DEAR JEANNE & LEONARD: I frequently have lunch at a sandwich shop that gives you a free sandwich after you've bought 10. If I eat there with a friend who doesn't bother with the shop's sandwich-card program, I ask the clerk to punch my card twice -- that is, to give me credit for the sandwich bought by my friend. The clerks are happy to do this, but some of my friends have given me funny looks. Am I doing something wrong?
-- Frugal Diner
DEAR FRUGAL: If one of these friends dropped a dime on the ground and didn't bother to pick it up, would you feel free to pick it up and keep it? Well, the same principle applies to what amounts to the scraps from your friends' meals. Just because they don't want them doesn't mean you're free to help yourself.
DEAR JEANNE & LEONARD: My parents have always made it a point to be even-handed with my twin brother and me. They contributed the same amount to each of our college educations. They gave each of us the same amount toward the down payment on our first houses. And Dad's will has always called for his estate to be divided 50/50 between the two of us (Mom died years ago). Now here's the problem: My brother has two children, and in recent years, Dad has begun listing one or the other of these kids as the co-owner of the certificates of deposit he buys for himself. So were something to happen to Dad, his estate would not be split 50/50; instead, my nieces would inherit his CDs, which represent at least a quarter of his wealth, and my brother and I would split the remainder. My husband and I don't have children, and I don't think this is fair. What do you suggest I do?
-- F.S.
DEAR F.S.: Adopt.
Wisecrack aside, if it remains your father's wish to be even-handed with you and your brother, then obviously he has made a mistake in putting his granddaughters' names on the CDs. Unfortunately, the only way to determine if this is the case is to bite the bullet and discuss the issue with him.
If your dad has indeed made a mistake -- if he simply failed to consider the implication of the CD registrations for his 50/50 principle -- a lawyer can tell him the easiest way to rectify the error. But prepare yourself for the possibility that, like many other doting grandparents, your father is perfectly comfortable with what he has done -- that he likes the idea of leaving some money directly to his grandchildren (while reassuring himself that the will still says 50/50), and that he is untroubled that his actions mean you'll be inheriting a significantly smaller share of his estate than will your brother and his family.
Of course it's your father's money, and he's free to leave it as he chooses. But we hope he's honest enough to see that putting your brother's children on his CDs means abandoning the 50/50 principle that he and your mother believed in for so long.
Jeanne Fleming and Leonard Schwarz are the authors of Isn't It Their Turn to Pick up the Check? Dealing With All of the Trickiest Money Problems Between Family and Friends (Free Press, 2008). Email them at
Questions@MoneyManners.net
Family on 11/25/2015