It has been said before, but it bears repeating: You do not do your families any favor if they are surprised by the details of your estate plan after you pass away. It quite often leads to problems between family members. The high-profile example of this comes from Nigeria.
Leader, Dim Emeka Odumego-Ojukwu passed away and his Will was read aloud. He left most of his property to his wife, Bianca, who is the Nigerian ambassador to Spain. That might not seem all that surprising to most people, but it certainly surprised his sons. He did not even mention his oldest son in the Will. Another son has declared the Will to be a fake and says that he is in possession of the real Will. Even more surprising, is that the Will revealed a son that the rest of the family did not know about. What is not a surprise is various family members are considering litigation.
Your estate is yours to do with as you want. However, you should be careful to make sure that your family is not taken completely by surprise. If there is something that you do not tell your family about beforehand, then make sure that you do leave some kind of explanation why you did what did.
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