Lawyers Who Write Wills Are Sharing The 40 Weirdest And Craziest Requests Their Clients Have Made

A furby collection from models collected in the late 90’s. They were convinced they would retain future value.

This was 2011.

My grandfather left me $1.00, he had dementia and confused my dad ripping him off with me. He left the rest of the family between $100,000 And a few million each.
They all said they felt horrible because they knew the details, but not horrible enough to give up any of their share.
The way I see it is it was never my money to begin with, so it's not a loss. I'm just glad my sister got a hundred thousand,she needed it more than any of the others.

My friends mother had in her will “that cat gets to live in my house alone until it expires” the cat lived there for a few years alone with a caregiver checking on it. Yes she was rich.

Had a friend who had a toxic relationship with his uncle. When his uncle passed he was surprised to find he was in the will. Turns out there was a handwritten IOU that read “I’m leaving you 15k BUT you have to come get it from me. I’ll see you in hell!” My friend laughed.

Here’s one from one of my dad’s law partners. He had a lady come in with an itemized list of books and wanted her will to contain all of the books and who will get what based on her choosing. So basically she decides who gets what specific book instead of letting her beneficiaries decide. The truly astonishing thing is how many books and how specific they get. According to dad’s law partner her list is at about 2,000 books to be divided among about 30 people. She is apparently very specific and comes back at least once a year to add all the new books she’s gotten.

My dad told me this about when my grandpa set up his will.
Basically, he first wanted to discuss the "who gets what" with his family first before putting it into writing. Smart, because that can nip a lot of issues later on in the butt.
So, my grandpa is sitting down with his two sons, discussing who gets what. And my mother and my aunt are there, and they're having a lot of ideas on how to split everything, whether item A is equal to monetary value B, and, most importantly, what their respective part of the family could do with what item/possession.
At some point, my grandpa had enough. He told the wives to leave the room because "hey, quit arguing about my stuff and money like that. I am not dead yet!".
But the most poignant thing he said was that he was dividing his earthly possession up between his sons. Not their wifes, not his grandchildren. He had two sons, and they would get the lions share.
There were provisions in there for individual items that he would ask people about. Do you want this? Would that thing make you happy? Could you use X? And he put aside certain monies to be divied up between the grandchildren, cousins, etc.
But he was very firm on who gets what and he communicated it very clearly. This is my stuff. I decide. And the only imput I value is by the two people I've known all their lives.
Well, he died and everyone was informed and knew what to expect.
My grandma is still alive. Years ago, around the same time that will was being drafted, she decided that most of her most valuable possessions should be similiarly taken care of.
She labeled all her jewelery. Put them in those little plastic bags that you freeze stuff in, because the bags my grandma uses for that have little labels on them that you can write on. Made the whole thing easy.
And then she eventually decided "why wait" and distributed them as gifts. She was getting up there, and she pretty much never had occassion to wear jewelery any more except for one or two beloved items.
I feel that there is an important lesson here: Deal with this kind of stuff early, communicate clearly, preferably when everyone involved is actually there, live. Everyone witnesses it and can't deny it later.
Not that there was any danger of that happening in my family, I think.
But I guess my grandparents knew: Inheritance, and money in general, can rip families apart. And if you want to curb that risk, no matter how insignificant it may seem, you gotta address the problem head on. You cannot hide from the problems caused by your death, just like can't hide from death itself.
Peace of mind, and a family not at risk of engaging in litigation against each other, is worth some time and effort.

I had the first son so my dad decided to leave me more. Except he did the math wrong and it came out to 105%. He had dementia.

Not a lawyer but my grandpa put in his will a chocolate bar for everyone one of his grand kids. Well I have like 12 cousins and very difficult to track down where a couple of them went. All this estates and money he had in will was at a stand still for months because they couldn’t find my couple cousins. Had to show court we put in effort to hire someone to track them down etc. The lawyer that was helping execute the Will was blown away that this lawyer allowed this and why he wouldn’t highly suggest not to do it. But I’m not complaining cause I got a Toblerone out of the deal!

Had a very attractive woman with terminal cancer try to get herself stuffed by a taxidermist and given to some rich guy that had been basically a sugar daddy to her for a few months. She said "He would give me a million dollar a week allowance as long as it was in an official will that he could see." I sent her to a lawyer who I knew that would do about anything for a buck because I didn't want to end up in the news when she died. That was 2 years ago, no clue what happened to her.

When my great grandad died in his will he stated that his coin collection be split equally across his family. There was like 8-9 of us and 3 potato sacks full of coins. So we all gathered round a table and each took one coin each until nothing was left. Among the coins was an Iron Cross, which was quiet odd as the only person on that side of the family that went to war was his dad, and he served with the ANZAC’s in WW1.

I research land and often go through wills to determine ownership of property.

“To my wife I leave a length of rope long enough to hang herself.”

My father is heavily involved in my great aunt and uncle's lives since their health has begun to decline (both mid 90's with no children), and has seen their will.
They have a small fortune (in excess of £1,000,000), and have left it all to a local dog's home.
When he asked them about it, my great uncle's response was "nobody has helped me in life, so I won't be helping anybody either."

I'm not a lawyer, but my grandfather saved his kidney stone so that he could leave it to my cousin. They never really got along.

In my Mums will, which I have seen, she has left me the kitchen table and chairs.

She lives on a South Manchester council estate.

My brother gets the sideboard.

I’m the executor of my grandmother’s will. I also get the house and everything in it and a share of life insurance that’s split three ways between myself, sister, and mom. My mom has always said that all my dad , my grandmothers son-in-law, would like to have is some table. Well in the will there’s like a whole paragraph that states how my dad gets nothing, he doesn’t lay a finger on any thing in the house or any money. How my dad is basically worthless and deserves nothing and how he was a c**p dad and that she begrudgingly has my mom in the will. Thanks grandma I’ll appreciate the awkwardness.

My grandfather has in his will to say “hi so-n-so.” Just so he can say that he mentioned that person in his will. He tells lots of people in the family that they are ‘in his will.’ It’s a joke that only he thinks is funny and he won’t be around for the punch line. I think it’s brilliant. He has about 10 people mentioned.

Client wanted her ashes spread at the restaurant (on the beach) where she met her husband.

Lawyer here. Probably the woman who wanted to gift the frozen semen of her dead dog.

My wife has clear instructions to use some of my life insurance to buy a dilapidated house out in the countryside, tie my corpse to a chair, and throw a raging party in my honor inside.

Afterwards, when everyone is good and hammered, douse me in accelerant and burn the house to the ground with me still inside. Party ain't over till the house (and me) is no more.

Lady wanted her small dog to be buried with her. If the dog happened to be alive when the lady passed, she wanted the dog put down and then join her.