(Removed)

[less4success]

(Removed)

[Glenstache]

Ideas B, C, and D seem to violate treating it all as one big pot between spouses. Depending on how assets are allocated, pulling a large percentage out could present logistical and financial issues for the surviving spouse. For example, if a house were 50% of assets by value.

A parallel way to think about this is the instance in which you have kids. When one parent passes, the estate is typically not dispersed at that time.

If you do want to be able to have a pool of money to be dispersed upon passing, you may just want to set up an investment account that would be specifically for inheritance to family in the case of one spouse passing. That allows simpler planning for the surviving spouse.

[GizmoTX]

Even with combined assets and/or in a community property state, you will need separate wills, each controlling 50% of your assets.
Our wills each address the following scenarios:
First of us dies: the surviving spouse (or named SO) gets everything.
Surviving spouse dies: our now adult son gets everything. If he is not living, then our estate is handled as if both of us died together. In the future, we may revise this to name him and our respective other bequests (see both die together).
When our son was a minor, our wills named a series of guardians and financial trustees (not the same people), in case the first could not serve, and created a trust to manage his inheritance and compensate his guardian if both of us were deceased.
Both die together (within 30 days): each of us has designated our own beneficiaries for our 50% of the estate if our son is not living. These are named relatives, friends, and charities, usually by a percentage of our bequest, not a specific dollar amount. If a relative is not living, we have chosen to direct that person's share to his/her descendants if living.

Our wills essentially are the same, with the exception of the individual preferences for beneficiaries. Our executors are 1) each other, 2) our son, 3) an independent financial institution; #2 or #3 serve if #1 cannot, thus the surviving spouse still has a valid executor specified when the first dies. We also followed this serial designation for springing powers of attorney for health & financial affairs decisions.

[Villanelle]

We have it so that our money goes to the surviving spouse.  If we both die, then we have it split between family and charity (with the majority going to charity). 

We have an agreement between ourselves that the surviving spouse, when writing a new will, would keep the deceased spouse's family in mind.  We didn't get in to specifics because timelines seem very important.  If I die tomorrow and he dies in 45 years and has a new spouse in that time, what seems fair to go to my family is not the same as if he dies one year later.  I trust him enough, and him me enough, that we didn't feel it necessary to codify anything legally, or get in to specifics. 

I wouldn't want him to give money to my family immediately upon my death because this is money he could potentially still need.  I don't feel my parents/sister deserve a chunk of the stache more than he does. 

[Roadrunner53]

We are in the same boat. Married, both in our mid 60's. We have an old will that included our parents but all are deceased now. The husband has 3 siblings. Two of which there is bad blood and no contact in years. Third sibling has lots of money. The three siblings are included in the old will but each only would get a very minor inheritance amount as a token. I want to do away will all of them. So now that means we have no children and I have no siblings. We have the bulk of our estate going to animal welfare. We need to update the old will but we keep not doing anything about it. Right now, if one of us dies everything passes to the living spouse.

Who knows if there will be any money left if we have ot go to a nursing home. That will suck every penny we have.

[Boganvillia]

All of remaining estate to spouse

Family members receive cash gifts in the will. If you don't have enough liquid assets (and you don't want your spouse to have to sell assets) life insurance would work here.

[Linea_Norway]

In many countries it is usual to implement a "longest living testament". In Norway this is default when you marry.
It lets the surviving spouse use the inheritance as long as the surviving spouse lives. In practice, the inheritance is on paper divided between all relatives at the moment the first spouse dies, but not given to them. The surviving spouse may spend it freely for the remainder of the surviving spouse's life. After that it is divided to the others.

My parents had this construction. I have inherited from my father on paper in 1995 and not received anything. My mother has been able to keep living in that large house, because my brother and I cannot claim her to pay out the inheritance. An exception is if she ever marries another person.

[honeybbq]

All of remaining estate to spouse

Family members receive cash gifts in the will. If you don't have enough liquid assets (and you don't want your spouse to have to sell assets) life insurance would work here.

This.

I would hate to think that my surviving spouse would for some reason need that money and I gave it away. My primary responsibility is to my immediate partner and family. Other relatives and worthy causes are in second place to me. I would give instructions for my spouse to provide for those whom I care for in their will once I pass. But if they need the money in the meanwhile - that is up to them. This isn't legally binding of course, but this is what we are doing. I trust my spouse to respect my wishes once I'm gone, and he trusts mine. Unless it is a token amount (say less than 5% of NW) I would just leave it all to the spouse.

 

[Mr. Green]

In many states the deceased spouse cannot give assets to anyone other than the surviving spouse without that person's consent because assets are treated as ownership-in-common. Personally, I would let everything go to my spouse because you don't know what the circumstances of your death will be. What if it's a bad car accident that kills you and permanently disabled your spouse to where they would need all the money to get through life. There are just too many unknowns to prematurely give away a healthy portion of assets. Not only that, the surviving spouse may have more difficulty reproducing the assets given away because now they're only one person. In general, living life as a single costs more, per person, than as a couple. Of course the risk here is that the surviving spouse could change their will after the other partner has died but I'm comfortable with that small risk. After all, I'd be dead and not know it even happened, and the odds of that are significantly lower than the possibility of short changing my spouse for the remainder of their life.

[GizmoTX]

Each person's will should address 2 scenarios: 1) surviving spouse, 2) both die, either together or eventually. If each will only addresses the surviving spouse, the survivor no longer has an effective will -- ditto for executor & POAs for health & finances. This recently happened to my brother -- I would have thought that every competent lawyer would advise broadening the scope beyond the surviving spouse, but apparently this is not universal counsel. He is in poor health and was very upset that he no longer had working POAs, not to mention dealing with the funeral, grief, settling an estate, & immediately needing to draw up a new will & POAs.

I wouldn't have my will pay anything out to others until the surviving spouse dies & no longer needs the estate.

[iris lily]

We are married with no children. There is no way I would leave my estate to anyone other than my surviving spouse.

But that said, Our will  lists people who will inherit after our spouse is dead.

[maizefolk]

Option D can be implemented with various kinds of trusts (income belongs to the spouse, assets go to the heirs upon death with the spouse able to draw upon the assets if needed), or with a simple handshake agreement between the spouses when still living.

To me, the handshake agreement saves a lot of moving parts. The fact of the matter is, if you cannot trust your spouse to honor your wishes after you are gone there is basically no way to structure the trust where they A) really do have access to the underlying assets in times of genuine need and B) wouldn't be able to subvert the will of the trust and drain the assets if they put their mind to it.

My parents had this construction. I have inherited from my father on paper in 1995 and not received anything. My mother has been able to keep living in that large house, because my brother and I cannot claim her to pay out the inheritance. An exception is if she ever marries another person.

Your father set it up so that if you mother ever remarried in the 1/3 of a century after he died she would be kicked out of the house she lived in for decades? ... that is not how I would chose to structure my own will, but okay.

[Linea_Norway]

Your father set it up so that if you mother ever remarried in the 1/3 of a century after he died she would be kicked out of the house she lived in for decades? ... that is not how I would chose to structure my own will, but okay.

Yes, my brother and I can in that case claim our inheritance. Keep in mind that my mother as spouse inherited 1/2 + 1/3 from my father. My brother and I only 1/6 each. I think mother has now so many savings now that she could easily pay us our share without having to sell her house.

[RetiredAt63]

Obviously, things would be more complicated if the spouses don't fully trust each other, but I luckily don't have to worry about this aspect.

Part of the trust aspect is trusting the remaining spouse will actually get around to making the new will.  I know so many people where one spouse had to nag the other spouse into making wills.  I can easily imaging the reluctant spouse, as survivor, never getting around to making a new will. 

Similar situation: I knew someone who was supposed to name his daughter as his sole beneficiary in his will, as part of his divorce settlement, and he never did it.  His family only found out about it when he died young and the Quebec intestate rules said other relatives were entitled to a portion of his estate.  Note, wouldn't have happened in Ontario, financial agreements in a divorce settlement override wills, so it depends on jurisdiction.