When one spouse inherits

[xux42]

Bit of an odd place to post this but this is one of those topics that yield a lot of annoyingly irrelevant links if you try to google it.
My question is this - if a husband or wife inherits and they are happily married then does the money go into the marital 'pot'?
I have tried in vain to research this but almost all the online advice is divorce related and does not address this thorny question - "That's great love, you've inherited £50k, now what shall we do with it?

I ask because whilst I have been the major breadwinner for 25 years, mrs xux is the one in line for a substantial inheritance. Now I know her well (obviously) and discussing this without being certain of the facts is guaranteed to end in a row. If I am entitled to half I'd like us to both to know the score before it happens. If its all hers then fine I'll just put it down to one of life's injustices. If it must be shared I want to talk it over now because I'm pretty sure she thinks it will all be hers and will go completely apesh*t if she finds out the truth immediately after losing her surviving parent. Please understand she is not a bad or vindictive person, just very volatile and prone to making assumptions based on hmmm how can I put this? - how she thinks things should be.

I won't pretend that there isn't an element of avarice here but I can also honestly say that I'm worried that if she had control of all the money she'd probably screw up in some well meaning but ultimately doomed property venture. Which would be a shame. Or pressurise me into a house upgrade with all the moving costs andbigger ongoing bills that entails which would really piss me off. Being excessively boring I'd rather pay off our boys' student loans and/or shore up our retirement funds.

On the fairness topic - attempting to research this led me into many divorce sites and its pretty distressing stuff. Sorry if this sound sexist but the very strong impression is that the starting point is that the more 'dependent' spouse, usually the wife, is automatically entitled to at least half of housing equity, investments, pension rights but often gets to keep 100% of things like recent inheritance and expensive jewellery given as a gift from the partner etc. Strong impression of 'weighting' but maybe its just my lack of knowledge of the legalities.
There also seems to be a lot of vague 'it depends' calls that must enable lawyers to drag things out and inflate their fees...

[hyperD]

Well, welcome to the world of modern matrimonial law and its peculiarity since the White vs White case in 2001.

If your marriage is considered a long term one i.e. 8+ years then everything you and your wife have owned or bought into the marriage beforehand is considered the “pot” and the judge will consider all assets as a 50:50 split between you and your wife, regardless of the breadwinner's contribution.

Despite your protestations to the judge and barrister about “fairness”, what you bought into the marriage and the other terms of unequal assets, it is immaterial: it is a simple 50:50 split.

If you have children, you may find your 50% share is significantly reduced.

If you are looking at assets of around £100,000 or less then simply take the hit. If you are looking at millions, it may be worth hiring a barrister at £2,000/day or more to fight over the intricacies and ambiguities of the law to gain a slight advantage.

Recent fiscal acquisitions in a marriage have to be big enough to make it worthwhile to pursue to take a bigger cut, but in reality, unless you are Paul McCartney fighting over a gold plated prosthetic gold digger, you won’t have the money to fight it.

Speaking purely from my own bitter experience.

Also, the lawyers always win. Everytime.