Written

For

The

Australian

-

Inheritance

battles:

stepchildren

face

hurdles

in

will

contests

What happens when your dad remarries, promises you'll be looked after, then dies leaving everything to his new wife — who later cuts you out of her will? In my experience, it happens more often than you'd think, and stepchildren are frequently left with little to no legal recourse.

Blended families are one of the trickiest areas in estate planning, and I explored this in depth with two lawyers who see the fallout regularly. The core problem is timing. Most disputes don't erupt when the first spouse dies — they explode later, when the surviving step-parent quietly rewrites their will. Under NSW law, stepchildren can only contest that later will if they lived with and were dependent on the step-parent. For adult children from a first marriage, that's usually a dead end.

So what can you actually do? A few strategies stand out to me. Mutual wills are a binding agreement between spouses not to change the terms after one dies — and if the survivor tries, cut-out beneficiaries can enforce the original deal in the Supreme Court. Useful, but not bulletproof. Nothing stops a surviving spouse from slowly draining a super account or gifting money away while alive.

The family home is often the bigger lever. Check whether it's held as "joint tenants" or "tenants in common" — they sound almost identical but produce completely different outcomes. Joint tenancy automatically shifts ownership to the survivor, bypassing the will entirely. Tenants in common lets each owner pass their share through their estate.

For more sophisticated planning, a life interest — or a portable "Crisp order" version that allows downsizing or a move into aged care — can give the surviving spouse security while protecting the eventual inheritance for children from a previous relationship.

My blunt view: if you've got a blended family, a DIY will kit from the post office is asking for trouble. Get proper advice while you still have full capacity — because your kids will be the ones left picking up the pieces.