What’s wrong with planning a once-in-a-lifetime holiday? Or dreaming of buying your first home? Nothing, of course – unless it hinges on the death of your elderly mother. Increasingly, it seems, many people’s future plans depend on such family tragedies. The sorrow of losing a loved one, soothed by an inheritance pay cheque.

Friends speak openly about moving into a bigger house once their inheritance ‘comes through’

There is something unpalatable about the idea of using a deceased relative’s estate to repay a loan you chose to borrow, or finally booking the cruise that has been sitting in your Tui basket since your father’s first dose of chemo. But more troubling still is the revelation that people are planning to rely on their presumed inheritance to improve their quality of life. In other words, they are already imagining what kind of life upgrade they will purchase following the death of a family member.

My first encounter with this way of thinking came during my father’s illness earlier this year, when I ran into a former classmate and told him about dad’s diagnosis. Like any decent person, he sympathised, but before I could thank him, he’d pivoted to a silver lining of the most peculiar kind: ‘What were our plans for Dad’s car?’ Seeing my bewilderment, he hurried to explain that he already had a promise of inheriting his mother’s SUV. He intended to sell it and use the money to trade in his own car for something........

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