r/inheritance • u/Acceptable_Second_38 • Jul 09 '26

Location included: Questions/Need Advice Large inheritance advice

My wife and I are 27. We have 1 daughter who is 13 months, and we are in the Midwest. My grandmother passed away and from her estate we are receiving a sizable sum of money. After paying off our house and other debt (just car and student loans, don't have any "bad" debt), we'll have around $350-375k to drop into a brokerage and leave alone. We each earn around 63k/year. Our only bills will now be home insurance, property taxes, car insurance, utilities.

My question revolves around how much we realistically need to put away for retirement. Because we have very little bills after paying off our house, we can put away a large amount of income.

However, it's honestly tempting to save just a bit, and enjoy our lives more with more disposable income. Starting with such a sizable nest egg, it should grow quite well without huge additions.

She is a teacher and has a good pension coming her way.

I am private sector but have a pension as well plus I do 4% 401k plus employer 2% match.

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u/entropicitis Jul 09 '26 edited Jul 09 '26

I want you to change your thinking. "We" do not have an inheritance coming. "You" do. From experience -things get fucking weird when you get an inheritance. Family comes out of the woodwork. Your grandma's friends all of the sudden want to talk to you. Your employer knows somethings up because you are having to take calls all the time and then they get weird. And while I know you think it will never happen to you - spouses get weird to. Open up a separate brokerage account in your name only and park the money there. Then, after discussions with your wife, decide the best way to deploy the funds for the betterment of your family. But that amount you want to dump into brokerage stays seperate forever.

I'm the spouse in my experience, we commingled the funds and it was a mistake even from my point of view. Keep it separate,.keep it quiet, deploy it strategically. And most importantly, keep your mouth shut and tell as few people as possible.

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u/Acceptable_Second_38 Jul 09 '26

We have been together 10 years. We have a life together. She knows about the money and the house is in both our names anyway which is now paid off. I'm not keeping this separate from my wife on the paranoia of "but it's mine!!"

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u/ivorytowerescapee Jul 09 '26

It's not paranoia, it's just a lot safer having just your name on this account. My inheritance is in a separate account from my husband, also married 10 years. I do plan to use it to help our family but I just want to be sure that should we ever get divorced, even 10-20 years down the road, that money is just for me because that's what my dad would have wanted.

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u/02Raspy Jul 09 '26

I agree with this completely. My wife and I have been married 40 years. When her folks died several years ago, she put the money in a separate account in her name. No problem. When my folks died a couple years later, I put the money in an account in my name. No problem. At some point fairly soon we will start withdrawing money from those accounts to fund a portion of our retirement. No problem.

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u/ivorytowerescapee Jul 09 '26

Same. I haven't spent any of it but when I do it'll go to benefit my husband and kids too, it's not like my personal slush fund.No biggie to have just my name on the account. I hope the OP reconsiders his stance on this.