To put it mildly: The financial future for millennials looks rocky. The vast majority of millennials fear that house owners will be impossible for them.
The Resolution Foundation is a think tank that aims to improve families’ standard of life. They believe there are good things in the future. According to a Foundation report, PS11 trillion worth of wealth was found in the hands of the older baby boomer generation. Inheritance is expected to be hugely beneficial for millennials.
In a recent family case, the issue of inheritance was the main focus (Hayat Alireza and Hossam Radwan [2017] EWCA Cit 1545). The husband was a wealthy man with a net worth of approximately PS16 million, most of which he had inherited from his father. The wife, however, had very few assets. However, the High Court Judge determined that the future inheritance prospects of the wife from her wealthy father were significant and certain due to forced heirship rules from Saudi Arabia. Therefore, her financial needs arising out of the marriage were limited. The wife was therefore granted a limited right to live in a London flat owned by her husband until either the children are grown up or she marries again. She was granted a capitalized maintenance grant to cover her income and maintenance for the children. However, she didn’t receive any property or money to purchase a home.
This approach was not supported by the Court of Appeal. The Court of Appeal ruled that the future inheritance opportunities of the wife did not reduce the financial claims she had from her marriage. Her husband was obligated to provide enough funds for her to purchase a home for her children and her. They noticed that leaving her future in the hands of several men (her husband and then a future husband of the father) was uncomfortably in line with current mores. This had a significant impact on her autonomy, as opposed to her husband, who had already remarried and begun a second family.
In divorce cases, inheritance and other issues such as parental support and family finances are becoming more common. Case law has shown that other third parties, such as siblings and trustees, are often being involved in disputes to try to protect or attack assets. Recent case law shows that the family court is continuing to be more strict in determining the availability of trust assets to meet the needs of the beneficiaries (than inheritance or parental largesse), particularly if the spouse expects to benefit. The historical distribution patterns and likely future actions by the trustees are persuasive evidence factors. As inheritance becomes a larger proportion of family wealth the court approach to divorce is likely to change.
It is not surprising that inheritance planning is becoming more complicated in light of the possibility of divorce. This is already a thorny enough issue for those fortunate enough to have wealth to pass onto the next generation; one predictable consequence of this development is the notable increase in the requirement by the senior generation and trustees for their offspring/beneficiaries to have pre-nuptial or post-nuptial agreements as part of their prudent estate planning.
There is also the less dynastically-minded approach, which Sting, who famously declared in 2014 that he didn’t intend to leave anything to any of his six children because he was too busy spending it now, and Bill Gates, who has stated in the past that he would not be able to leave his kid’s huge amounts of money as it would be unfair. The vast majority of millennials rely on the older generational gratuity for their long-term housing needs. While case best divorce lawyer surrey bc shows that the family court will consider the provenance of wealth in deciding which assets should be divided between spouses during divorce proceedings, it is clear that the court will seek to ensure that each spouse’s financial needs are met.
