AARP Hearing Center
Leaving your children an inheritance seems like a blessing, but it can also be a curse. Just ask Rupert Murdoch, 93, who's feuding with his kids over who will gain control of his media empire after he dies.
But not all families are in the same position as the Murdochs. While cold-hard cash is almost always welcome, surprisingly there are some seemingly valuable assets that your offspring may not be interested in inheriting.
This is true, in particular, if the items you’re handing down require a lot of effort to take possession of or extract value from, not to mention a lot of money to maintain or space to store. Sure, your kids may appreciate the thought, but if an asset being inherited is too hard to hold on to or easily sell, it could cause more hassle and expense that it's worth.
Jean-Luc Bourdon, founder and wealth adviser at Lucent Wealth Planning, once had a client who inherited an exotic car but didn’t know what to sell it for or whom to turn to for help. Instead of unlocking the value, the vehicle gathered dust in the garage. “When it’s an asset people don’t understand, it’s very difficult,” he says. The same goes for expensive furniture and collectibles that take up space but are hard to get rid of.
“The most common assets [kids don’t want] have some type of obligation attached to them to maintain value,” says Joseph McNair, a certified financial planner at WA Asset Management. “The closer to cash the assets are, the less cumbersome they are.”
Most heirs aren’t going to turn down money, but there are a handful of possessions they may not want that may surprise you, including these four.
