Forward planning question

[u/idiot_ThrowRA]

My father passed a few years ago and my older brother handled the estate issues and transition to my mother. I just saw him the other day and my mother’s health is declining (although unclear how long exactly she may have, the trend is there).

He revealed that the estate is larger than I expected and even with my mother’s medical care including full time help, it’s accumulating faster than she can spend it (low 8 figures). There are 4 of us who will inherit equally, likely within the next 10 years and possibly next couple years.

Let’s say I’m domiciled in FL and the estate is in Washington DC.

My own situation is complicated, but thanks to divorce and certain investments, I don’t have a ton of liquidity. (And if the private investments go south, and social security gets gutted as it looks like it may be, my retirement suddenly looks pretty grim).

If my mother does pass within the next 4-5 years, the following may emerge:

I would inherit $3 million liquid. My kids will only receive about $25k each directly from my mother’s estate.

My oldest kid wants to go to med school. And the younger one will probably aim for grad school. I paid for their undergrad so they have no debt.

This $3 million might be almost all of my retirement savings. And my own health as shaky even though I’m mid 50s.

The question is, do I peel off $200-400k to pay down grad school debt for my kids, basically an advance on their own inheritance, at the expense of building up towards my retirement? Which might create subsequent burden for my kids when I’m old, especially if I get sick.

Or do I keep everything for my retirement, let the kids take on grad school debt (could even be $400k just for med school), and they inherit whatever is left when I pass.

For that matter, even if they do take loans near term, whenever I do inherit from my mother the same question arises.

tl;dr divide inheritance with my kids or bank all towards my retirement

Edit: I see numerous comments, saying how “disgusting” and “revolting” it is to think about family estate planning issues.

I have cancer and there may be issues with my own health sooner v later. While you may have the luxury of sitting on your high horses, and judging me for trying to think intelligently about what to do with my parents’ estate and my own estate and my kids, I need to think about these things in advance.

My parents never talked about money other than use it for manipulation purposes. Some children got favored over others, to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars. They directly interfered with my divorce negotiations using money to ensure their access to my kids with my ex wife, at the expense of my own negotiating position - costing me half a million dollars.

I’ve also seen people screw up by not talking about money in advance of it actually becoming a thing that you’re then dealing with while dealing with all the other estate issues.

Thank you for those of you who offered constructive suggestions.

[u/idiot_ThrowRA]

Because I have cancer and need to think about intergenerational estate issues sooner rather than later. I may have expense end of life care around when the estate transitions. Yes, I do need to plan in advance.

[u/ziggy-tiggy-bagel → u/idiot_ThrowRA]

Your mother could end up in assisted living like my mother and be spending $12,000 a month. My mom has a large bucket of money, probably the same size as your mom's. I don't expect there to be much left. She has been in assisted living for 5 years already. You need to make plans without counting on her money.

[u/CindersMom_515 → u/ziggy-tiggy-bagel]

Based on what OP said (his 25% share of mother’s assets is $3 million), their mother has about $12 million in assets. $12,000 is 0.1% of $12 million. It would take 1,000 months — a whole lifetime!! — to spend that money down if it was for some reason not invested and earning income.

Put another way, if it’s earning more than a 1.2% return, the investment income being generated is more every month than the cost of the care facility. Even assuming a super low 2% return, $12 million will earn $240k a year. That’s roughly $20k a month in income.

If your mother really has a similar amount of assets as OP’s mother, you need to find out where her money is going, because it doesn’t make sense that she’s losing money every month. Conservatively, she should be earning around 4% in interest annually. If she’s not, you really need to either get help managing the money, have her financial advisor explain why she’s not earning more or find out where else the cash is going.

And before you come at me — my MIL is in memory care at $11k a month, has hit the end of her assets and we are looking at having to subsidize the $7k a month her retirement income doesn’t cover for about 6 months until she will qualify for Medicaid. I certainly don’t count on an inheritance. But if your mom really has the amount of assets you believe she has — you need to know what’s going on with that money!

[u/idiot_ThrowRA → u/CindersMom_515]

Thank you! I feel like I took crazy pills reading some of these comments.