Personal Finance

My sister manipulated my mom to pay off her $33k credit card debt before she died. How can I deduct that from her inheritance?

Maurie Backman

Published: January 13, 2025 11:38 am

Key Points from 24/7 Wall St.

• When parents give financial assistance to one sibling and not another, things can get tricky.
• It’s best to have honest discussions about money and inheritances to avoid conflict and ill will.
• It’s a good idea to work with outside professionals to handle money matters.
• Retiring early is possible, and may be easier than you think. Click here now to see if you’re ahead, or behind. ^(Sponsor)

It’s pretty tricky for parents to treat their children as exact equals when it comes to financial assistance. A parent might, for example, throw one adult child $100 in a pinch and forget about it, or help another child cover a bill or two during a period of unemployment.

But when a parent assists one child financially to a large degree and a remaining sibling gets no help at all, it can quickly escalate into a problematic situation. Such is the scenario this Reddit poster is dealing with.

Before their mother died, she paid off their sister’s credit card to the tune of $33,000. And now, the poster wants to deduct that amount from their sister’s inheritance, which they feel is the fair thing to do.

As a joint account holder with their deceased mother, the poster controls the estate. There’s no will and no executor, so it’s all in their hands.

The total value of their mother’s estate is $114,000, and the sister owes $14,000 to the estate on top of the $33,000 in financial assistance she received. So the poster feels these amounts should be withheld from their sister’s inheritance to make things fair.

However, they’re certain their sister will not react well to this news. And they’re probably right.

How to avoid financial conflicts with family

I truly feel for the poster here. They don’t want to screw their sister over, as they say, but they also don’t have a particularly good relationship with her and say she’s a volatile person.

The poster should not have to lose out on money because their sister couldn’t get her act together and needed the mother’s help. On the other hand, because there’s no will, it’s hard to know what the mother’s intentions were. Maybe the mother would’ve wanted her remaining estate to be split evenly among her two children despite having helped the sister with $33,000 worth of credit card bills.

That’s why, in these situations, the best bet is to have open, honest conversations. What I wish the poster would’ve done is sat down with their sister and mother before her passing and been up front about their feelings.

Had they said, “Mom, you gave her $33,000 in assistance to pay off credit cards, so I think that should come out of her inheritance,” this perhaps wouldn’t be an issue for them now if the mom would’ve said, “Yes, absolutely.”

Instead, there’s a gray area because it’s not clear what the mom’s intentions were. And the sister could make the argument that the $33,000 was meant as a gift outside of her inheritance.

It’s a good thing to seek outside help

At this point, I’m not sure what the original poster should do. If they split the inheritance evenly, they lose out financially. If they don’t, they risk a world of backlash.

One option is to sit down with a financial advisor and see if they have any suggestions. It could also be a good idea to consult an estate-planning attorney to see what rights they have.

But for anyone else in a similar boat, my advice is to not let things get to that point. Rather, put a game plan in place that everyone is on board with before a parent passes away. And talk about inheritances and financial assistance openly instead of making it a taboo topic. Getting everyone on the same page could help keep things equitable from a financial standpoint while saving important relationships from souring.