One of the reasons to invest is to build up assets, and enjoy the wealth the assets to pay for whatever lifestyle you want to live. Eventually everyone passes away and everyone leaves an estate. Some estates are not enough to change your lifestyle, some estates will change your lifestyle whether you want it or not and some estates automatically change your lifestyle. In the movie My Fair Lady, the father of Eliza Doolittle inherits money and his lifestyle changes from being a dustman – by its nature a dirty job, but one he enjoys to wearing a suit and tie, needing to marry and manage his finances respectability.

The England the wealthy tend to have titles such as Lord and Honorable, and it is relatively easy to become a Lord if you have money. Buy into it, and have the King appoint you a Lord of some plot of land. The wealthy in England tend to have large estates and homes, which makes it easier to tell who is really wealthy and who is not.

In a book written by Laura Thompson called Heiresses – The Lives of Million Dollar Babies, published by St. Martin’s Press, NY, 2021, she writes about the woman who inherited wealth, what kinds of lives did they live?

There is always a cross section – some were involved in the party scene which lavish parties – originally they had champagne and alcohol but gradually move to hard drugs; some funded charitable events; some influence world affairs, some married for a wide variety of reasons. They were similar to what most people do, but on a higher monetary scale.

For generations, it was the oldest male heir which were inherited and this was written into the law of the land. It has only been the last hundred years or so where change took place. Many of the women who inherited needed a husband to be respectable in society. In our society, we often read about billionaires, there are many people who want to marry a billionaire and there are dating sites for them. The billionaire often has to ask – is the person interested in me or my money? It is the same for the women in the book – is the person interested in me or my money? and if my money what would they do with it?

Linking to dividend paying stocks, as you ensure your estate will be large for your heirs, sometimes this will be the best thing in the world you can do and sometimes they might wonder if they had a little less money, but not much less money. Whoever you leave the money to, their values will show, it the meantime it is better to have money than not to have it as it changes the stress level of life.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.