My husband and I are worth more than $1 million, but we can’t stop fighting over who will inherit. How do we decide?

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Dear For Love & Money,

I have been married for eight years. This is my husband’s first legal marriage and my third. I have one child, and he has one sister.

All our assets combined hold a value of about $1.25 million. We have zero debt and have paid off our house. We tried doing a will online, and it was a mess.

We constantly fight about dividing the estate between his sister (who is wealthier than us and does not need the money) and my daughter, who is married and has two children. I suggested leaving his sister $50,000 as a gesture. We got nowhere.

If we both die at the same time, does his sister have a claim to 50% of the estate?

Sincerely,

Playing the Odds

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Dear Playing the Odds,

If you both die at the same time without a will, your estate will be frozen and combed through, and no one will get the money for a very long time. When the money is finally released, his sister will have a claim to it, although your daughter will likely take precedence.

However, there are no guarantees on how these things will work out. You asked what would happen if you die at the same time, but what if you don’t? What if you go first? Your husband would get the money and be under no obligation to leave anything to your daughter and grandchildren.

Your best option is to find a compromise and write a will. You mentioned trying to write a will yourself with an online template, which I understand can feel less daunting and expensive than hiring an estate planner. Still, you have considerable assets to leave. Hire an estate planning attorney. The peace of mind that will come with putting this arduous and complex task into their capable hands will be worth every penny.

Before you make an appointment with a professional, you’ll want to ensure you aren’t just hiring someone to witness you and your husband go 12 rounds over his sister and your daughter’s shares. So first, you must reach a compromise. You said he wasn’t impressed with your suggestion to leave his sister $50,000, but you didn’t mention how much he wants to leave her. I will assume he wants to divide it between the two women equally, which you don’t agree with due to need.

Your husband’s resistance to leaving the bulk of your shared estate to your daughter, despite his sister’s lack of need, makes me think the issue isn’t about who will get the money later but who it belongs to now — you or him.

We are taught from infancy to share and that sharing is as simple as drawing a line down the middle or taking an equal amount of turns. The truth about sharing, though, is that 50/50 division undermines the sense of total autonomy that comes with ownership. The feeling of independence is a zero-sum game. You either answer to someone or you don’t.

Due to this, the compromise partnership demands of us rarely feels like a win/win. Instead, it feels like what it is: giving up part of what we want, an emotional admission that the decision we’re arguing over was never ours alone to make. So, all too often, we try to outrun this admission by fighting to get our way over our partner’s. We’ll even throw our opponents a bone (or $50,000) here and there to entice them to let us win.

The only way these conflicts can resolve outside of everlasting gridlock or separation is to recognize that the triumph you feel after compromising isn’t achieved by mostly getting your way; it’s from recognizing that you and your partner overcame your self-interests and achieved a solution that was best for your marriage, not for yourselves.

This means you must accept that your daughter’s needs and his sister’s lack of need have little to do with reaching a fair compromise with your husband. A fair compromise must reflect your estate’s dual ownership: drawing a line down the middle with each of your beneficiaries getting half.

If you are willing to make such a huge concession, your husband may feel inspired to do the same. Having been reassured that you understand half the estate belongs to him, he might have more clarity around questions of need. Perhaps he’ll be more open to ideas like splitting the money between your daughter and his sister, but leaving the house to your daughter.

You signed your letter “Playing the Odds”, and I wonder if you were referring to rolling the dice on your daughter’s future by counting on outliving your spouse. Even if you take my advice and set up a will that divides your estate evenly between your sister-in-law and daughter, your daughter’s future doesn’t have to be a gamble. You can set up financial supports for your daughter and grandchildren while you’re still alive. Open trust funds in their names, set up 529 plans for your grandchildren’s college tuitions, and look for other ways to put them on the road toward future success now, with or without a million-dollar inheritance waiting in the wings.

I always say that the most challenging part of marriage is sharing a life. It may sound simple, but doing it is anything but. It means giving up half of your agenda in favor of another’s, and this requires faith. Faith that when you give your spouse half of everything, they will do the same — an even trade.

Rooting for you,

For Love & Money