks, real estate, bullion, krugerrands, bitcoins, overstuffed mattresses, whatever. It’s your money, you decided how to apportion it as you acquired it.

Unfortunately you’re also not immortal, so what are your instructions for dispersing it when your sole purpose is pushing up daisies?

Mine looks something like this.

All real estate is to be liquidated at fair market value. Any listed heirs are given the right of first refusal to purchase any properties being sold. If more than one heir wants a given property, the closest blood relative is given priority to buy it from their inheritance or personal resources. If that results in a tie, they can cut cards for it.

Then on to the cash.

Siblings, children, and spouse get 5 million each.

Grandchildren and their children etc., nieces, and nephews get a million each held in trust until their 25th birthdays.

10 million gets put into an education trust fund for the children of nieces and nephews for up to a master’s degree by age 40. This includes trade schools if that is their desire.

Various friends will also get some amounts of money.

With the remaining hundreds of millions…

Foundation(s) will be funded to support scholarships for STEM programs, but these will have been established while I was alive.

A variety of charities will also benefit. These will also have been vetted and gotten my personal approval.

That’s about it, but I reserve the right to amend my choices by blatantly and unapologetically plagiarizing any good suggestions posted here.

2

My heirs are my brothers equally, and if they predecease me, their children by blood or adoption.

That won’t change if I win the lottery.

If they want to slug it out rather than divide things rationally that’s their problem, I’ll either be enjoying some heavenly popcorn while watching the fight or not.

3

Mine looks like a scroll made from parchment and inked in human blood.

4

All to wife.

5

10 million each to my two kids, who don’t really need the money. Another 5 million to my grandson, in trust, to cover education and doled out in chunks until he is 30.
No more than that - it will distort their lives too much.

After that, big chunks to the Freedom from Religion Foundation, Planned Parenthood, ACLU, Red Cross, our town library, food banks all over the Bay Area, our classical radio station, which is listener supported.

However, unless I keeled over the week after I won the money, I’d probably set up a foundation to support some other projects, like science education, so that might actually keep most of the money.

I’m assuming my wife predeceases me - but we’d probably give lots of it away before I die.

6

I would make sure my sister is comfortably provided for, if necessary (she seems to be already, but maybe some more money would make her life better as she gets older). This would probably be in the nature of a trust so that after her death the remaining money wouldn’t go to her children, it would go back into the main fund.

I would set up a trust for my husband that sees that all regular bills are paid and he has plenty of money to travel or whatever; but the trust will be solid and he won’t be able to get his hands on the capital. There would be a proviso that none of the money would be spent on his wastrel niece (if possible). After his death the remaining proceeds of the trust will go into the main fund.

There isn’t anyone else I want to provide for directly. The main fund would set up a foundation to pursue some worthy goal that I would decide before my death. Teaching people to read, providing sex education and contraception, resources for women’s health and autonomy, something useful that would also improve society as a whole. The foundation would not have my name on it, it would have a name indicating what it does, to make it harder for weasels to try to change the purpose.

7

Tens of millions of dollars for my family and relatives, the rest all divided among a hundred or more different charities, Christian schools, political groups, etc.

8

Anybody I want to have money already has it.

The rest of the money is in one or many trusts in support of other projects I started (the aquaculture farm–goes to my son, the ad-free FM radio station–goes to my youngest daughter, the animal rescue farm–goes t my wife, etc.). My death affects nothing apart from my influence. I have no right to affect the world after I leave it–if the projects are liquidated then so be it.

9

This. If I somehow manage to accumulate that much money it’ll be distributed long before I pass away. I like the Bill Gates/Warren Buffett model. No need to wait until I die for my money to do good in the world.

In my case, it would be a mix of conservation, public health, and political causes.

10

A study in debauchery, hedonism, and decadence.

11

We have a living trust. After we both die the leftovers go the scholarships for military children and veterans.

12

My liquid and semiliquid assets are divided evenly between these parties

  1. My parents (they share their share)
  2. Each sibling I have gets a share.
  3. My aunt that lives in town gets a share.
  4. My one and only friend gets a share.

(I’m single, childless, and have only one friend. I’m assuming that won’t change if I’m rich. I base my assumption on the fact that I’m so unappealing as a person that nobody will start liking me just because I have money. History to date supports this assumption.)

If my parents both die before I do, their share evaporates, leaving more to the others.
If any of my siblings, aunt, or friend die before I do, their share shifts to their current spouse, if any. If they have no surviving spouse, then their share will be subdivided evenly among their surviving adult first-generation children. If there are no surviving adult first generation children then their share evaporates, leaving more to the others.

If, after all this shuffling and evaporating of shares, I have no surviving adult relatives, then fuck it, the entire pile goes in trust to the eldest descendant of any of my siblings, who gets it all upon reaching legal adulthood. If my siblings somehow had no surviving descendants (I think I’m up to about to about fifteen nieces/nephews now), then the eldest surviving descendant of my aunt gets it. Failing that, my friend. Failing that (how the hell did I outlive them all?) - presuming there’s any government left, they get it all. If there is no government left, -can I stop handling corner cases yet? I’m a computer programmer; I don’t know when to stop on my own.

Anyway.

All my physical assets are considered to be a single unit, which will be granted to a single beneficiary as follows: All the people who get a share of my money get to decide among themselves who gets it. They have a month to decide. The decision must be unanimous, and delivered to my lawyer in the form a notarized document signed by all parties (one signature per above share). If no such document is delivered within a month then all physical assets will be liquidated and their value will be distributed evenly in the same manner described above.

The person who gets all the physical assets (if anyone does) may, if they choose, give away any or all of those assets to other family members of their choosing, or to anyone else for that matter. This is not the business of my will or my lawyer; the stuff is theirs; they can do with it what they will.

13

My wife’s and my wills would basically do the same thing:

  1. Whichever of us survived the other, would get the whole pile.

  2. When the survivor died:

a) Surviving relatives of my generation and older would get $1M each to ensure a comfortable retirement.

b) The Firebug would get an annuity of $25K/year, payable monthly, adjusted for inflation over time.

c) A trust fund would be set up for the Firebug to pay for up to five years’ tuition, room, and board at an undergraduate institution, and up to five years’ graduate/professional school tuition. It would be funded well in excess of the amounts necessary to pay for these things. Anything left over at his fortieth birthday would go to a designated charity.

d) The rest would go to charity.

The deal with the Firebug is, he’d never starve, but if he wanted to be affluent, he’d have to earn it. No Eric Trumps in my family, thanks.

14

Partner gets it all.
If partner is gone, there is a circle of friends and family that would get something about $2millionish. Enough to allow a comfortable and pleasant retirement.
The rest to a handful of favorite charities.

It’s all going to be very clear and precise. I’ve seen to many families that end up hating each other because 1) He got more than me, or 2) He took the china (which I hated but it’s MINE)

15

one way trip to…

16

In general terms…divvied up between worthy causes, jokes, and spite. Some these will overlap.

Plus, an allotment to construct an appropriate tomb to hold my mummified remains and my most precious worldly treasures in comfort and security for the next few thousand years.

17

Stolen! :slight_smile:

For myself, such wealth means that I will be in control of the lives of tens of thousands of employees. So I will want to ensure the exercise of good governance of the companies I control. A friend of mine - of much lesser wealth - failed to do this and the company he left was quickly ruined. Describing how to achieve this is beyond my knowledge; I just know that I would do it.

Beyond that I will want to set up a store of wealth for my family that will last generations. Enough to survive a duffer or two.

There will be charitable bequests.

18

If my mother is still alive I’d be sure she was provided for after my death. All the best medical care and/or retirement facility, sparing no expense.

I’d settle a million dollars on each of my nephews, maybe more if they or their children(if and when) have a disability.

The rest would go to favorite local charities, my church, and other favored local groups. There’s the Humane Society, the public library, the zoo, the Cat Association, aid to local medical help groups, and so on. Oh, an an endowment to the little cemetery, way out in the country, where I will be buried.

19

All of my wealth will go to fund a foundation whose sole purpose will be to figure out a way to bring me back to life.

20

Set up a trust for family, maybe put 50-100 million in it.

Terms of the trust is every living relative gets $100,000 a year. Limited to 3 kids per family to avoid any one family pumping out kids for the checks.

I figure that’ll keep family in a middle class lifestyle for at least 6 generations.

The rest gets donated to neuroscience research. If I were a billionaire I’d match Paul Allen in investments in neuroscience.