Democracy Dies in Darkness

Dividing assets in your will can split siblings. Here’s how.

You aren’t entitled to other people’s money, even your parents’ assets.

5 min
(Illustration by Kat Brooks/The Washington Post; iStock)
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On occasion, I’ll be revisiting and updating past columns with the most universal financial advice. This column originally ran Dec. 6, 2016.

An inheritance is a gift, not a right.

To potential heirs, I often give this advice: You aren’t entitled to other people’s money, even your parents’ assets. Equality is sometimes not fair. But for the sake of peace, fairness may mean an equal distribution.

This opinion has elicited so much feedback that I thought I’d share some of the comments from readers who have urged me to reconsider my view that parents have no obligation to leave anything to their adult children.

“Discovering that you are being treated very differently than your siblings is a wrenching experience,” one reader wrote.

Another said: “I have dissected, investigated, and lived the horror of disinheritance. The blow from the grave was stunning.”

I’ve heard from people who say their parents doled out money to irresponsible adult children, essentially squandering the inheritance they would have received.

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